It’s a hotbed of psychopathology rivaling that of any daytime soap opera. These individuals cover the entire spectrum of mental illness as outlined by the psychiatrist’s bible, the so called DSM-IV (revised).
I am referring, of course, to the stable of unstable “Retro” cartoon characters to which Warner Brothers subjects our children on a regular basis.
Come on, you can’t tell me you didn’t realize these guys had serious problems? Let’s take the Tasmanian Devil, for example. With such poor impulse control one can’t help but diagnose hyperactivity.
While he pursues Bugs Bunny his distractibility consistently proves to be his undoing, confirming that attention deficit is also present. Clearly ADHD is present of the predominantly hyperactive impulsive type, diagnostic code 314.01.
Moving on to
Daffy Duck, the diagnosis of paranoia immediately takes wing. This whining, overbearing, insecure creature must surely be more pitied than blamed. He has strong goal-seeking behavior, and yet his poor social skills and outbursts of temper often sabotage his success.
Daffy thinks the world is out to get him. He is suspicious of everyone’s motives, bears grudges and trusts no one. This behavior consistently alienates him form others, only further aggravating his paranoid ideation.
Clearly he has had some bad experiences as a duckling. Label him paranoid personality disorder, cluster A, diagnostic code 301.0.
Yosemite Sam manifests a pervasive pattern of disregard for the rights of others. He fails to respect the law, is unable to delay gratification and is deceitful in his dealings with others. He is irritable and aggressive, resulting in frequent fights or assaults.
Sam shows little regard for his own safety or that of others. Yet his impulsiveness and failure to plan appropriately frequently frustrate his efforts. Sam’s a typical antisocial personality disorder, cluster B, diagnostic code 301.7.
Now Marvin the Mar
tian is an interesting study. He has a one-track megalomaniacal desire to conquer the world and will calmly disintegrate anyone who gets in his way, without remorse. He is clearly delusional if he believes that, even with advanced technology, he can do this single handedly (or at most with the help of his dog).
Marvin most likely suffers from a psychotic, delusional disorder of the grandiose type, diagnostic code 297.1. His dog on the other hand shares his master’s delusion in that he slavishly follows him despite Marvin’s illness and clearly should be labeled a share psychotic disorder (“folie a deux”), 297.3.
Pepe LePew is another sadly disturbed character. He is preoccupied with fantasies of ideal love and therefore follows and victimizes a helpless and hapless feline.
He lacks the empathy to see that his feelings are unrequited and shows an unreasonable sense of entitlement to the affections of the poor cat. Obviously we are dealing with a narcissistic personality disorder here, cluster B, diagnostic code 301.81.
The cat herself shows signs of pathological passivity in that she does not seem to express her rejection in an effective and assertive manner to Pepe. Her half-hearted attempts to escape make one wonder if she enjoys the victim role. Perhaps at a subconscious level she likes the attention.
Tweety and Sylvester pose an interesting diagnostic dilemma. At first one tends to label Tweety as the victim and Sylvester as the victimizer. But look at what happens in a typical interaction. Tweety maintains a pose of innocence while engineering all sorts of horrible events for Sylvester.
The cat falls from great heights, is attacked by aggressive canines and otherwise is beaten, maimed and subjected to all sorts of negative life experiences. Who is really the victim here?
Tweety is a typical passive aggressive personality. Unfortunately, this useful term seems to have been engineered out of the present DSM-IV (revised), so I can’t give it a code number.
What about Sylvester? He seems to be a co-dependent in this sick relationship. Why doesn’t he just leave, or seek counselling to escape this cycle of violence? Alas, he could be a little better endowed in the brain department (witness his mistaking a baby kangaroo for a mouse).
Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner present the single-minded fanatic and the object of his fanaticism. Wile E. is obviously highly intelligent, judging from the various schemes and plans he develops to capture Road Runner. He most certainly manifests strong obsessive-compulsive tendencies as despite consistent failures he is always ready to try one more time.
It is my opinion that the Coyote shares traits in common with most successful scientific researchers. Perhaps he had previously focused on other, more lucrative areas of inventing and hence the financial wherewithal to purchase myriads of expensive devices from Acme in his pursuit of Road Runner. Also, since he obviously can afford to buy food, his obsessive pursuit of RR suggests other, deeper and darker motives than just hunger.
Elmer Fudd superficially resembles Wile E. Coyote in his single-minded pursuit of his quarry, Bugs Bunny (with an occasional foray into duck hunting). It is evident that he does not share the Coyote’s high intelligence, though in fact IQ doesn’t seem to correlate particularly well with success in either case.
One wonders if Elmer has some doubts about his masculinity, as he is almost always seen holding a large gun with it obvious phallic symbolism.
Finally we must deal with Bugs Bunny himself. Bugs is a relaxed, laid-back sort of fellow, who rarely gets too excited. Even when threatened by various and sundry of his
unbalanced brethren, he usually handles the situation with aplomb and sang-froid.
On the Global Assessment of Functioning Scale in Axis 5 of the DSM-IV (revised), we could say he shows “superior functioning in a wider range of activities, life’s problems never see
m to get out of hand and he is sought out by others because of his many positive qualities”.
My only qualm is his dependency problem with carrots. While it could be argued that this is not really an addiction, Bugs enters risky situations for these crunchy treats. I’ll leave this one at a questionable diagnosis DSM 304.9, “other substance abuse”.
It would seem from the great number of disordered cartoon characters in film and television that normalcy is a condition which may be desirable, but makes for boring programming. As Pepe LePew would say: “Vive la difference!”
Photo Credits
All pictures courtesy of “Looney Tunes” Warner Brothers
This article appeared previously in The Medical Post.
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I love this! But to me, Bugs has an Antisocial Personality disorder. I see it in his lack of compassion and/or remorse for others. In one cartoon, Bugs asks, “I wonder if Daffy will remember he can fly?” Daffy plummets to earth and splatters into the ground, whereupon bug’s response is, “Eh, guess not”. Yosemite Sam, if I might suggest, comes across to me as presenting with Intermittent Explosive disorder.
One wonders the extent to which Warner Brothers cartoonists projected serious mental illnesses into their work.
This is not true, remember when Bugs tricked Sam into the oven that Sam had been trying to cook him in the whole cartoon, Bugs responded had the compassion not to go through with it, and ended up rewarded with a party.
I have an Abnormal Psych assignment, which parallels this. Too bad I cannot (Nor would I) submit that as my own work. I have to agree that Yosemite Sam was Explosive, and Bugs, while he had Narcissitic tendencies, I would label him more as OCD. He was very focused on the task at hand and only occassionally was he Narcissitic.
I’m a psych major and I love this!
I’m no psych major, but I’m pretty sure foghorn, porky pig, and Elmer fudd have some sort of speech disorder. I would say bugs has a bit of a sadist personality because he likes to see others suffer (when he keeps tricking Elmer into shooting daffy in the face).
Recalling data from DSM-IV TR:
Bugs -Antisocial Personality Disorder (zero remorse and totally disrespectful of others’ feelings and opinions)
Daffy Duck -mood congruent, so not schizophrenic. Possibly Bipolar I rather than Bipolar II, given the severity of his manic episodes
Yosemite Sam -Intermittent Explosive Disorder. Moods are irritable and expansive. Very short patience. Shoots revolvers at other characters at the slightest provocation. GAF scale 40-ish. Needs to improve hygeine -especially a bath and a shave.
Wile. E. Coyote -Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder. Despite thousands of failed attempts to capture, and subsequently eat Roadrunner, and in spite of spending tens of thousands of dollars on such items as ACME rocket skates and boomerage dynomite sticks, pushes aside all medical concerns resulting from being pulverized by boulders, falling off of cliffs as high as a quarter of a mile, and ACME products failing during critical moments and causing injury to him, nontheless continues his pursuits of a bird who would have very little meat to yield for a meal.
Sylvester Cat -Masochism. Seems to find comfort -perhaps even pleasure- in being on receiving end of insults from Tweety, being beaten up repeatedly by Mr. Bulldog, and spanked by Granny.
Thanks for all the great comments. The DSM has been revised since I wrote this piece so there would some changes in classification. Thanks also for pointing out points I missed on my first go round!
Thanks for letting us share, George! At first, I wanted to diagnose Daffy with Hebephrenic Schizophrenia, but they pulled/renamed that diagnostic criteria from the DSM. Besides, Daffy is too mood-congruent and doesn’t present prodromally toward the illness. I’d love to know who his health provider is.
Using this for a research assignment for my psych students!! love the background in this
Fascinating diagnoses. I am wondering, however, regarding Bugs if one might not consider that he may have identity issues as well, because he seizes every opportunity to dress as the opposite sex. Those him dressing up as a woman are “disguises” Bugs seems to relish the costumes and chance to play the part. While transgenderism is technically not a psychological diagnosis, one who has unidentified issues with it may need counseling to help them deal with their feelings about it.
Interesting thought. Not only does Bugs apparently enjoy cross dressing but he is very good at it. One could speculate that carrots may have phallic connotations as well and perhaps this could be also further explored in counselling.
Perhaps gender dysphoria is an issue, but I’m somewhat covinced that Mr. Bunny is engaging in exhibitionism. He seems to prefer an audience to display feminine behavior to. Perhaps he seeks approval from others, which calls into question both narcissism and, as ironic as it may seem, low self esteem issues. On one hand, he appears to regard himself as “above the fray”, preferring other characters to suffer various consequences while he remains the only one to avoid each of these. To me, this indicates a sense of exaggerated self importance.
On the other hand, he seems to have a great deal of difficulty accepting himself as a member of either gender. Since we all base our self concepts to a large degree on our gender identity, and since Mr. Bunny seems indecisive regarding the subject, he appears to question who he is. This contributes to his questioning whether or not he can function, to a societal level of acceptance, as either a jack or a doe. In turn, he questions his competence as one, which compels him to “move away from” (Karen Horneye) the traditional role of buck. His real issue is, is he merely moving away from societal pressures placed on him to “perform” as a buck, or is he actively moving toward acceptance as a doe?
In either case, his lipstick bill will soon put Warner Brothers in the red, so to speak.