The recent Sun-Times front-page headline, “Once homeless drug addict now an ‘icon’ who helps others,” is an attention-grabber yet unintentionally stigmatizes its hero and the group of people with the disease.
Community outreach worker Michael Ferguson’s message that treatment works need not get lost among outdated words such as “abuse,” “clean” and “addict.”
Feeling stigmatized can make people with substance use disorder less willing to seek treatment. Negative stereotypes about people with substance use disorder can make others feel pity, fear and even anger. Words matter — what we say and how we say it makes a difference.
Simple changes in our language can go a long way toward stopping the stigma associated with addiction. Let’s flip the script. Why not a similar yet more impactful and hopeful headline such as “Once Homeless, this Outreach Worker now an ‘Icon’”. Indeed he is.
Gail Basch, MD, FASAM
Associate professor, Rush University Medical Center Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Illinois politics has big problems
To anyone who doesn’t have any concerns about Illinois politics, I urge them to read Fran Spielman’s column on Anna Valencia. After taking hundreds of hours off from her elected position as Chicago city clerk to campaign for the secretary of state job and losing, she took the month of July off to catch up on sleep, vacation and reconnect with her daughter. Working people can only dream of such a scenario.
The icing on the cake is that she lost to a candidate as ethically challenged as she is. Yet that is what Illinois politics offer to its citizens.
Joe Revane, Lombard
Think pink
As Natalie Moore writes in her Sept. 16 column: I too grew up in a house on the South Side that had a pink-tiled bathroom and a knotty pine paneled basement.
My husband grew up in a home in Rogers Park that also had these same styles.
I agree with Ms. Moore that these post-World War II homes reflected a hopeful, happy time. The war was finally over, and most of these new home buyers also had lived through the hard times of the Depression. They were ready for a new life, with new, joyful styles, as well as a new way of entertaining in an extra room: a finished basement.
It amazes me that many millennials are so interested in mid-century modern styles, things we simply lived with on an everyday basis.
But it does make me smile that a new generation can enjoy the bright colors, clean lines and futuristic shapes, and the happy feelings these styles still evoke — a special beauty from a certain time and place.
Mary Jo Przygoda, Gurnee
