There’s something sad about the current crop of youngsters in America, namely themselves. They are lonely, stressed out, and their levels of depression are increasing rapidly. A Blue Cross Blue Shield study released in 2018 found that diagnoses of major depression had risen 47% among millennials since 2013. Millennials’ generational successors aren’t any better, with a Pew Research poll finding 70% of Gen Zers think anxiety and depression are major problems among their peers. Perhaps nobody embodies this generational angst better than Billie Eilish, the teen music phenom whose first studio album “WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?” debuted at the top spot on the Billboard 200 last week.
Eilish, for those unfamiliar, is a 17-year-old female who first came to fame when a song of hers on SoundCloud, “Ocean Eyes,” went viral in 2016. Eilish now has seven gold and two platinum singles to her name and has garnered quite the following. Eilish is like the anti-JoJo Siwa, the overly bright and peppy YouTuber popular among today’s teens. Eilish’s music videos are over-the-top dark, with disturbing, macabre imagery: dripping blood, decapitated heads in plastic bags, spiders crawling out of mouths, needles being forced into flesh. It’s an aesthetic matched by the lyrics and sonic ambience of her songs.
An article published by the Telegraph proclaimed Eilish “the pop princess romanticizing death,” calling her oeuvre “misery music.” Even as a fan of her work — she does more with her voice just muttering under her breath than most people could hope to do after years of singing lessons — I’ll admit, there’s something to this notion. While it’s a stretch to say her music “romanticizes death,” it is, above all else, deeply sad stuff. Which is exactly why it’s so well received by today’s youth.
With record levels of depression and anxiety among millennials and Gen Z has come a natural attempt to address the problem, primarily by actually discussing mental health publicly in order to break down the stigma associated with such afflictions. There are obvious benefits to doing so, as those who struggle with their mental health are able to be more open about their experiences and are, thus, able to seek out the help they need more easily. But there exists a strain of this normalization that looks much more like glorification than destigmatization. Gold necklaces reading “Anxiety” and “Depression” are selling out at $48 a pop; “13 Reasons Why,” heavily criticized from the start for glamorizing suicide, will start its third season later this year; and though Urban Outfitters pulled its “Depression” shirt a few years ago, similar products are still easy enough to find.
Anne-Sophie Bine noted the fad writing for the Atlantic back in 2013, focusing on the portrayal of depression as “beautiful suffering” on Tumblr. In large circles of the internet, mental health issues, but most especially depression, are viewed almost as personality traits, things that make individuals special and give them depth, a particularly appealing idea to teens and young adults who feel unsure of their identities and long for a sense of uniqueness. It’s so appealing, apparently, that some people who aren’t depressed wish they were. These so-called wannabe depressives believe that the disorder, if they actually had it themselves, could give them a lens through which to understand their lives while making them seem more real and raw to those around them.
Eilish’s music is the perfect fit for the depression chic trend. In her song “bury a friend,” she questions, “Why aren’t you scared of me? Why do you care for me?” and repeats over and over in the chorus, “I wanna end me.” In “when the party’s over,” she warns, “I’ll only hurt you if you let me,” and, “Don’t you know I’m no good for you?” She asks, “Which one is worse, living or dying first?” in “you should see me in a crown.”
These are just a handful of examples from her latest album, but there are many more. Eilish’s music wallows in its own sadness and gives fans a chance to as well.
Nobody should ever feel ashamed of their mental health. That society is no longer as unaccepting of mental health issues is undoubtedly a positive thing, but we should bear in mind that moving too far in the other direction can cause trouble, too. There’s nothing wrong with being depressed, but it should never be sought out either. Normalization does not require romanticization.
Alec Dent is a senior journalism major at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
