After years of working in various settings across North East England – including prisons, community drug treatment and homelessness services – I noticed something unsettling: the invisibility of marginalised LGBTQ+ people. This led me to apply for a three-year funded PhD in which I interviewed 72 people – 39 LGBTQ+ individuals dealing with issues like homelessness, substance use, or domestic violence, and 33 professionals who work with them. 

Performing Recovery is an organisation that supports, connects and promotes artists, arts groups and arts practices in the world of recovery from substance use and compulsive behavioural disorders. It publishes a quarterly magazine, podcasts and a newsletter, and it runs live and online events. Performing Recovery is for individuals or groups who are involved in, or interested in, recovery arts. 

Photo credit: Point of View Photography

As drug-related deaths continue to rise across the globe, debates about what can be done to tackle society’s addiction problems continue. Although stigma is generally recognised as major barrier to addiction recovery, arguments can sometimes be heard that stigma – or at least societal ‘disapproval’ - towards substance use is in fact, a ‘good’ thing.  

We have seen again this weekend a shocking example of stigmatising, offensive and counterproductive media reporting  Zombie Drug Horror.

I’m not encouraging you to read it, not least because the media outlet concerned shouldn’t be rewarded by high click rates for these offensive articles. But needless to say it contains derogatory language, dehumanising images and videos and othering of people.

I’m sitting with my mum, Kim, ready to talk about my brother, Karl, who passed away 13 years ago this month. The ripple effects of his loss are still deeply felt across our family. His absence is a shadow that never quite lifts — especially around this time of year.

Following on from our recent blog looking at the public shaming of primary school teacher Ms Atkin, we have been considering the nature of public shaming.

In this post, James Armstrong of Phoenix Futures questions the reasoning behind the public shaming of Cheshire primary school teacher Ashley Atkin.

Issues of stigma and language choice have been gaining increased attention, prompting debate and sometimes even opposition to calls to be mindful of language. Concerns about language choice and its role in stigma are of course valid, one reason being that the context in which they are used matters. For instance, whilst terms such as ‘alcoholic’ or ‘addict’ reflect harmful stereotypes, they are also often used by people in recovery to self-label, and even as a way to challenge stigma.