Election debate makes it into 'see me's Stigma Stop Watch
It can feel as if one is spoiling the fun a bit to be the person who raises the issue of inappropriate language within this election campaign, but Nick Clegg's use of the term 'nutters' in the Sky TV leaders' debate was surely a mistake, and offensive to people who have mental health problems. If you don't think that the term 'nutter' is something to get exercised about, try substituting it with any of the derogatory terms which used to be used to describe people with a range of disabilities or people from ethnic minorities?
Nick Clegg obviously intends to do the right thing (he made the effort, in January 2009, to sign his support to the English campaign against the stigma of mental illness) but somehow, perhaps in the pressure of last night's live debate, he resorted to words which should have no place in anyone's vocabulary, and especially not the vocabulary of someone aspiring to be Prime Minister of the UK.
Perhaps this is a time to remind all our politicians that one in four of the people they'd like to represent will experience mental ill-health and, for many of them, 'nutter' is a word which is only ever heard in a hurtful and stigmatising sense.
Suzie Vestri
'see me' - let's stop the stigma of mental ill-health