Black Men’s Mental Health is the Next Pandemic
If you were to pause and look at the world today, you would see why a lot of black men lose sleep. This year alone we have seen the killings of black men go viral and reports of how the coronavirus has disproportionately affected black people more than any race
Peace of mind is a privilege that has not been afforded to black men before this pandemic and it’s certainly not got better during it. In June, a report by the Centre For Mental Health warned that mental health inequalities could be “exacerbated” due to the impacts of Covid-19, putting pressure on communities whose mental health was already “poorer and precarious” before it hit the UK. One of those communities has long been black British men and women: 13 years ago, psychiatrist Dr Kwame McKenzie wrote about how “Being black in Britain is bad for your mental health”.
According to counsellor Malcolm Phillips, nothing has really changed. “We were catching hell before [Covid-19], we will be catching hell after,” he says. McKenzie showed how institutional racism leads to black British men and women being heavily overrepresented in psychiatric hospitals, plus 2020’s summer of police brutality and protests means charities are warning there are more pressures on black British mental health than ever before. “We need to respond differently as a community,” added Phillips, who has spent the past 30 years developing black mental health services in London, “because the change won’t come from the system until we make it happen.”
A lot of the mental health services in the UK struggle to connect with black people, he said. “When we get ill, we need other options, places that we can trust. We can’t continually detain and unjustly target people. We know about the deaths in custody. We know their names: Roger Sylvester, Orville Blackwood, Rocky Bennett and many more. We see how black men are criminalised. And you think that we are easily going to mental health services? We need ways of accessing support long before things get that bad.”
We don’t have to look far to see this. On 4 July, European and Commonwealth relay gold medallist Bianca Williams and her partner were stopped by the police while driving a Mercedes in Maida Vale, London. They were handcuffed as the car was searched for weapons while their three-month-old son was in the vehicle. The search, despite raising no misconduct issues, lasted for 45 minutes. It later resulted in a police apology to the couple. If law enforcement – or education or
healthcare – continually fail to show respect to black people, why would they seek the support that they need for mental healthcare from other institutions?
In 2019, a report on loneliness by the British Red Cross called “Barriers To Belonging” asked if black people felt they were treated with less courtesy or respect than other people because of their ethnicity. The results were staggering. For black Caribbean people, 61 per cent said they did, followed by 63 per cent of mixed-race people and 65 per cent of black African people. Post-Covid-19, there are concerns that even more members of these black communities will be left behind.
During Covid-19, the lives of black men don’t seem to be that much better off. Rotimi Akinsete, author of This Book Could Help: The Men’s Head Space Manual, said that the only way this can improve is by talking about the additional pressures black men are experiencing, even when the entire nation is under the cosh.
“If you don’t have a job because the system doesn’t necessarily want specific people in [that] job, or you are at risk of losing it or you’re counted out of any possibility of employment, what kind of impact is that going to have on you as a man, who wants to provide for himself, his family and the ones he loves?” asked Akinsete. “These are some of the pressures that black men, in the West in particular, find themselves under.” If systemic racism makes even a global pandemic affect black men more, mentally as well as physically, is it any wonder black men’s mental health is looking so precarious?
THERAPY IS AN IMPORTANT TOOL, BUT THERE ARE BARRIERS OF ENTRY FOR BLACK MEN
Therapy is an important tool for navigating your emotional health, but there are barriers of entry for black men. These range from affordability to cultural stigmas such as “keeping personal problems inside of the family” – hard when some emotinal issues stem from family issues – as well as the expectation to be strong and resilient enough to not need mental health support. Phillips doesn’t think it’s the only answer, but it’s a better start than some might think. “How therapy is taught in the West, and how it’s delivered to people, is very Eurocentric, but it’s not a new thing for black people. Black people can benefit from therapy, but it’s the way it’s delivered that matters.”
Community organizations are especially important when it comes to bridging the gap. In London’s Kensington And Chelsea there is African-centred mental health support via places such as The Oremi Centre and US based BroKin- Mental Health Solutions for Men of Color. They work as advocates for black patients seeking mental health support from doctors and other professionals who may not have the cultural know-how to handle their specific needs. BroKin, run by mental health US based practitioner Dr. Ifeanyi-Allah Ufondu, is also dedicated to providing talking therapies for Black and Latino people at affordable prices by using trainee counsellors and psychotherapists. Additionally, Black Minds Matter, cofounded by Agnes Mwakatuma and Annie Nash, are collating a directory and service that connects black people with free mental health services.
“The change during Covid-19, to me, has been largely positive,” concluded Phillips. “We are developing connections with more black people across the world. It’s been far more possible for us to come together as a community, to better understand our needs.” The next step, he said, is for the way mental health support is viewed by black men to shift.
Ufondu agreed: The people in the highest levels of British healthcare are white and male, while the lower levels are non-white males. There needs to be people representative of the country in these places to provide care for disadvantaged communities. “Something needs to happen in the system. Across the board, the barriers to entry, racist policies and practices that can lead to misdiagnosing mental health issues for black people and more [need] to change,” he said. “If they don’t, all they’re doing is perpetuating the system.”
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