Writing Advice: Disability And Infantilization

Writing Advice: Disability And Infantilization

Here Is Life Lesson To Take Into Everything: Disabled Adults Are Adults

In My Multi-Part Series, I Will Be Talking About The Different Ways That Writers Alike Mess Up This Phrase.

Disabled Adults Are Children?

This is a common mistake that authors make when attempting to write distabled characters. This is especially common when representing intellectually disabled characters but it definitely appears in the representations of the physically disabled.

Infantilization is a form of ableism where an individual talks/thinks/acts with a disabled person the way you might interact with an infantile child or dumb dog.

This type of infantilizing tends to impact those

If you want to understand how infantilization impacts real humans living in the real world and not characters, there are a ton of resources online and on Tumblr.

For disabled characters, love interests, allies, and the narrative itself relegate these characters to "funny animal sidekick" or "symbol of innocence".

I'm going to go through a rapid fire list of how authors infantilize and downplay how amazing their characters could be if you gave them something to do. Ok? Ok!

Never Giving Your Disabled Character Something To Do In The Story Besides Sitting There And Looking Innocent

Portraying Your Disabled Or Disabled-Coded(autism-coded) Character As Ignorant Or Unwanting Of "Adult Things" Like Sex, Problems, And Unhappiness

Assuming That Your Disabled Character Couldn't Do [THING] Despite Not Asking Mommy Google About It

Not Treating A Disabled Person's Desires, Beliefs, And Opinions Are Serious Which Often Leads To Characters Violating Their Boundaries

Having Your Likeable Characters Treat The Disabled Character Condescendingly Like Patting Their Head Or Acting Disapprovingly Shocked When A Character Goes Outside This

Refusing A Character's Ability To Be Independent By Having Them Only Rely On Others To Do Everything

When you, author, treat your intellectually/physically disabled character as a symbol of innocence or a child, you deny audiences the ability to see well-developed characters on screen! Disabled adults are adults who do things that adults do!

They drink if they want to

They have sex if they want to

They identify as [Something] if they want to

They date if they want to

They swear if they want to

They believe if they want to

Caretaker/Friend/Love Interest characters should not be romanticize when they disrespect this character, desexualize this character, and violate the boundaries of this character.

"When you deny the humanity of certain characters, you deny the humanity of certain people. "

Hi, Plus-Sized Person here who can't focus on class because the chairs with the armrests because they squeeze into my stomach and I literally need to think in advance how I am going to get out of this hellhole

We don’t talk enough about the systemic health effects of casual fatphobia and how much they fucking skew the data to the point where we literally cannot know how much outcomes are actually related to fatness and how much they are related to society not being designed for fat people, like literal design.

My best friend cannot find a bra.

She’s fat. We won’t get into the ~why~ here because it honestly wouldn’t matter whether it was “all her fault” or whether it was a result of outside forces like genes and such, she still deserves a goddamn fucking bra that fits.

And she cannot find a bra.

She’s short and fat, and Fat Bras are usually full cup, but because she’s short the full cups are usually too tall, or the armbands around them are too tall, to the point where what’ll fit around her chest and over her boobs will also dig up into her arms or have such high coverage that she literally cannot wear a shirt with a neckline high enough. Any bra that goes out enough goes too high.

This affects her ability to find clothing, impacting her ability to go outside sometimes, because she has this tiny selection of bras and she constantly has to wash them and when they’re gone she has no idea when she’ll next be able to find another unicorn bra. They appear in a flash usually in startups that die soon after, and COVID has killed most the small businesses remaining where she had even a hint of a chance of finding a fitting bra.

So she wears bras that don’t fit. Or she doesn’t leave the house. One gives her back pain. The other is, obviously, not very active. She likes to be active.

If she brings it up, people suggest breast reduction surgery.

But the thing is, with a good bra, she does not get back pain.

But if it’s that hard to find a good bra, they say, wouldn’t a reduction just be easier?

Wouldn’t it be easier for you to chop off part of your flesh, they say, then for us to cut fabric and underwire to more sizes? As if that is normal. As if that isn’t horrifying.

It’s not just bras. It’s chairs. It’s benches. It’s goddamn shoes. It’s seatbelts. It’s exercise equipment - I just got an exercise bike for Christmas. I had to shop around to find an affordable one that was also rated to take my level of fat. If I were 100 pounds heavier, which some people are? I don’t think any equipment would have existed in a price range that any working person could expect to afford. I don’t think most people even look at the weight ratings on chairs and couches and furniture. Once you start? They are lower than you think. There are absolutely 100% people you love in your life - whether really tall men or just average kinda overweight fat people - who should not be using the things they are using. Who are not getting support from their mattress, their footwear, their office chair. It might be you! You might be thinking “but I am average size!”, but the amount of furniture out there that’s only weighted to about 200lbs? Or 175??? It’s SO MUCH MORE THAN YOU REALIZE. Get into the Proper Fat? The 350lb, 400lb, 500lb fat? There’s virtually nothing.

Seatbelts are not tested for fat bodies and seatbelt extenders aren’t regulated.

We know about the problems with too small a blood pressure cuff. With too low a medicine dose. With no MRI a really fat body can fit in for a thousand miles.

We know, from multiple studies on multiple oppressed communities, that social bias by itself, with zero other compounding factors, can give people worse health outcomes.

Now add up

+ one of the social biases with the least pushback even from the educated liberal set with

+ having a world that is literally not made for you. Where you cannot get clothes, furniture, or transportation in a way that will actually accommodate you,

+ where society is constantly blaming you for this. And even if you somehow (and if you know how, please tell me) manage to retain some sense of self worth and optimism and determination despite all that

+ that’s not gonna magically give you access to the daily supplies a person needs in their home and out in public that’ll make living safe and healthy life literally physically possible.

If you’re really so concerned about fat people’s health start a bra company. If you’re really so concerned about fat people’s health mandate changes to seatbelt requirements. If you’re really so concerned about fat people’s health have a variety of chairs in your waiting room with at least some being properly Fat Rated. If you’re really so concerned about fat people’s health, make it easier for fat people to be active by making exercise equipment that fits them, swimwear that’ll actually stay on them, athletic shoes that can bear them. If you’re really so concerned about fat people’s health ask they be included in more medical trials. If you’re really so concerned about fat people’s health, promote fat visibility and fat people loving their bodies - because hating yourself has literally never been good for anyone’s health.

If you’re using “concern for health” as a shield to allow you to judge and criticize strangers, you don’t give a fuck about anyone’s health. You’re just an asshole who prefers a veneer of respectability when you bully people. You’re hateful and we can see right through you.

But fatphobia isn’t just bullying. It isn’t just judgment from strangers. It isn’t just medical neglect and medical bias. Even if we could wave a wand and make all that go away, my best friend still wouldn’t have a bra that fits, people still wouldn’t have a chair that supports them, a seatbelt that protects them. It’s literally engineered in. And it slowly kills people day by day by day.

A good bridge point between not breaking the suspense of belief and dramatics is to have a "boiling point". You put a character into a type of circumstance and they start changing subtly/internally. Then, at an emotional high, all of this boiling and emotional turbulance culminates in a big dramatic display of what was happening internally. So, while the change may appear "sudden" it was actually the result of a rise in tension!

Writing Advice: Writing Out Of Character

No, this time I am not going to trash bad examples of characters being "out of character". Instead I am going to explain to you what seperates a good character who is behaving differently and a bad character who is behaving illogically.

Question 1: Why Is The Character Behaving Like This?

When we writers put our characters through the ringer we often see our characters change in drastic and "unexpected" ways. This is an example of "good character arc" and not "out of character" because if you supply justification for why your character is changing things up and doing different things then it's character development!

Virtuous Character A, in a desperate bid to stay alive and after being repeatedly pushed to the brink by these harrowing cirumstances, kills Character B? That is good character development!

Intelligent and prudish Character C suddenly starts acting like they're staring in a smut fic towards Character D as their "body betrays them" due to horomones they should've learne to control in their teens? That is out of character!

Has this writer(me) been writing informative yet argumentative works but has tried to start offering a softer and less confrontational side in order to appeal to more people? That is character development!

Question 2: Have You Given Your Character Enough Time To Evolve?

Unlike what love stories try to convince you, it takes a pretty long while for people to change their behaviors and mindset!

Has your normally stoic character who has been practicing understanding their emotions finally expressing some emotion? That's character development!

Have I been slowly adding more informative perspective and softer actions throughout my rants? Then it's much more believeable that I would express a softer side towards this issue!

Verified Palestinian gofundme’s Masterlist

Rightfully so, I have gotten messages worrying if everything I post is legit (I try my best to make sure the answer is yes), but here’s a masterlist of ones that one or more people have confirmed are legit Palestinians. Most are from the blogs @el-shab-hussein, @ibtisams, @palestinecharitycommissionsassoc ,@90-ghost, @nabulsi and @palipunk

I will also be making individual posts for most of these

Help Khaled and his family escape Gaza

Help lara and abdalla Family to be safe in Gaza

Emergency: Help Ibrahim's Family Find Safety - $50 is 500kr

HELP Ezzideen & his Family to EVACUATE Gaza

Your help is the only hope to save us from war.

Hope : Help Little Elen Fetch a brighter Future

Help Aseel’s family evacuate from Gaza.

EMERGENCY: HELP evacuate Bashar from Gaza

Help Mohammad Hammad evacuate his family from Gaza

Help Madleen's Family From Gaza

Help Jehad Evacute From Gaza

Help a med student & his family evacuate to safety

Help Fadi's Family Rebuild Their Life Amidst Crisis

Help Us Safely Evacuate a family from Gaza

Help child with Cerebral Palsy evacuate

Protect an open source engineer and his family

Help Bring Ayah’s Family in Gaza to Safety

Call to Action: Keep Gazas Talent Alive

Help Belal and His Family Escape the War in Gaza

Urgent Rescue Mission for the Mortaja Family

Save my family from the war in Gaza

Urgent: Help Evacuate My Family From Gaza War

Urgent help to evacuate my family out of Gaza

Help evacuate Safi’s family from Gaza in warfare

emergency : Help Support the Khalaf Family in Gaza

Help AbdulAziz and his family

Help Yousef escape Gaza and treat his cancer

Help my family rebuild home und evacuate Gaza

Please Help Me Evacuate My Children To Safety

Escape From War Nightmare: Support Gazan Family

Help my family in Gaza

Salaam Animal Care, find a safe home for animals

URGENT HELP help my family to evacuate Gaza

Help me & my Family Evacuate from Gaza

Urgent Appeal for Support: Help a Photographer

Help Jana's Family Find Refuge and Peace

Help me to save my family from the war in Gaza

Help evacuate my brother and his family from Gaza

Urgent apeal to help Elzomar family leave Gaza immediately

Help my mum to travel to a safe place

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Support getting Linda and her family out of Gaza

Support Mohammed and His Family Affected by the Gaza War

Help Ala's Family Overcome Crisis in Gaza

Freedom and home repair for Aesha an family

Help us evacuate and rebuild what's left of our lives

Help Tamer and his Family in Gaza!

Help my family escape death and reunite with me.

Help me and my family escape the Genocide in Gaza

Help rebuild Ahmed's family life in Gaza .

Emergency : Saving My Mother and only brother From War Zone

Rescue Mahmoud's Family: A Call to Escape Gaza's Devastation

Help Mohammed & His Family To Safety

Help Almoghrabi family to evacuate Gaza strip

Urgent Appeal: Help Save Ruba & Muhammad in Gaza!

Urgent help to evacuate my family from Gaza

Help Alia's family and their children get out of Gaza

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Support My Family Escape War in Gaza

Help me get my family out to safety

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Please Help Evacuate Fadi's Family from Gaza

URGENT: Help Hayam and her Family Escape the Genocide

For what remained in us من أجل ما تبقى فينا

Please Help Restore The Sharifs home & Help Leave A War Zone

Help Shymaa's Family Reunite in Egypt

Help Mahmoud’s family evacuate from Gaza

Donate to help Deyaa and his family escape Gaza

Fatima’s Journey to Restore Artistry in Gaza

My family under fire, help them evacuate Gaza.

Help me to evacuate from the genocide

Help Mahmoud to evacuate from Gaza to continue education

Help my family evacuate from Gaza

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Haytham needs your help to support his family

Help my family survive and evacuate from Gaza

Help me rebuild a shelter for my family in Rafah

HelpYoussef and his family get out of Gaza for a better life

Let my family be safe and live in peace!

Relief Appeal: Secure Evacuation from Gaza War

Please Help Tahani save her children and husband

Urgent Help Appeal: exit the war of Gaza"

Help My Family Get Out Of Gaza

Vegetables, food, and water for Palestinian families

HELP Muhammad evacuate his family out of GAZA

Secure a Safe Future for Youssef’s Family - Act now

Support My Journey to a New Start

Help Shymaa's Family Reunite in Egypt

Help Me and my Family to evacuate from Gaza ASAP

Saving My Family from the Horrors of War in Gaza

Help the Allahawani family escape genocide

URGENT - Help Azzam evacuate his family from Gaza

help my children get out of gaza safely

Emergency: Help Evacuate My Family from Gaza

Help Safaa secure her children‘s lives after war

Help Kareem get his family from Gaza to safety

Help Karim and his family get to a safe place

Thank you so much for adding my thoughts! Sometimes I have to cut down on information and exceptions for the sake of clarity and to make a point. Luckily, I don't have all-comsuming influencing power over people's writing ;)

Writing Advice: Writing Out Of Character

No, this time I am not going to trash bad examples of characters being "out of character". Instead I am going to explain to you what seperates a good character who is behaving differently and a bad character who is behaving illogically.

Question 1: Why Is The Character Behaving Like This?

When we writers put our characters through the ringer we often see our characters change in drastic and "unexpected" ways. This is an example of "good character arc" and not "out of character" because if you supply justification for why your character is changing things up and doing different things then it's character development!

Virtuous Character A, in a desperate bid to stay alive and after being repeatedly pushed to the brink by these harrowing cirumstances, kills Character B? That is good character development!

Intelligent and prudish Character C suddenly starts acting like they're staring in a smut fic towards Character D as their "body betrays them" due to horomones they should've learne to control in their teens? That is out of character!

Has this writer(me) been writing informative yet argumentative works but has tried to start offering a softer and less confrontational side in order to appeal to more people? That is character development!

Question 2: Have You Given Your Character Enough Time To Evolve?

Unlike what love stories try to convince you, it takes a pretty long while for people to change their behaviors and mindset!

Has your normally stoic character who has been practicing understanding their emotions finally expressing some emotion? That's character development!

Have I been slowly adding more informative perspective and softer actions throughout my rants? Then it's much more believeable that I would express a softer side towards this issue!

My Favorite Writing Thing :)

I love seeing stigmatized communities and character archetypes, grabbing them with such a feral energy that they may just but never do break, and whispering in their ear like i'm professing stories of the end with a flustered laugh in my eyes

"be my character. i won't change your life. i'll help you grow. i won't force you to be something you aren't so just be with me, please. let me be your god and i'll be your most devoted worshipper"