Something about a person that causes that person to have a deeply compromised social standing; a mark of shame or discredit. The modern use of this work derives from the ancient Greek practice of burning or cutting a mark into the bodies of slaves, criminals, or traitors, to make visible something bad about the moral status of the bearer.

Some common stereotypes:

Mentally ill people are...

• lazy
• unintelligent
• unsafe to be with
• worthless
• stupid
• always late
• untrustworthy
• unable to be productive members of society
• irresponsible
• out of control
• without conscience
• unpredictable
• dangerous to children if unsupervised
• frightening
• incomprehensible
• demon-possessed

Such people have no value to society at large. Aside from giving charity to these people, no good can come from contact with them. They are more like each other than like other people. They might have a few individual traits, but the most important thing about them is that they are members of this particular group.

What do they want from me and my family, anyway? They should stick to their own kind.

Some comments:

These stereotype have been applied to mentally ill people in the present-day US. They have also been applied to African-Americans, particularly in segregated places and times, to Japanese-Americans during World War II, to Irish-American immigrants in the 1800's, and to the new British arrivals in New England in the late 1600's by those who had been there since the early 1600's. They have also been applied to blind people, deaf people, retarded people, people who use wheelchairs, and in the 1990's, homosexuality.

My own experience has been that, while some of these traits might apply to some people who have mental illness, they do not apply uniformly to mentally ill people as a group any more than they apply to any other group of people. What I find especially damaging about these stigma stereotypes is that they make stigmatized people seem somehow less than human. The facts are that mentally ill people are much more like everyone else than they are unlike everyone else. We all need food, clean air to breath, pure water to drink, a sense of belonging and community with other people, the dignity of contributing to the greater good of our community through useful work, and a chance to express our highest ideals and our spirituality. These needs are common to all people, including mentally ill people.

• Someone should be blamed for an individual's mental illness.
• Mentally ill people cannot work at regular jobs.
• Mentally ill people are dangerous.
• Mentally ill people are lazy, and if they would get a job, they would get better.
• All mentally ill people are creative.
• Mental illness and mental retardation are the same.
• Mental illness can't be treated successfully.
• Treatment of mental illness requires years of frequent, intensive psychotherapy, and even if this is provided, treatment is not usually successful.
• Mental illness is a moral failing, a divine punishment, or demon possession.
• If mentally ill people really wanted to, they could get better just by
  applying some old-fashioned will power.