Labeling – Food For Thought (or ramblings of a drought stricken lavender farmer)

Why is it that human nature tries to put a label on anything we don't quite understand ? Or more importantly, perhaps we do understand and then want to apply that to numerous other situations?

In my fist year of studying Sociology at college I distinctly remember my college lecturer when we were studying that riveting subject of “Deviance” quoting the words of some revered author as saying, “a deviant is someone who has been successfully so labeled”. For some reason I have never forgotten this and from time to time I am distinctly reminded of the need for care and prudence when using generalised terms—labels, to describe a person or situation.

I have found that working in the area of “problem gambling” as both a counsellor, community development worker and also the experiences of being the partner of someone affected by this disorder, I am becoming more acutely aware of the labels we use in our professional lives, to shorten descriptions, clarify client groups and assist us communicate at an academic or professional level. However, these labels can also at another level, prevent us from identifying with clients own perceptions of themselves and family perceptions of the problem.

So for instance, I am ever so humbly reminded when in a past professional life presenting a paper on working with “dementia sufferers” (the accepted label at the time), a well respected lecturer reminding me that “wasn’t I talking about “people with dementia”. I, who had always prided myself with being “ideologically correct” in language use—felt cut to the ground.

How simple it had been to buy in to the label of the moment without really thinking about what I was saying. How different it felt to be talking about “people with dementia”.

For someone like myself committed to working with people and their perceptions of themselves, how easy it had been to get caught into the web of using language which separated myself from them, placed them at a comfortable distance and pathologised their disorders. This was so incongruent with my actions for assisting others in training, helping them find ways to understand this disorder, “to get behind the disease and work with Mrs. Smith to outwit the disease process which was robbing her of her abilities”.

So here I am working in the field of “problem gambling” with a client group of “problem gamblers” and “concerned significant others” looking at “evidence based best practice“ (any chance of practice based evidence ? ), talking about “pathological gambling and compulsive behaviour”, “cognitive therapy” and “solution focused treatments” and wondering how might the “people experiencing difficulties with gambling” actually be relating to all these labels.

As a community development worker, best practice to me was defined as assisting others to define their issues then provide skills, opportunities and resources to assist them to address their own issues in their own way — “community capacity building “ is the latest label for this one. With a language which seeks to define people by their disorder rather than the way they may see themselves, the incongruencies between the language of counselling and the underpinning assumptions of community development work would seem to impinge upon any meaningful engagement at a community development level between “consumers” (read “people directly affected by gambling problems”) and those seeking to ameliorate the problem at an individual level.

Perhaps this is why we see so few counsellors actively engaged in community development initiatives, as possibly even the tools of our trade—language, already alienate us from the very community we seek to “assist” at a community action level?

However, enough of that—I’m sure I could fill up several pages with the differences in theoretical assumptions between community development and counselling. Thankfully I have been exposed to both and continue to reap the reward of working with people in a variety of modalities, as I am sure many others also do.

In the matter of labeling, I am also drawn to an analogy from another aspect of my life—as a primary producer and one up to her ears in “aromatic gifts” and the “culinary delights” of running a lavender farm. Every time I label a food jar I am reminded that by law, I have to enter the contents in priority order of their contribution to the whole product.

For example: jam is primarily made up of fruit and sugar, these would be first and second on an ingredients list—you get the picture. Latest food regulations also state that one has to list the nutritional values by percentage as well. So lets see how we fare if this analogy was applied to a “problem gambler” known well to me ...

Ingredient List:

Committed partner, loving husband, devoted father, competent civil engineer, creative thinker, productive worker, diligent domestic engineer, competent chef, effective host, talented carpenter, gardening labourer, gifted tennis player, caring friend, tolerant confidant, patient problem solver ... and many more before ... person experiencing difficulties with problem gambling.

Values List:

Honesty and trust 95% (5% affected by gambling addiction), loyalty 99% strong work ethic 98%, persistence 90%, commitment 100%, and so on ...

So what am I saying – I guess it’s the old adage “don’t’ judge a book by its cover” particularly in times of crisis when the difficulties of gambling problems can seem to change the perspective and suddenly a person's weakness come to the fore.

This is the time to hold on to all you really know about that person — their strengths and weaknesses, at a time when too much focus on the problem may skew your view of them as a person. Take time to explore their skills, resources, ways of looking at the world. Find out what are their underlying values and how this helps them make sense of the world from their perspective.

Working as a counsellor I am constantly reminded that I often see people in crisis—like the fact that as a Social Worker in Aged Care I was constantly seeing the 7% of people who have difficulties with ageing - but one only had to take a trip to the bank on pension day to see the other 93% who were enjoying their later years to the fullest. I find myself trying to remember that in counselling and in my experience as partner of someone struggling with problem gambling in their lives.

The impacts of problem gambling do not negate all the realities of who they are first as a person, but reflects how some aspect of their self is struggling with a psychological/ behavioural problem. It is so easy for us to jump to the use of labels to deal with anomalies—families, friends and even work mates are sometimes too eager to define the person by the problem rather than see it as a component which may be difficult, but still only a small part of the total person.

As a counsellor, I am tasked by the client to assist them with that component of their lives and in doing so need to understand other aspects of them to develop a healthy wholistic approach to the problem. In addition, when I put on my community development hat, I am there side by side with others also dealing with the direct impacts on their lives, I am sharing a common issue of our times.

I am part of the problem as well as part of the solution, the way I think, act and use language around this problem can either enhance opportunities for change or continue to contribute to the stigmatisation of those affected. I can use language which empowers or diminishes the abilities of others and myself to address this issue, I can assist others in knowing about this disorder or I can join with their fears.

Ultimately each of us is a reflection of our own value system, personal strengths and weaknesses. In using labels we seek to generalise the unique and in doing so run the risk of contributing to the marginalisation of a group of individual people affected by a problem by defining them by their shared problem rather than exploring their uniqueness first.

As in food, you can get a general picture from the label on the front but you need to read the list of ingredients on the back to really know what you are getting.

Kate Roberts is a Social Worker/Gambling Counsellor with Nowra Community Health Service and Chairperson of the Gambling Impact Society (NSW).

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