I think many of us are grateful for mental health’s increasingly prominent presence in society. Every conversation is a step towards the de-stigmatisation of something that almost 1 in 4 of us experience. And, to be fair, celebrities have played a big role in drawing attention to these conversations and moving them forward. But just because we’ve finally acknowledged that the rich and famous suffer from things like anxiety and depression, just like the rest of us, it doesn’t make it okay to attach the condition to their names for the sake of jumping on an increasingly crowded bandwagon.
Zayn Malik is among the growing number of young men in the music industry who have publicly addressed their struggles with anxiety. He’s had to cancel shows, back out of appearances and done what he’s needed to do deal with something we all know to be incredibly difficult. But funnily enough, contrary to the insinuation of the headlines, this doesn’t mean that anxiety is all Zayn’s got going on at the moment.
In a recent video interview with Vogue, Zayn chatted about lots of stuff. He spoke about how when he first moved over to his LA home, he was staying on a mattress for about six months. ‘I didn’t really want to do anything to it’, he said. ‘I just liked the way it felt… there was nothing to really hold onto’. Beyond experimenting with a seemingly avant-garde hipster style of living, Zayn also spoke about his fashion influences (Prince and his grandad, by the way), confirmed that he has indeed been working on a second album, and his beloved collection of comic books. All the interesting celeb interview stuff.
He also spoke about fame. After mentioning that he was excited to see what people think when he makes a musical return to the spotlight, he mentioned that it’s been about a year since he’s ‘properly showed his face’. He added: ‘I feel like I’m always trying to work through whatever, you know, certain issues are around certain subjects’. I’m sure that it’s a feeling that many of us have shared. Life feels a bit like an endless journey of working through shit, amirite?
In the context of our awareness that yes, Zayn struggles with anxiety, it’s easy to automatically connect the conversation to the mental health issues he's previously told us he's been dealing with, but there's a danger in that becoming the default take away from any and every interview that might actually about a lot more (or less) than that. The responses to Zayn's Vogue interview have been anxiety led. 'Zayn addresses ongoing anxiety issues..', 'Zayn reveals truth about anxiety battle', and so on. On the one hand, of course, it's great that we're so willing and ready to address anxiety head on, but that willingness can't help but feel a bit jaded when we know that anxiety exists on a far deeper and more complex level than what can ever be put forward in a few minutes of interview.
Zayn quite candidly mentioned that he's not a very outgoing social person. He also said that a lot of his trying to work through stuff 'comes from a place of not ever wanting to come across as an over arrogant person or a person that takes themselves too seriously.' He added: 'I’m not always trying to be pretentious or say something that I think’s going to change the world. I feel like one voice among millions'. While we all appreciate Zayn's willingness to discuss his thoughts and concerns, because that's not an easy thing to do regardless of whether you're a millionaire superstar heartthrob or not and being able to vocalise that sort of thing is important, crying mental health every time a celebrity opens up doesn't move the conversation forward. It doesn't address anything about a condition that still feels quite misunderstood in society. It doesn't help the correct use of words like 'anxiety' and 'depression' which are often used pretty flippantly. In fact, it does very little.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.