Billie, Bieber, and Exorcising Our Demons
The headline shouted at me: Suicide is Gen Z's second-leading cause of death, and it's a worse epidemic than anything millennials faced at that age.
This increase in youth suicide has accelerated in the last few years. According to the Business Insider report, “in 2007 and 2013, the suicide rate for young people grew at an average of 3% per year; between 2013 to 2017, that number shot up to 7% per year.”
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Depression, isolation and suicidal thoughts were on full display at the Oscars and Grammy Awards this year, where Billie Eilish took home five Grammys and Joaquin Phoenix won the Oscars Best Actor for Joker.
Whereas both Phoenix and the Joker he played reflect the complexity of mental illness, it is Eilish who is channeling the angst of her generation.
In bury a friend Elilish sings over and over “I wanna end me,” and in when the party’s over Eilish literally ingests and weeps a darkness of the soul. She has talked about her struggles, acknowledging that the depression she suffers from has “controlled everything in [her] life.”
“I’ve always been a melancholy person. I feel like there are some people that neutrally they’re happy,” she said, hoping her work and openness when talking about her mental health inspired her fans.
What Gen Z is manifesting now may just be the tip of the iceberg — one of the key contributing factors appears to be over-use of social media, which is only increasing, and which can cause loneliness, depression, and anxiety according to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America.
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Surveying the cultural landscape, one has to ask, where does the hope lie? Ironically, perhaps in two of the most social media present celebrities on the planet: Justin Bieber and Kanye West.
Over the years, Kanye has discussed publicly his struggles with mental illness, as well as the demons that have haunted him:
“Four in the morning, and I'm zoning
I think I'm possessed, it's an omen”
From: BLKKK SKKKN HEAD (Explicit)
In the last few months since I wrote about Kanye, he has only doubled down on the importance of his faith to exorcise his demons: “They say you can rap about anything except for Jesus, that means guns, sex, lies, video tapes, but if I talk about God my record won't get played, Huh?”
What is fascinating is how Kanye has also come to embrace his mental illness. According to Forbes, “Like some entrepreneurs with conditions like ADHD and Asperger’s, he sees his diagnosis not as a hindrance but as a “superpower” that unlocks his imagination.”
Similarly Justin Bieber has said that it has been in embracing faith, along with traditional treatment, that has saved him from certain destruction. In a remarkable interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe, Bieber opened up about how his faith and relationship with his new wife Hailey Baldwin saved his life and inspired him to make music again.
This is where the stars collide:
Last weekend, Bieber visited Kanye and Kim at their “Sunday Service," poignantly singing Marvin Sapp's gospel hit, "Never Would Have Made It.”
In the Apple interview, Bieber literally cries for Billie Eilish and over her quick rise to fame, offering that whenever she needs someone to be there for her, he’ll be there.
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How will Gen Z navigate the consequences on mental health due to the obsession with social media and the fascination with artistic expressions of hopelessness and pain?
Although some write about the decline of religion among Gen Z, it just may be that Justin and Kanye offer the key to countering the despair and hopeless that can lead to suicide. And maybe, just maybe, we will see Billie sing with them both at a Sunday Service.