- 4 months ago
John Davidson is a Scottish campaigner for Tourette syndrome, who became widely known after this documentary raised awareness of the condition and was later voted one of the 50 greatest documentaries.
His life is the subject of a 2025 biographical film, I Swear, starring Robert Aramayo released in the UK on October 10th, focusing on his journey from a misunderstood teenager to a prominent advocate.
His life is the subject of a 2025 biographical film, I Swear, starring Robert Aramayo released in the UK on October 10th, focusing on his journey from a misunderstood teenager to a prominent advocate.
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00:00MUSIC
00:20Some of the time I just, when I feel bad, I just feel like killing myself or something like that.
00:26It feels so bad.
00:27John Davidson is 16.
00:29He suffers from a disturbing neurological disorder, once regarded as a wild madness.
00:34Well...
00:39But when you know him better, you discover that John's not mad.
00:50Hello?
00:51Could I speak to the duty officer, please?
00:53Last year, John's mother called the social services
00:56and asked them to warn the police about his disorder.
00:59John had sworn at an officer and came close to arrest.
01:02I was talking about my son, John.
01:04My son was approached in the street by a police officer who swore at him because my son had used foul language.
01:12My son has Tourette's syndrome.
01:15Yes, he comes out with quite abusive words.
01:19He shouts them.
01:21The point is, Tourette's syndrome makes John swear when he doesn't want to.
01:26The thoughts come into his head and he just says them.
01:29It has made his life, and the life of his family, almost impossible in the close-knit, well-ordered community of Galachiels where they live.
01:37No, he won't hurt anybody.
01:40Fuck off!
01:41He's very slippery.
01:44Tourette's syndrome is quite rare and is seldom as intense as John's,
01:48varying from small involuntary tics and obsessions
01:51to what the scientists call full-blown Tourette's, like this.
01:55Fuck off!
01:56I wonder what on earth you were...
01:58You were shouting at him like that.
02:01But if you didn't know about John, what would you think as he passed you in the street?
02:07Hey! Fuck off!
02:16That's a police dad, then, that, mind.
02:18Houses and books.
02:19That's right, yeah.
02:20We've got it all fitted out now.
02:22I've got all the pigs.
02:23Yeah, all the pigs.
02:25S**t, Dolly. Hang on.
02:27Fuck off!
02:30Fuck off!
02:34It feels like...
02:35I think...
02:37It's hard to explain.
02:38It's...
02:42When I feel I'm going to say it, I try and stop myself.
02:44But it just feels as if I have to say it.
02:47It's like somebody's forcing it out of me.
02:52Fuck off!
02:53Fuck off!
02:54Fuck, John.
02:55I want some fruit.
02:56Fuck you!
02:57Fuck you!
02:58Because he feels that the words are being forced out of him, John buttons his lip, almost literally,
03:13in an attempt to keep the offending words private in his head, rather than public in the shop.
03:18I'll get a big bag of potatoes.
03:19Ahem!
03:20Cunt!
03:21Oh, God.
03:22Fuck it!
03:23You can't get those weights, will you?
03:24Fuck off!
03:25It's not always swear words.
03:26Sometimes he barks and yelps.
03:27Fuck off!
03:28Fuck off!
03:29Ahem!
03:30Ahem!
03:31Cunt!
03:32Oh, God.
03:33Oh, God.
03:34Fuck it!
03:35You can't get those weights, will you?
03:36Fuck off!
03:37Yeah.
03:38It's not always swear words.
03:40Sometimes he barks and yelps.
03:42Oh, fuck.
03:43Ah!
03:44Anything in there?
03:45Hey!
03:46Oh, God.
03:47What's up?
03:48Perhaps because John is an adolescent, most of his involuntary outbursts are sexual,
04:01particularly if he sees a young woman.
04:03Fuck off!
04:04Fuck off!
04:05Fuck off!
04:06None of the specialists investigating this puzzling disease can offer any convincing explanation
04:16about why sexual words predominate.
04:19Words that shock local people.
04:21Look for one without the preservatives in, John.
04:23I'll get the right one.
04:24What kind of coffee do you want, ma'am?
04:27Nescafe.
04:28I need dog food too.
04:29You need dog meat as well?
04:30Yeah.
04:31I'll get a bonus.
04:32I'll just get the one.
04:37It's for carrying it.
04:38I'll just get the one.
04:39They've moved the coffee.
04:40It must be on the other side.
04:41Then sometimes the outbursts seem more directed, more focused.
04:46Here he tries to stop himself calling his mother a slut.
04:49No, choosy, I think, if we've got it.
04:51Slut!
04:52Mum, you're slut!
04:53Kitty cat.
04:54It's a catkin.
04:55We'll get catkins.
04:56That's only 26.
04:57That'll do.
04:58Any biscuits for a minute?
04:59No.
05:00I'll need a bowl for my bedroom, remember?
05:01Is it a big one or a normal one?
05:04Will an ordinary one fit?
05:05I don't know.
05:06Just get a normal one and it'll see fit.
05:09It's a 60 watt.
05:10That should be enough.
05:11Yeah.
05:12Can you see where the coffees are there, it is, John?
05:26It is!
05:27Quack up!
05:28Fuckin' this!
05:29Do you want nice coffee or much?
05:30Hold the way.
05:31Hey, fuck off!
05:32Hey, fuck off!
05:36Hey, fuck off!
05:43So while these ticks and head jerks are clearly involuntary and random, John's swear words sometimes
05:49seem connected in mysterious ways to the world around him.
05:53Oh, fuck you.
05:54Fuck you.
05:57Thanks very much.
05:58Bye.
05:59Bye.
06:00Bye.
06:01He is both aware of the words and of what they mean.
06:04And, perhaps more important, what they mean to others.
06:07Sometimes I think that I see them because I know they're disgusting and I know that somebody's
06:14going to get angry about it or turn the back about it.
06:19And when I think of that, it just makes me worse.
06:22That's exactly what my mum thinks as well.
06:25And the noises as well.
06:26I know it's going to annoy somebody, so I just can't stop myself from doing it.
06:34His language is very bad now.
06:38Some of the words he comes out with is really very shocking.
06:42You know, it's...
06:44His jerking's not quite as bad.
06:46He went through a stage where he was jerking so bad he was falling over.
06:51He would suddenly have a rapid arm movement, you know, throw his arm to the side and just
06:58about knock the person out that was walking next to him.
07:01Not deliberate, you know, it was all involuntary.
07:05We didn't know that at the time, though.
07:07You know, we didn't know what was happening with John at all.
07:10In fact, we thought he was going mad.
07:13Of course John's not mad.
07:18But Gala Shields is a town of only 13,000 people.
07:26They attend the same schools and churches and go to the same pubs.
07:31The police know many of the people by name.
07:45If you're afflicted with a public disorder like Tourette's, a small town is a difficult place in which to hide.
07:51I used to walk through the town in Gala Shields to get back and forward to college.
07:59But recently I've not been doing that.
08:03And when I used to walk through the town, I felt all right.
08:05I wasn't bothered about anyone looking at me and that.
08:07But now I just, I can't cope walking through the town.
08:11I just feel like everyone's looking at me.
08:14And now I walk, I go a right detour right round the town to come to college.
08:22And now I am.
08:23I'm.
08:24I'm.
08:25I'm.
08:26I'm.
08:27I'm.
08:28I'm.
08:29I'm.
08:30I'm.
08:31I'm.
08:32there is a real need to hide and to be alone the peace and serenity he finds
08:48along the banks of the river tweed have a remarkable effect gone are the
08:55exhausting explosions of foul language the yelps and the ticks here he is oddly
09:00quiet quite clearly the pressure of strangers or even friends has a lot to do
09:08with his outbursts suppose the things I choose it's like I'm trying to avoid other
09:17people like when I go fishing and I see a pal a friend somebody I know that's
09:23fishing I'd rather not I'd rather be further down the river on my own fishing
09:28than be with someone else
09:36but being alone is not the complete answer paradoxically Tourette's make excellent
09:41musicians dancers and athletes for John the boisterous noise of college
09:50basketball is a great release
09:52Thomas back back Thomas
09:58Thomas Thomas
10:00he's good at it too
10:05when I first started the school I was getting teased a lot because I blinked and then from
10:13on I never used to want to go to school I just because because I'm getting teased I can't fuck and
10:21so my mum just let me stay off and then phoned the school and explained that I was getting teased and the school would say right they'd look into it and then I'd go the next day and it'd be the same thing and I'd end up walking out of school for instance in the college and I'm walking through the college when I first started going to college I was making noises people just look at me and my funny look and then about a week later they used to always come after me and shout things and that
10:39and I knew instantly as soon as I'd start speaking to them and I knew instantly as soon as I'd start speaking to them they'd just laugh or say oh my you know don't believe you
11:00there was a teacher that just didn't want to accept it as well in the college he was just
11:06he was explained and
11:10he told he told them at the time that he'd understand and that but
11:14a couple of weeks in the classroom I was just
11:16he just
11:16just threw me out
11:19you know he just couldn't cope
11:20he kept saying that I was just disrupting the classroom and
11:26I wasn't able to be in the classroom because of it and
11:30just nasty things like that
11:32he was and he said a couple of times to the boys after
11:36if I went to the toilet he said to the other boys I hope he doesn't come back and
11:40things like that it's really nasty
11:42a couple of teachers were very bad to John
11:44you know one teacher in particular pulled John out in front of the class
11:48and said that he was mental that he ought to be locked up
11:51another teacher locked him in a cupboard
11:54because he was disrupting the class
11:57today John attends special lessons at a local college
12:04but some things never get any easier
12:07there are few who would regard this relaxing midday break as threatening
12:18it's a time for friendly conversation
12:23for meeting people from other classes
12:25eating and drinking
12:26all of us take social rituals like this for granted
12:35listening while others talk
12:37we eat our food in an ordered way
12:39but for John
12:51none of this is possible
12:53I don't know
13:08but
13:08Paco, calma.
13:38Sometimes I just feel like everyone hates you.
13:46Just because I've got this, I just feel like everyone hates you.
13:53The pressure is enormous.
13:56If you feel hated, nowhere feels friendly.
14:00Unlike the quiet calm of the empty classroom or riverbank,
14:03the whispering silence of the local library is an impossible challenge.
14:09Fuck off!
14:11Oh, God.
14:20Fuck off!
14:22Fuck off!
14:33To read syndrome is one of several baffling neurological disorders
14:40that radically alter what we call normal behavior.
14:44For one man, such afflictions are so fascinating,
14:47he's turned stories about them into best-selling books.
14:51Neurologist, Dr. Oliver Sacks.
14:53The range of symptoms is enormous and extraordinary.
15:00Things were put together about a century ago
15:02by a French neurologist, Gilles de la Tourette,
15:06who saw the sudden violent movements and noises
15:11and also sometimes sudden extraordinary perceptions and ideas
15:15and convulsions of the imagination and the emotions
15:18as forming a sort of syndrome of body and mind,
15:24as being a sort of possession with an organic basis,
15:28which usually would appear in childhood.
15:33It might get better after adolescence,
15:35but tended to last all through the person's life.
15:39He also commented on a tendency to suggestibility,
15:45to imitation, to echoing,
15:47and to the sudden exclamation sometimes
15:51of obscene or profane words.
15:54Oh, no.
15:57Fuckin' it!
15:59Can't...
16:00It may be that medication would help him
16:04to some extent.
16:07I get the feeling that if he's overloaded with medication,
16:10he feels half-dead, and that's not good.
16:12Perhaps there's some level of medication which will help him.
16:15But the most important thing
16:16is that he come to terms with it,
16:20and especially that other people come to terms with it.
16:23Coming to terms with such a publicly humiliating form of Tourette's
16:27is not easy.
16:30Soon John will need a job.
16:33Fuck off!
16:33Again, not easy for someone who's likely to swear at his boss.
16:39It's nine o'clock on a frosty morning,
16:42and John's class arrives at the college horticulture centre.
16:45Are you ready, Cooby?
16:48Fuck off!
16:49It's part of special vocational training for slow learners.
16:53Because of his trouble at school,
16:55John fell behind in his studies
16:56and now attends these special classes.
16:58But John is keen, bright, and quick to learn.
17:01Ironically, this has put him at the top of his class.
17:05We'll be in the glass house and we'll be in the workshop.
17:08Fuck off!
17:09The world's dead girl!
17:11We've been painting again, John, I see you.
17:13Yeah?
17:13We've been painting again.
17:14I'm afraid so.
17:16Delicate pink.
17:17That was Coby, wasn't it?
17:18That is usual.
17:19Not painting.
17:21Aye, aye.
17:21We're all ready then, Coby.
17:23The plant must, must be in the centre.
17:27Right, must be in the centre.
17:29Alistair Fraser, John's teacher,
17:31ignores the bad language
17:32and instead uses his enthusiasm
17:35to motivate the other students.
17:37If the plant's not in the middle,
17:38don't give it a yank up
17:40because what'll happen is
17:41it'll break the roots
17:42and the plant'll just die.
17:45That's getting worse.
17:45Look at that!
17:47It's getting worse.
17:48It's a bit divet.
17:49Fuckin' idiot.
17:51Prick!
17:55You get yourselves
17:56into the right guttle here.
18:00Shit!
18:01Where you, cunt?
18:03That's a bit shallow, that, innit?
18:05It's not even in the middle.
18:06I think some of you boys
18:07are crossing cross-eyed.
18:09Hey, cunt!
18:10What do you mean?
18:11Babe, you're a fuck, cunt!
18:13Hey, big nose!
18:14You haven't cut them
18:14right in the middle, have you?
18:16Alistair?
18:17Mike, go, Bingo!
18:18Yes?
18:18You and your children...
18:20At 16, John is at the crossroads
18:22of his life.
18:23That's good.
18:24Getting better, eh?
18:25Not only does he carry
18:26the burden of Tourette's,
18:28but he's changing
18:29from boy to man,
18:30from classmate to worker.
18:32Not looking very happy there.
18:33To John,
18:34these horticulture classes
18:35offer a rare chance
18:37to learn a skill.
18:38OK, lads.
18:39But the jinx of Tourette's
18:40mocks his efforts.
18:41Fuck off!
18:42What do we call these plants?
18:44Spider plants.
18:44Spider plants, sir.
18:46Remember, a couple of weeks back,
18:47we took off the offset.
18:48Recently,
18:49John has started spitting at people.
18:51Put them in these pots.
18:52You can see they're
18:53nicely grown away.
18:55We'll take out someone's plant
18:57and see how it's doing.
18:58That one.
18:59That's a good job.
19:00I do.
19:01Fucksy, cunt!
19:02We don't know who that one is.
19:06That's Kobe's.
19:07Kobe's.
19:08There you are, then.
19:09Let's see how it's doing.
19:11I can tell,
19:11because it's...
19:12Quacken, quacken!
19:12...reasonably
19:13firm in the pot there.
19:16Knock it out.
19:17Well, there's no...
19:18No evidence...
19:19It needs to be said, incidentally,
19:21that Tourette's
19:21is not a progressive disease.
19:23People with mild ticks
19:24will never move
19:26into the sort of yelling
19:27and cursing
19:27which John shows.
19:29Because you want the compost
19:32all the way around.
19:33But it seems to be
19:34surviving there.
19:37Another way of...
19:38Then, quite suddenly,
19:41John's curses
19:41are focused again.
19:43Here, he reacts
19:44to his teacher's error
19:45by calling him
19:46an effing idiot.
19:48Very well.
19:50Fucking idiot.
19:53So, we'll be
19:54putting these on
19:55later on this afternoon.
19:57All of us, I think,
19:58have...
19:59I feel obscenities
20:00and sort of angry curses
20:04arising in us,
20:05but we repress them,
20:07we inhibit them.
20:08John, I think,
20:09the...
20:10You know,
20:11it tends to leap
20:11over the bounds
20:13of inhibition.
20:15Generally,
20:15there's disinhibition
20:17and Tourette's,
20:18which can go all ways,
20:19which means
20:19the Tourette feels too much,
20:21but also too much
20:23comes out of him.
20:24There's a sort of transparency.
20:26He has to bear
20:27a bad form of Tourette's
20:29and a particularly
20:30distressing one
20:32to him and to others
20:33because it involves
20:34these socially disruptive
20:36yells and, above all,
20:39words.
20:39So he has to
20:41use obscenities.
20:43He struggles with this.
20:45He wants to say...
20:46This image of him
20:48holding his mouth
20:49for so much
20:51of the time
20:51so that, you know,
20:52so that things
20:53don't burst out
20:54is very painful
20:56to see.
20:56We sometimes say to him,
21:13for goodness sake,
21:14John, you know,
21:15you can't...
21:16You don't have to do that,
21:17you know.
21:18Stop it.
21:20You can't, really.
21:21When you stop
21:21and think about it,
21:22you think,
21:23I shouldn't have lost
21:24my temper,
21:24you know,
21:25really, he was...
21:26He can't help it.
21:28It's difficult to live with.
21:29It's terrible to live with.
21:31Oh, God.
21:34Shut up!
21:36Thump you on.
21:37Now, come on, behave.
21:39Tea time is no fun.
21:41The cake in the centre
21:42of the table
21:43is covered with a plastic box
21:44to keep John's spit off it.
21:49As well as William and Caroline,
21:51John has an older sister
21:52away at college in Edinburgh.
21:55But whereas his younger
21:56brother and sister
21:57are prepared to sit
21:57and eat with him
21:58if forced to,
21:59John's father prefers
22:01not to face the spit
22:02and bad language.
22:03Does he fuck off?
22:06He's not...
22:07He's normally in.
22:10Quite often,
22:11he's late,
22:12you know,
22:12because he works.
22:14He does extra jobs
22:15inside.
22:19And he doesn't like this.
22:20Not laughing.
22:22Carry on, either.
22:27It put a great strain on us.
22:30We came to the point
22:31where we were breaking up
22:33because of my husband's attitude.
22:35He tended to go and drink
22:37to get away from it.
22:40Which I don't blame him.
22:41If I could have done
22:42something like that,
22:43you know,
22:44I think I use my work.
22:46When I'm at work,
22:47I forget about the house.
22:48It's fucking not bad.
22:53Stop laughing, you.
22:54They sometimes
22:55have their friends to stay.
22:57Caroline has a friend
22:58that comes and stays
23:00the night sometimes.
23:02William and Bench's friends, eh?
23:03They just accept, John.
23:05They're not bad.
23:06I'm for that, ma'am.
23:06It's the older...
23:07Oh, Christ.
23:08The older children
23:09don't like it as much.
23:12Now you see why
23:17I don't want to sit.
23:18That's the worst
23:19habit he's got.
23:22Is the, um...
23:24The spitting.
23:25You don't want
23:25to have a bit of fish?
23:26It's the hardest one
23:27to live with, really.
23:29Are you not wanting
23:29that bit of fish?
23:30You can have it
23:31if you want.
23:32I don't like the chips, ma'am.
23:34I thought you were full up.
23:35It's the chips I don't like.
23:37Too greasy.
23:37No, I don't like it, ma'am.
23:42Grain food, John.
23:44Pardon me.
23:55How many fish is this?
23:56Hardick.
23:57It could.
24:00It could be hardick, John.
24:02It could be too deep.
24:05I don't want that, ma'am.
24:06I'll have it, no one.
24:09I'm sure the cat will enjoy it.
24:10As a professional nurse,
24:12Mrs Davidson accepts
24:13John's affliction
24:14as a medical condition.
24:15But her mother,
24:17John's grandmother,
24:18believes he is possessed
24:19by darker forces.
24:22God's sake.
24:24She thinks that, uh,
24:26John has the devil in him,
24:27that he should go to church
24:29and, uh, beg forgiveness
24:30for his sins and all this.
24:32Tourette himself
24:33had written a book
24:34about possession
24:35in the, in the theological sense,
24:37but this was a,
24:38a neurological possession.
24:40But it was a neurological disease
24:41which was also a public disorder
24:43because necessarily,
24:44it exploded into the public domain
24:46and people would have to react to it.
24:48They're just a smaller post office.
24:50Because the disease prevents
24:52John behaving normally in public,
24:54he attends special classes
24:55where necessary social routines
24:57can be practiced.
24:58Now, do you know what that means?
25:00Here, John and his classmates
25:03deal with tasks like
25:04paying fares on a bus,
25:06dealing with government forms,
25:07or today,
25:08the type of questions
25:09he might get asked
25:10at a post office.
25:11You need a visit
25:12to the post office.
25:14Okay, Ewan?
25:15All right.
25:16Postal orders,
25:18what do you think?
25:19As John is bright,
25:20he doesn't have much difficulty
25:22with all this in the classroom.
25:24Whereas teacher Lorna Peggy
25:25is forced to face
25:26the difficulties
25:27of John's Tourette's.
25:29Get it in anyone?
25:30I would think so.
25:32That's something that you can check.
25:34The spitting is manageable,
25:36but with girls in the class,
25:38the sexually explicit language
25:39is more difficult to cope with.
25:42So many of the things he says
25:44have a sexual connotation,
25:47and when girls are around,
25:49these are the things he says.
25:51It's all right here
25:52because the girls understand,
25:54although, you know,
25:55they do take offence occasionally,
25:57and one girl had a particular problem
25:59in understanding
26:00that it wasn't directed
26:02at her personally,
26:04that it was, you know,
26:06something that John does,
26:07and he's more upset about it
26:10than she would be.
26:14Personal or not,
26:16John's obscenities
26:16will always be a verbal time bomb
26:18waiting to go off in public.
26:21Fuck off.
26:22Fuck off.
26:22First class stamps, please.
26:31Fuck off.
26:34What?
26:35What an inquiry about a dog license.
26:37Uh-huh.
26:37What?
26:38How much is it?
26:39There are no official figures
26:42for sufferers of Tourette's.
26:44Estimates vary,
26:45but about one person
26:47in every 3,000
26:48seems to be the accepted average.
26:50The reason for the vagueness
26:55is the range of the affliction.
26:58John's Tourette's may be extreme,
27:01but it's not unique.
27:03For sufferers of this
27:04socially unacceptable disease,
27:06the only real hope
27:07is that the rest of us
27:08will understand
27:09that people like John
27:11are not mad.
27:12This is what I'd be,
27:14you see that I saw this,
27:15this is what I'd be digging up
27:16if I was working
27:17with the parts department now.
27:18Would it?
27:19Yeah.
27:19At this time of year?
27:20No!
27:21Fuck off.
27:21Right, I think we're
27:22going across here, John.
27:23All right.
27:23All right.
27:23I think we're going to cross here, John.
27:27There's something,
27:29one just keeps thinking
27:30why it has to be me
27:32and not
27:32folk that are criminals
27:35or
27:36deserve it.
27:37I think we're going to cross here.
27:39Okay.
27:40I'll cross here, John.
27:40Okay.
27:41Okay.
27:41Come on.
27:42We're going to cross here.
27:43Okay.
27:43Come on.
27:44I'll cross here.
27:44I'll cross here.
27:45All right.
27:45I'll cross here.
27:46Let it go.
27:46Come on.
27:46Get to the right side of the side.
27:47Come on.
27:47All right.
28:00Director of the side of the side of the side of the side.
28:02Take it.
28:02Come on.
28:32Come on, stop.
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