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attackfishWriting my current chapterfic, Children of Mars, is becoming a didactic exercise. The writing itself is as much a pleasure as ever, and has even gained a sense of catharsis, but when it comes time to post, I want to just save it to my computer and never let one more idiot reader anywhere near it. Now I know not all of you dear readers are idiots, and one of the things I like best about writing fanfiction is the social framework and critique of fandom (yeah, I write for the comments, such a bad girl) and I have never felt this way about posting a fic before. Before I have always written about able-bodied characters.
My writing Snape with a disability along with werewolfism is part protest at the way characters with disabilities were portrayed in the books I read as a child and part personal expression of myself as a writer with disabilities. We don’t have the same disability, in the story Snape uses crutches, whereas I’m oxygen dependent and have an immune disease, but we share a certain status as people with disabilities, or (good God) disabled people. It’s wonderful, and freeing, and it makes me feel so much better after bad days.
But once I post, it seems like so many of the reviews I receive are “teachable moments” and that’s not so wonderful.
Some of you have been saying you can’t wrap your heads around Snape as disabled. That isn’t because of anything inherent in either Snape as a character or disability, but in cultural narratives that paint people with disabilities as either weak, or more insidiously as plucky, happy symbols of Good, like the damsel in distress in action movies, not a character so much as an object. Snape will never be a tragic, passive, stoic cripple (a word that I see a lot in reviews and makes me throw up a little in my mouth each time). He will never be helpless. He is and always will be a snarky git. So many of the reviews talk about how horrible all of the other characters are to him. Well, he’s horrible to them. Besides which if anyone, even Lily, especially Lily, were suddenly to treat him like a helpless incompetent child who can’t protect himself or do a thing on his own, he would hex them all into oblivion. When people do that to me, I wish I could.
When I was a kid, books about people with disabilities seemed to end one of two ways. Either the pure, good, tragic cripple died, or the pure, good, tragic cripple was cured. Okay, there were also villains whose disabilities were a symbolic sign of their inner corruption, but I’m not even going to touch that one. Such endings are incredibly disheartening for me, growing up, because I didn’t want to die, and I was never going to be miraculously cured. I had to carve out a happy ending of my own that included my disability. For those of you who keep saying you want Snape’s leg repaired at the end, you are tapping into that same disenfranchising cultural narrative. Stop it. Stop it now. Don’t make me get out my squirt bottle of wrathful smiting. Whatever ending I write (and I will spoil this, if nothing else) Snape and his disability will be around at the end, along with their happy ending.
One thing I didn’t mention about the perfect tragic cripple trope is that they are always portrayed as lacking any sort of sexuality at all. They neither have sexual feelings or are appropriate objects of desire for other characters. What. The. Hell. Okay, okay, there is one type of character with disabilities allowed to lust, the disabled villain. Of course their sexuality is always portrayed as deviant, and threatening, and further sign of their evil. Now, no one has sent me a comment with this bit of fail in it, as Snape hasn’t done any more than engage in some canon unrequited Lily love, but I’m waiting, When the situation calls for them, I’ll get these too. I have no doubt.
All of this makes me feel even more queasy as I write this, and I get no catharsis or enjoyment from it. It shouldn’t be my job, but because I will continue writing characters with disabilities, not just in fic but in original works as well, I have put myself in the position of teaching by example, so for my own peace of mind, I must also teach directly. I’m sure those characters will get similar sorts of reviews, sometimes, if I’m lucky, from reviewers and writers I respect. When I send my stories out into the world, the knowledge that people will read my characters differently because of their disabilities will always be there.
Snape is not tragic. He is not a poor crippled boy to be protected and treated nicely by the noble heroes. He is the hero. He will fight against and work with his disability, but ultimately, he will do it on his own, like all of us must do at the end of the day.
I’m sure I didn’t cover everything in this post, and a lot of you will be rolling your eyes going “yes, we know all this” and this is really basic realize people with disabilities are people stuff, but I keep getting comments where I have to reiterate this. All of you dear readers who do know all this, thank you, and no fear all, I’m still writing Children of Mars and other fanfics.
My writing Snape with a disability along with werewolfism is part protest at the way characters with disabilities were portrayed in the books I read as a child and part personal expression of myself as a writer with disabilities. We don’t have the same disability, in the story Snape uses crutches, whereas I’m oxygen dependent and have an immune disease, but we share a certain status as people with disabilities, or (good God) disabled people. It’s wonderful, and freeing, and it makes me feel so much better after bad days.
But once I post, it seems like so many of the reviews I receive are “teachable moments” and that’s not so wonderful.
Some of you have been saying you can’t wrap your heads around Snape as disabled. That isn’t because of anything inherent in either Snape as a character or disability, but in cultural narratives that paint people with disabilities as either weak, or more insidiously as plucky, happy symbols of Good, like the damsel in distress in action movies, not a character so much as an object. Snape will never be a tragic, passive, stoic cripple (a word that I see a lot in reviews and makes me throw up a little in my mouth each time). He will never be helpless. He is and always will be a snarky git. So many of the reviews talk about how horrible all of the other characters are to him. Well, he’s horrible to them. Besides which if anyone, even Lily, especially Lily, were suddenly to treat him like a helpless incompetent child who can’t protect himself or do a thing on his own, he would hex them all into oblivion. When people do that to me, I wish I could.
When I was a kid, books about people with disabilities seemed to end one of two ways. Either the pure, good, tragic cripple died, or the pure, good, tragic cripple was cured. Okay, there were also villains whose disabilities were a symbolic sign of their inner corruption, but I’m not even going to touch that one. Such endings are incredibly disheartening for me, growing up, because I didn’t want to die, and I was never going to be miraculously cured. I had to carve out a happy ending of my own that included my disability. For those of you who keep saying you want Snape’s leg repaired at the end, you are tapping into that same disenfranchising cultural narrative. Stop it. Stop it now. Don’t make me get out my squirt bottle of wrathful smiting. Whatever ending I write (and I will spoil this, if nothing else) Snape and his disability will be around at the end, along with their happy ending.
One thing I didn’t mention about the perfect tragic cripple trope is that they are always portrayed as lacking any sort of sexuality at all. They neither have sexual feelings or are appropriate objects of desire for other characters. What. The. Hell. Okay, okay, there is one type of character with disabilities allowed to lust, the disabled villain. Of course their sexuality is always portrayed as deviant, and threatening, and further sign of their evil. Now, no one has sent me a comment with this bit of fail in it, as Snape hasn’t done any more than engage in some canon unrequited Lily love, but I’m waiting, When the situation calls for them, I’ll get these too. I have no doubt.
All of this makes me feel even more queasy as I write this, and I get no catharsis or enjoyment from it. It shouldn’t be my job, but because I will continue writing characters with disabilities, not just in fic but in original works as well, I have put myself in the position of teaching by example, so for my own peace of mind, I must also teach directly. I’m sure those characters will get similar sorts of reviews, sometimes, if I’m lucky, from reviewers and writers I respect. When I send my stories out into the world, the knowledge that people will read my characters differently because of their disabilities will always be there.
Snape is not tragic. He is not a poor crippled boy to be protected and treated nicely by the noble heroes. He is the hero. He will fight against and work with his disability, but ultimately, he will do it on his own, like all of us must do at the end of the day.
I’m sure I didn’t cover everything in this post, and a lot of you will be rolling your eyes going “yes, we know all this” and this is really basic realize people with disabilities are people stuff, but I keep getting comments where I have to reiterate this. All of you dear readers who do know all this, thank you, and no fear all, I’m still writing Children of Mars and other fanfics.
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no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 03:12 am (UTC)And now you've made me want to read your fic. It sounds really, really good. :)
no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 04:10 am (UTC)Lol, *blush* It's really really not done, and it's on hold while I finish up other projects.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 04:20 am (UTC)I find the idea of exploring disability in a fantasy/sci-fi world to be really fascinating. The adjustment is hard enough for someone with normal human abilities - what would it be like for someone who can fly to suddenly not be able to move?
Well, I'll check out what you have, anyway. :)
no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 04:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 02:17 am (UTC)In re to mainstream media portrayals of characters with disabilities, have you seen the TV show, Friday Night Lights? One of the main characters became paralyzed early on and I thought the show did a pretty good job of representing a whole human being with a disability as opposed to a stereotype.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 02:42 am (UTC)It's in my netflix queue, actually, but it keeps getting oushed back in favor of BBC crime dramas.
Clear out of the blue...
Date: 2011-09-29 02:35 am (UTC)In terms of fandoms with awesome portrayals of disabled characters, might I recommend 'Covert Affairs?' Auggie Anderson is one of the main characters, a CIA analyst who was blinded before the start of the series. He is, at no point, plucky, stoic, or god forbid, inspirational. He *is,* however, snarky, funny, charming, cocky, and occasionally kind of a dick. The characters around him do not doubt his competence. He is, occasionally, denied field work, but this is a limitation imposed by his bosses which he constantly works to rectify or subvert.
The actor who portrays him, Chris Gorham, *is* sighted, and I know able-bodied actors portraying disabled characters is a bit of a bugbear of its own. But Chris insists on accuracy, both in his own performance and in the show's handling of his character's condition. He spent time with the Canadian Institute for the Blind to prepare for the role, learning the skills and habits that blind people use to navigate the world, and he portrays them well. Auggie uses real products available to the blind-- a talking watch, a Braille line for his keyboard, specialized stove-tops, an iPhone (Apple's products are apparently very good about accessibility), and more. Even minor things like the ways his hands trace objects and interact with his environment are, to borrow the words of Annie, the main character, "oddly mesmerizing."
And the best part about all of that is that it is simply worked into the background of the show. The other characters treat it as routine. Annie and Auggie walk into the office around the same time. She touches her hand to the back of his, he recognizes her perfume, grabs her arm, and they walk and chat. It's a regular thing. Auggie is brought in for an interrogation by his boss; he enters the unfamiliar room, boss says "You'll never guess what I found today. Chair's right in front of you," Auggie sits down, interrogation continues.
Sorry, I know I gushed a bit there, but as you can probably tell, I *really* like the character, and I think his portrayal is just flat-out awesome. One of a small (but growing!) number of examples of doin' it right. (TOPH!)
Thanks again for writing and sharing this! I hope more and more people starting reading things like this and checking their assumptions at the door.
Re: Clear out of the blue...
Date: 2011-09-29 03:32 am (UTC)I don't like Covert Affairs for reasons that have nothing to do with it's treatment of disability (it just kept breaking my suspension of disbelief) but it's always good to have one more well portrayed character with disabilities.
TOPH IS GOD. THAT IS ALL. THIS IS A TRUTH WHICH CANNOT BE DENYED.
Re: Clear out of the blue...
Date: 2011-09-29 10:05 am (UTC)Speaking of Toph, I'd love to hear your thoughts on the Disability Superpower (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DisabilitySuperpower) trope. That's kind of what she has, but at the same time, kind of not (since it's stated that any earthbender could develop that sense, but very few actually *do*). I'm on the autism spectrum, so it's an interesting query from a personal standpoint. My brain is wired so that some things are much easier for me, while others are vastly more difficult... and yet, the same could theoretically be said of anyone's brain, to a certain degree.
Re: Clear out of the blue...
Date: 2011-09-29 01:45 pm (UTC)Me too. I have visual processing issues from my seizures, but we joke that the linguistic centers of my brain just took over. I remember everything I hear and most of what I read, but pictures and graphs? Oh why! And escalators hate me, and if I can't remember your face, I'm sorry, deal. I also speak English, Arabic, Hebrew, and Russian, and I understand Swedish and Dutch (though why most English speakers don't always throws me). And (utterly unrelated) I have a child's ability to hear very high pitched noises, like dog whistles, the antibarking things, tvs that have been left on with the cable box turned off... Mostly useless and occasionally really painful. This gets made into a disability superpower all the time, usually for blindness. At the same time, what gets me about that trope is that the superpower almost always makes up for the disability, I.E. a blind person uses their other super strong senses, so we don't have to show what it's really like being blind! This is part of the reason I wrote my blind Zuko AU. Since the only thing he can sense with his bending is fire, he has to deal with his blindness with a cane and spatial memorization. And then when he joins the Gaang, they make comparisons... The interesting thing about Toph, though, is that they frequently put her in situations where she can't see with her bending, and she's at a much larger disadvantage than other blind people, because she didn't learn other coping strategies. This means that in certain situations, Zuko gets to have the advantage.
I've actually been planning to do an essay on this topic for a while. Things just keep getting away from me. Right now though, I'm more likely to go on a long rant about the "no death or permanent injury" tag to h/c fics. Oh, they're equivalent now? Can't have our happy ending if someone has a disability at the end, can we? Bullshit.
Grateful
Date: 2011-11-17 04:42 pm (UTC)Why? Because people are clueless. We can only understand what fits into our worldview, or what we've been exposed to. We can do all the research we want, but at the end of the day it can be really hard to put yourself in the shoes of someone different. Another race, another gender, someone with a disability, anything. It's posts like yours that make us stop and go "Huh."
So thanks. I came from FF.net and I loved your stories already, but I have a new respect for you for not being afraid to smack poor, unenlightened folks in the face.
Sometimes we need it.
Re: Grateful
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