Naomi Osaka And The Ongoing Infantilisation Of Mental Health

Why kind-hearted over-compensation and infantilisation won’t help her or the rest of us

Let me get started by saying that this one is going to be controversial. There might be stuff in this article you disagree with and there might be stuff in this article you find doesn’t align with your worldview because of your individual circumstances.

That’s fine. You’re allowed to disagree. What’s more, you’re allowed to vociferously disagree in the comments. I encourage exactly this sort of thing because that’s what a marketplace of ideas is for. This article is not a personal attack on anyone struggling with their mental health.

No, not even you.

Mental health struggles are very difficult, subjectively for the person having them and objectively for wider society to comprehend and provide solutions.

There can be many reasons why people have poor mental health. Sometimes that is down to the individual and their genetic predispositions, sometimes it is down to the wider circumstances people find themselves in. I’d argue it may be baked into the actions of the competitive capitalist fabric we collectively weave.

We are having a mental health crisis in the West, we’ve yet to work out why and we’ve yet to solve it.

When someone breaks their leg, we take them to the hospital and it gets put in a cast. When many people break their leg walking the same route, we look for the paving slab that’s tripping them all up and remove it.

We don’t have that approach to mental health. We keep treating the symptom without addressing the underlying cause. So what is the cause?

I don’t have an answer, I think social media has a part to play, I think the decline of religious institutions and community spaces may also play a part. I’m sure the disconnect between our cerebral capacity and the amount of information we now ingest daily doesn’t help.

But I also believe in the human capacity for mass stupidity.

For that reason I think it’s becoming a ‘go-to’ for people who need a label for the part of being human they don’t like. The huge moveable feast that is the DSM means that we can generate a relevant pathology for pretty much everything.

This is troubling because I can assure you from working with children in the care process, once a label has been given it becomes very difficult to get rid of. When a mental health label forms part of your identity and becomes integral to how you’re treated — the desire to remove the label wanes.

And there are labels everywhere. You don’t need to be a psychologist to know there’s a difference between ‘sadness’ and ‘depression’ in the same way there’s a difference between ‘being a bit up-and-down’ and ‘bipolar’.

Sadness is an integral part of the human experience, being depressed is an imbalance of brain chemicals. Lots of people have started wearing faux-pathologies with pride.

Many conditions are a recent invention and it pays to remember Psychology and the study of thought itself is barely out of infancy. I’m not disputing the existence of mental illness, there is certainly enough clear evidence to suggest it’s a real and pressing problem. I retain the right to be sceptical about how we deal with that fact.

So let’s talk about the events at the French Open

What happened?

Naomi Osaka didn’t show up for a press conference after one of her matches. This was because she has anxiety and depression and doing press conferences make her anxious and/or depressed. I don’t dispute this for one second, she’s a relatively young player and seems to my eyes at least to be naturally introverted.

She’s an athlete’s athlete.

I suspect she hates doing press and I have no reason to doubt sitting in front of the press, being asked questions and being made to analyse her performance makes her feel anxious.

The French Open then fined her €15,000 for a code violation and promised to instigate further fines if she continued not to show up to the press calls. After considering her position, Osaka withdrew from the tournament citing that she would prioritise her mental health on this occasion.

And the Twitterati weighed in to slam the French Open for their shameful conduct. How dare they bully someone so young and vulnerable! Do they have no shame?

This was bullying in the first degree and the epitome of everything that’s wrong with society. I respectfully disagree. I think everyone here has behaved exactly as an adult society should and for the benefit of all. The only people left feeling aggrieved are those who advocate a ‘supportive’ approach to mental health — I think those people are mistaken.

Let me talk you through the penguin rationale for this.

Why this isn’t an issue for the French Open

Firstly, Naomi Osaka, like all tennis players, isn’t an employee of the French Open or any of the large tennis tournaments. She is a skilled freelance contractor and she would’ve signed up to a contract.

The contract often outlines what you do, when you do it and any penalties for not complying with your contract deadlines. How do I know this? I’m a freelancer. My agent negotiates contracts and I choose to sign them or I choose to not sign them.

Naomi Osaka’s job under the contract was two-fold, the same as every other player in the tournament. To play tennis and then to talk about playing tennis with the press and media. This allows the French Open and other tournaments to monetise the game and allows the press access to the players.

In short, it makes the tournament money, and some of that money goes towards the wages of the players when they win or come runner up. Without sponsorship and the coverage and access to the player, the sport would not have the profile it currently has and would attract significantly fewer players

Consider how few media obligations there are for people who do Curling. They also don’t get paid hundreds of thousands of pounds or get lucrative broom sponsorships. Or maybe they do?

What I do know is I can’t tell you the name of any single curler in the world and my country has won gold medals in the sport. Despite not being at all interested in boxing, football or uber-loud-zoomie-car racing, I can tell you the names of many participants. Why? Sponsorship and press.

So you’re saying that we should put the capitalist agenda ahead of the mental health of players? You are a horrible evil sadistic penguin. No, I’m saying there’s a conversation that needs to happen here, but vilifying one side because of perceived oppression is unhelpful.

Plus that conversation can’t happen in the middle of an ongoing tournament.

Naomi Osaka signed a contract, she was aware of the press obligations prior to signing it. When she didn’t show up to the press conference she was in breach of the contract. She was fined.

If she’d known she was going to struggle then she shouldn’t have signed the contract in the first place. Then she wouldn’t be allowed to play. Correct. Because the contracted job is twofold, playing and then talking about playing. If she is given a hard pass on the latter this gives her an unfair advantage over other players.

How?

At that elite level, the difference created by forcing one group to speak to the media while others go back to their hotel room is huge. Whether they’re unwinding, getting a massage or doing match analysis with their coach — there’s an obvious advantage to skipping press.

Given the choice I suspect ALL the players would skip press.

Why I’m pleased with Naomi Osaka’s conduct

I don’t have a problem with Naomi Osaka dropping out of the French Open. She may not have been able to predict a flare-up of her anxiety and/or depression. She may have signed the contract feeling she was capable of doing everything and she was mistaken.

That’s okay too, people are allowed to make mistakes.

Rather than soldier through, she has exited the French Open. This is a very sensible and mature thing for someone with anxiety to do. It’s also important to note that SHE made the decision. She wasn’t forced out of The Open, she chose to leave when asked to fulfil her contractual obligations.

This requires applause.

By trying to insist that the world should accommodate her at the point of her distress, many well-meaning people have missed the point. She’s an adult and capable of making her own choices.

If we insist the world bends around her then we both infantilise and disempower her. This wasn’t a failure on her part, it was a show of strength, personal autonomy and should be applauded as such.

This isn’t a you problem we say, this is a problem with the world itself… which, of course, it isn’t. In the same way that an agoraphobic’s problem isn’t actually the outside, it’s their subjective experience of the outside and their mental conceptualisation of what it represents.

She cannot do the job she has signed up to do and lacks the psychological resilience to stay the course. That’s not a bad thing. It’s a neutral thing but she’ll have to factor psychological resilience to press intrusion as she moves forward in her career.

In the world of the well-meaning kind soul, Osaka is allowed to compete and skip media appearances without punishment because this is compassionate. The French Open would accommodate her needs and bend the rules for her. They would acknowledge the distress she suffered and not be a stuffy Edwardian organisation about it.

There would be a predictable backlash.

Doing this would breed resentment from other players and coaches in the locker room. Their feelings would become known if not overtly then covertly and this would likely feed her Osaka’s anxiety, negative self-talk and feelings of isolation. It would have made her feel worse.

For the French Open to capitulate would have been a short term win at a massive long term loss. The short term win would’ve been a few games of tennis that people feel should have been played. The long term loss would’ve been a further deterioration of Osaka’s mental health.

It sounds like you’re saying we should show her no compassion at all?

Of course we should. The tennis world should have a look at the levels of press access they allow to their athletes. There are some objectively unpleasant things that tennis players are contractually obliged to do.

On the spot analysis of why they’ve lost a match, questions about their personal life or romantic relationships, discussion of injuries, personal circumstance or what happens in the locker room.

These can and should be mitigated against with particular protections offered to younger players, BIPOC player and people who have just lost a high profile match.

The four big opens should consider changing the contractual obligations and making it easier for tennis players to concentrate on the game. They could find ways of doing this that don’t cause acute distress to some or all of their players.

The whole thing might need a total overhaul.

I would suggest that Osaka and other tennis players past and present (many feel like she does) form a freelancers union and threaten to boycott future opens. They are big draws, they occupy a lot of power in the game off the court. As a lefty-liberal I’m happy for this to happen.

For Osaka, I’d be delighted.

To do this is to take control of her mental health rather than cede the responsibility to others. This is empowering, will restore a sense of self-efficacy and agency in her own life. She needs help overcoming her anxiety, she doesn’t need the world overturned on her behalf.

Not everyone experiencing a negative thing is oppressed. Removing this ‘oppression’ may inadvertently remove the capacity for growth.

What should happen next?

Naomi Osaka should take some time away and return to the game after some CBT for anxiety and some wider help. Her return may not be immediate but I suspect she has a full set of people who will empower her to find a solution to the problem at hand.

Depression is harder to fix than anxiety but neither is a life sentence with the right sort of help. She needs coping strategies to make the world feel safe rather than well-intentioned activists diving to her rescue to ensure the world is safe.

I’m very pleased she chose not to continue and play in the French Open, I’m very much of the opinion it would’ve pushed her to a crisis point. She walked away under her own steam and that must’ve been very difficult to do.

I think this demonstrates exceptional bravery rather than psychological collapse and if she doesn’t think like this, I hope someone points it out to her.

I’m also pleased that the French Open held firm in their commitment to the rules and fairness to all players (despite the backlash). Having said this, I think the French Open may wish to consider making a donation of €15,000 to the Samaritans or another mental health charity.

Doing this would show it can be a caring organisation rather than one focussing on the bottom line at all costs. They don’t need that money and neither does Osaka — the transaction can be put to public good.

I think advocates for mental health need to stop insisting upon allowances for mental health at all costs. Would we have tolerated McEnroe if he’d got a diagnosis of ADHD? Would we turn a blind eye to Nick Kyrgios’ outbursts if it turned out he had Oppositional Defiance Disorder?

The answer is no. Wider society is a shared space, we can accommodate each other’s needs up to a point — but we cannot change literal and figurative contracts on the whims of what Twitter feels. It will cause untold chaos and put vulnerable people in more psychological danger.

By insisting the world should accommodate all mental health conditions at all costs — we remove the capacity for growth. It’s a delicate balance for a society to make and one misunderstood by many kind-hearted people.

Someone with a mental health condition like depression or anxiety is often their own oppressor. There may be an outside trigger, but the triggers force unhelpful thought processes. You can either remove all the triggers — and you can read my feelings on safe-spaces here — or you can encourage people to make positive steps forward.

Altering the world to remove the triggers doesn’t make people better, it makes them more sensitive to further triggers.

Cruel to be kind

Taking a spider away from an arachnophobic when they scream doesn't cure them of their fear. Sure, it’s the kind thing to do but it reinforces their fear rather than resolve it. Short term win and long term loss

Sometimes you need to make them get a jar, find a piece of paper and solve the problem on their own. Cruel? Depends on your timeframe.

When it comes to discussing mental health I prefer the term ‘mental hygiene’. I don’t know where I heard this

There are things you can do every day to improve your mental hygiene. If your brain is ‘dirty’ rather than ‘broken’ then you have the ability to clean it.

If you eat well, sleep properly, can get a reasonable amount of exercise and avoid social media then I’d argue you’re giving your mind the best sort of clean it can have.

For some people, this might be enough. Any therapist worth their salary will try and shift a patient towards considering these things first.

Now I know that for some people this sounds like an impossible task and I’m okay with that. There are medications which will rebalance your brain chemistry. You may need those.

That doesn’t mean you should let your mental hygiene go. Some deodorants make teenage boys smell pleasant, but they’re a quick fix rather than a replacement for proper showering. I’d argue the same is true of SSRIs when used incorrectly. Necessary, but not a long term solution.

We must be caring and compassionate towards others in society but we must be careful we don’t accidentally reward anxious behaviours or create an unnecessary dependency on others, psychoactive drugs or the state itself.

Instead, we should offer boundaries, compassion without indulgence and remain open-minded about the individual capacity to cope. This is exactly what I think has happened across the whole Osaka and French Open situation — it all played out the way I thought it should’ve done.

It’s why I’m pleased with everyone involved and nobody who writes about mental health on Medium is pleased with me.

More Penguin on current affairs?