CHICAGO — Local artist Joe Burns is reportedly refusing to take any form of antidepressants for his crippling mental illness, fearing it may inhibit his creative process despite the fact he hasn’t produced any artistic works in over two years.
“Meds are for placating the sheep of this world,” said Burns, who claimed to be a musician, author, painter, and installation artist. “My art reflects my pain and the truth I see around me. But, right now I need to try every kind of potato chip I can find and watch every episode of ‘Murder, She Wrote’ on Amazon before I expose that truth.”
Friends and family have attempted to get Burns the help he needs, but Burns believed the psychologist his family was paying him to see was trying to “steal all of his good ideas,” and that he’s simply “too busy” to attempt meditation.
“He told me he had some big, new art project he was working on,” said Burns’ sister, Emily. “But that just turned out to be trolling alt-right subreddits, taking screen caps of the conversations, and then sending those to me as a PDF for some reason. He’s also using a VHS camcorder to record himself sleeping… but I honestly think that’s just an excuse for him to sleep all day.”
Burns admittedly did try Zoloft for a single week in 2007 before claiming it destroyed his sex drive, crippled his creativity, and made him a “drooling zombie.” Meanwhile, others claim it was the most pleasant time they’d had with Burns since meeting him.
“I didn’t get any calls at 3 a.m. with him in tears, which was nice. And he wrote an amazing short story I really enjoyed about fighting against his own toxic masculinity, which really illustrated how compassion makes you strong,” said longtime friend Janey Coley. “But by the next week, he was back to lighting his worldly possessions on fire and claiming I was trying to give him a lobotomy.”
When informed that a change of diet and a steady workout routine could help, Burns allegedly claimed, “That’s a bunch of jock shit.”