Tag: diabetes in pop culture

Another Day, Another Annoying Diabetes Reference

mollyt1d1 Comment

I have controversial taste in entertainment.

While I’m a huge fan of trending shows like The Last of Us and Wednesday (I recently finished both first seasons and fell in love with the characters on both shows/mourn the fact that they likely won’t produce second seasons until 2025), I’m also really into what my mother calls “trash TV”.

This is synonymous with reality television – think along the lines of anything that the Bravo network plays. Most of those shows symbolize pure escapism and innocently mindless entertainment for me, and I’m addicted, so much so that my trash taste in TV translates to my podcast listening.

I listen to a handful of podcasts hosted by personalities that either appear on the Bravo network or talk often about Bravo-lebrity drama, and while I usually find them wildly entertaining, I’ve noticed an emerging trend on these podcasts in recent months that makes me incredibly irritated. And that’s how often diabetes comes up as a topic on these podcasts.

Nine times out of ten, it’s about Ozempic (the type 2 diabetes drug that famous and non-famous folks alike have started using in order to lose weight). Usually, the podcast hosts are poking fun at it or spending way too much time speculating who is and isn’t using it, and it drives me up the wall. NOBODY is talking about the morality of taking a type 2 diabetes drug when they do not have that condition themselves, or the fact that since it’s become so popular it’s made it scarce and potentially unavailable to the people that really need it. Now, I’ll take a step off the soapbox for a second because obviously I 1) don’t have type 2 diabetes and 2) don’t use or need to use Ozempic; therefore, I don’t have a true stake in the game other than that I could imagine myself being even more worked up if it were a matter of people taking Humalog for similar reasons (goodness knows the rage that I would feel if Humalog was becoming virtually fetishized because taking it resulted in some desirable outcome).

I also shouldn’t sit here and judge people who go on Ozempic who have maybe tried multiple other weight loss methods that have failed them, and they’re genuinely using the drug to try and get healthier – I can empathize with that more. No, what really bothers me is the resulting dialogue that seems to happen every time Ozempic is brought up, and that is pure ignorant bliss regarding what diabetes actually is and how significant of a role it plays in the daily lives of people living with it. Multiple podcasts that I listen to have covered the Ozempic “fad”, explaining to their seemingly naive audiences that it’s a drug for diabetes, followed by a punch line about how they don’t even know the difference between type 1 and type 2, and saying things along the lines of how they hope they get diabetes just so they have an excuse to take Ozempic.

It’s gross. And quite frankly, embarrassing for these podcast hosts to admit that they know so little about a condition (and I’m speaking broadly here about both T1D and T2D) but then claim they want to be diagnosed with it so they can maybe indulge in their vanity and lose weight. There’s much better ways to make clever little jokes about diabetes and I’m getting tired of people being lazy in their comedy by continuing to be misinformed.

Maybe all of this is a signal to me that it’s time to take the trashy podcasts out of my rotation…

Diabetes in Pop Culture: Is it Really That Hard to Get it Right?

mollyt1d3 Comments

I used to be an avid fan of the cultural behemoth, The Walking Dead. Imagine my delight and surprise when type 1 diabetes actually made a cameo in one of the episodes! T1D, in the zombie apocalypse! What could go wrong?

Turns out, a lot. A minor character in the show’s sixth season passes out, only for a main character to flock to her side just in time to give her a shot of insulin. Within moments, she’s totally fine, though – spoiler alert – she gets attacked by zombies and doesn’t survive at the end of the episode.

What’s wrong with this scenario is that if a person with diabetes passes out like that, it’s more than likely that their blood sugar is low, and the last thing that they need is more insulin. I can’t imagine her blood sugar being high seeing as it’s the ZOMBIE FREAKING APOCALYPSE and supplies are scarce. I doubt she’s eating, well, anything, let alone substantial meals. And how the heck does insulin stay fresh during the end of the world, anyways? I don’t necessarily expect a TV drama to explore that in a tight 60-minute time frame, but these are things to consider, as well as details that leave unusually informed viewers like me a little bemused and irritated.

Diabetes in pop culture_

And it’s not just The Walking Dead – it’s a LOT of shows that make mistakes or omissions that can be eyebrow-raising. A few shows that come to mind include The Big Bang Theory, Hannah Montana, and even my beloved soap, General Hospital. The errors have been to varying degrees, but a common theme among countless television shows is perpetuating the stereotype that all types of diabetes are caused by a poor diet; specifically, consuming sweets. It’s always an extremely cheap joke, and one that’s gotten stale in its overuse.

Surprisingly, reality TV doesn’t help dispel any myths, which is a bit ironic. Recent episodes of Southern Charm and one of the Real Housewives franchises spread diabetes misinformation that was just ludicrous to me. In the former, a licensed anesthesiologist implied that his girlfriend shouldn’t eat a pastry because it’ll cause diabetes (insert eye roll here) – last time I checked, an anesthesiologist does not know the intricacies of the endocrine system, so who is he, as a medical professional who ought to know better, to say something like that? And in the latter, one woman was scolding her T2D husband over not taking care of himself. She explained his condition in a confessional…but did a really rotten job of it. If I didn’t know anything about type 2 diabetes, and I “learned” about it from this source, then I would be seriously misled.

I’m not trying to be oversensitive here, but it is hard for me to understand why pop culture struggles to get certain aspects of diabetes right when it appears in various story lines. There’s a wealth of correct information out there that writers could rely on. It’s a shame that they don’t, because whether they mean to or not, all it does is add to the confusion and general misunderstanding of all types of diabetes.

Needless to say, pop culture in this day and age has a long way to go when it comes to the portrayal of diabetes.