(no subject)
Thu, Oct. 25th, 2012 04:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chordatesrock posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
access_fandomHello! I'm pleased to find that this place exists. I joined DW just to be able to post here, actually. It's awesome that I'm not the only one out there who cares about fandom AND disability. Nice to meet you all, I think we'll get along splendidly, although, alas, no one else here seems to like my ridiculously obscure current main fandom.
So, I was wondering if you have any advice to offer about something.
I was writing this fic that I may or may not ever get around to actually posting, in which a character has a disability xe doesn't have in canon. And as long as it's just for my own amusement, I can just write what would happen without worrying too much about what other people would get out of it, but in case I ever do post it, I'd rather it not fail, which it probably won't, but there's this one scene I was writing where xe's decided to try Doing Something Cool, but the Cool Something in question is one that real-life people with xyr extracanonical disability don't (at least where I live, I don't think it's legal and I'm pretty sure the necessary assistive tech isn't on the mass market yet), and someone is pointing out to xem that there's a reason for that and this is a really risky idea. But the character with the disability is canonically the sort of person who does risky things for fun all the time and (sometimes literally) drags the cautious character along, so xe's having none of this. Plus xe has access to assistance Doing Something Cool that real-life people with this disability don't, and is in a situation that's a little different from real life in that all of the risk is to the disabled character, the cautious character or a third person's property, whereas in real life the risk is to all of those things plus other people's lives. Also, in this canon, there don't happen to be applicable laws forbidding this, again unlike real life. And this particular Something Cool occupies a totally different position in the fictional culture from the one it occupies in the real-life one I live in. Among other things, the Something Cool is viewed as being really important to a person's ability to be a contributing member of society, to a greater extent than real life.
In terms of how I think the characters involved would act given the circumstances they're in, Extracanonically-Disabled Character is going to do this despite Cautious Character's protests. Xe's going to fail to mention a relevant disability to a character who would probably try to stop xem, and then Do Something Cool, and a couple of characters are going to be surprised afterward but they're not going to keep sputtering in denial or anything ever, they're just going to be surprised and move on. The character's going to be worse at Doing Something Cool than xe is in canon, because canonically at this point xe would have had several years of practice as opposed to just now learning.
But halfway through writing the scene I started thinking about how a CND audience might read it. And I started thinking that it's going to look like I'm being didactic and saying anyone can do anything absolutely regardless of any disability at all. I'm also worried that it's going to come off as questioning real-life people who (in obedience to the law, no less) don't Do Something Cool. Worse, I'm worried it could give the CNDs in the audience the idea that this is totally how it really works in real life, never mind the assistance the character is getting (which is a reasonable solution in their situation, but not in real life because not everything this canon has exists in real life), or that it could come off as a preachy lesson on how disability could never prevent anyone from doing anything, and only someone stupid and prejudiced would ever conceive of such a thing. Because the characters who are surprised are being reasonable (and I'm worried since neither of them are planned to be viewpoint characters in this scene, it's hard for the reader to tell the difference between "oh, I didn't think disabled people could do anything, OMG, I've Learned a Lesson that PWDs have value and can be capable" and "I didn't realize you could do that particular thing with this particular disability, but it looks like I guessed wrong") and the character saying this is a bad idea is acting pretty much like he does in canon about everything.
So, I'd love to know if anyone has any recommendations. If you were writing this, what would you do?
So, I was wondering if you have any advice to offer about something.
I was writing this fic that I may or may not ever get around to actually posting, in which a character has a disability xe doesn't have in canon. And as long as it's just for my own amusement, I can just write what would happen without worrying too much about what other people would get out of it, but in case I ever do post it, I'd rather it not fail, which it probably won't, but there's this one scene I was writing where xe's decided to try Doing Something Cool, but the Cool Something in question is one that real-life people with xyr extracanonical disability don't (at least where I live, I don't think it's legal and I'm pretty sure the necessary assistive tech isn't on the mass market yet), and someone is pointing out to xem that there's a reason for that and this is a really risky idea. But the character with the disability is canonically the sort of person who does risky things for fun all the time and (sometimes literally) drags the cautious character along, so xe's having none of this. Plus xe has access to assistance Doing Something Cool that real-life people with this disability don't, and is in a situation that's a little different from real life in that all of the risk is to the disabled character, the cautious character or a third person's property, whereas in real life the risk is to all of those things plus other people's lives. Also, in this canon, there don't happen to be applicable laws forbidding this, again unlike real life. And this particular Something Cool occupies a totally different position in the fictional culture from the one it occupies in the real-life one I live in. Among other things, the Something Cool is viewed as being really important to a person's ability to be a contributing member of society, to a greater extent than real life.
In terms of how I think the characters involved would act given the circumstances they're in, Extracanonically-Disabled Character is going to do this despite Cautious Character's protests. Xe's going to fail to mention a relevant disability to a character who would probably try to stop xem, and then Do Something Cool, and a couple of characters are going to be surprised afterward but they're not going to keep sputtering in denial or anything ever, they're just going to be surprised and move on. The character's going to be worse at Doing Something Cool than xe is in canon, because canonically at this point xe would have had several years of practice as opposed to just now learning.
But halfway through writing the scene I started thinking about how a CND audience might read it. And I started thinking that it's going to look like I'm being didactic and saying anyone can do anything absolutely regardless of any disability at all. I'm also worried that it's going to come off as questioning real-life people who (in obedience to the law, no less) don't Do Something Cool. Worse, I'm worried it could give the CNDs in the audience the idea that this is totally how it really works in real life, never mind the assistance the character is getting (which is a reasonable solution in their situation, but not in real life because not everything this canon has exists in real life), or that it could come off as a preachy lesson on how disability could never prevent anyone from doing anything, and only someone stupid and prejudiced would ever conceive of such a thing. Because the characters who are surprised are being reasonable (and I'm worried since neither of them are planned to be viewpoint characters in this scene, it's hard for the reader to tell the difference between "oh, I didn't think disabled people could do anything, OMG, I've Learned a Lesson that PWDs have value and can be capable" and "I didn't realize you could do that particular thing with this particular disability, but it looks like I guessed wrong") and the character saying this is a bad idea is acting pretty much like he does in canon about everything.
So, I'd love to know if anyone has any recommendations. If you were writing this, what would you do?
(no subject)
Date: 2012-10-26 02:58 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-10-27 03:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-10-26 07:17 am (UTC)Hmm...
Date: 2012-10-26 09:28 am (UTC)work. Have I got some stories
that deal with disabilities in
very realistic ways, along the
typical limits of current
culture and technology? Yes. I also have some at considerably lower levels of technology.
Do I have some characters who respect their own limits and are fairly sensible people? Yes. I have some disabled characters who are quiet. I also have some who do things like fight sea monsters or alien robots.
So that leaves more leeway to explore how other cultures and other technologies might compensate for disabilities in different ways, and how characters with different personality traits might deal with limits.
If you've only handled a motif once, the risk of getting something wrong or looking like you're sending the wrong message is higher. If you've explored it in different aspects across multiple stories, poems, illustrations, or whatever you make then it's less likely to seem as though you're saying "this character = ALL PEOPLE with this disability." Plus if somebody doesn't like stories with unrealistic exceptions to disability, you can say, "My more realistic stuff is over here." It's kind of like having a warp drive and a plain old rocket ship in SF. Not everybody likes the same stuff.
Re: Hmm...
Date: 2012-10-27 03:31 am (UTC)Hey, wait a sec, how come characters who respect their own limits and are fairly sensible people can't fight sea monsters or alien robots? ;) (Joke.)
Thanks!
Re: Hmm...
Date: 2012-10-27 04:45 am (UTC)Precisely. The difference
between tokenism and icebreaking
is the difference between
singularity and plurality.
>>So what you're saying is, my wanting to write everything about disability all the time is actually a good idea, not something that makes me boring and repetitive? Cool!<<
As long as you're exploring a
diverse span of the topic, yes,
that's an asset. Different
disabilities, different ways
that people cope or try to cope
with them, different cultures
and roles for people with
disabilities, etc. -- it all
adds up to one of the things
you can become known for as a
writer.
Every writer has favorite topics.
Some of mine include unusual
sexes/genders, fish out of water,
and alien languages. But I've
also built up a lot of characters
with disabilities. You can see
several examples on my Serial
Poetry page including The
Clockwork War and P.I.E.
In the science fantasy shared
world Torn World, we have a theme
set for "Disability in Torn World."
>>Hey, wait a sec, how come characters who respect their own limits and are fairly sensible people can't fight sea monsters or alien robots? ;) (Joke.)<<
Of course they can; it's just
that the wilder type-A heroes
seem to get caught on camera
more often. *ponder* Okay,
Brenda in P.I.E. is pretty calm
and practical about the fighting
of villains and pests. But she
also still goes kayaking, even
though her legs barely work. I
haven't gotten to the kayak scenes
in the storyline yet, but have
ideas for them.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-10-27 02:16 am (UTC)I was able to come up with an example if you don't want to reveal what's happening in your work.
You've decided to blind your Cool Character. In our world, blind people don't drive cars (in fact that's informally how we separate someone with lousy vision from someone who's "blind.") So you're going to give C.C. a magically super smart car (albeit based on currently-available tech) which C.C. can drive all over town.
My question here is, what's the point of blinding a person and then removing their functional limitation with magic tech?
(no subject)
Date: 2012-10-27 03:25 am (UTC)C.C. does also have assistive tech, and it's not 100% identical to real-world assistive tech, but the most blatant improvement I made to anything was making something wireless and magically self-powering that in our world needs to be attached to a power source. The other change to assistive tech is a real-world thing that's designed with the goal of being able to do Normal Everyday Activity and making it how it would be if it were designed with Much More Epic Activity in mind (thus compromising the device's ability to help with Normal Everyday Activity). In fact, I'm not sure, but that last one might even be feasible if it were something anyone in the real world actually wanted to build.
It's not like I've just given C.C. a disability and then given them assistive tech that completely eliminates all the disadvantages. C.C. is relying on their canon sidekick for a lot of things they canonically don't need help with, and the different set of abilities means plot changes that were really fun to plot out. I get to add a subplot where a canonically one-dimensional villain teams up with C.C. to do a wonderful public work for completely selfish reasons. Several characters get to learn something about one story arc too soon (and therefore get time to actually react to it instead of just go OMG and then head off to the climax). And C.C. and their sidekick are both public figures, and people's perceptions of them are a lot different, partly because the sidekick ends up acquiring their canon disability much later than in canon.
Okay...
Date: 2012-10-27 04:55 am (UTC)Conversely, sometimes the point is that there is magic or technology so powerful that it really can eclipse a handicap. I've got one blind wizard in an unpublished story who's that way; and it's important because he's in a ratty little shop in the armpit of town. That's a clue that, despite appearances, he is damn good at magic.
Then taking the next step, there are adaptive devices that create better-than-original abilities. (People are currently fighting over this in sports, particularly with the Cheetah feet.) This dates back to mythology with stories like Nuada of the Silver Arm, and forward into science fiction with things like Honor Harrington's telescopic prosthetic eyeball. I think these stories are important too, because they can inspire us to imagine better coping mechanisms that somebody might actually build someday. What do we want it to do? How will people react? What are some possible drawbacks we could avoid? Those are vital questions and better to explore first in fiction.
So as long as writers are trying to be respectful, and they make an honest attempt to do their homework, and they have a point to the disability and its role in the story -- I'm inclined to be flexible about what motifs are okay to explore. Try it out. If it sucks, your audience will say so. There is so little being written about people with disabilities, I'm disinclined to discourage it unless it's obviously exploitative, inaccurate, or otherwise troublesome.
Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-27 02:07 pm (UTC)Synthesis by
http://archiveofourown.org/works/259174
Cool Hand Luke by
http://fiercelydreamed.livejournal.com/30225.html
Tall Kingdom I Surround by
http://toft-froggy.livejournal.com/356107.html
Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-28 07:32 am (UTC)for sharing. This is the kind
of stuff I think about when I
say we need stories like this
to explore possible future
applications of technology to
repairing or improving the
human body.
Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-27 08:37 pm (UTC)Personally, I'm not sure if I'm qualified to judge this, but I think the erasure wouldn't be a problem if it weren't stealing from the already limited pool of portrayals, you know? If there were more portrayals of actual disabling disability, then portraying conditions that are disabilities in the here and now as nondisabling in a hypothetical society or for a wizard wouldn't be as erasey. Or am I wrong here?
By the way, how do you feel about situations where a character's got a physical limitation that magically disappears (temporarily) as a side-effect of using their preferred Magical Awesomeness Facilitator? I feel like if their "real life" (the one that stirs their emotions and that they identify with) is the nondisabled one, that's really problematic. But I feel like if, instead of that, they're still doing the same things (or other awesome things) as their disabled self and carefully budgeting time spent without the impairment so they have a TAB body available if they really need it, but still have to use workarounds and do things their normal (disabled) way most of the time, then it's more like budgeting spoons and doesn't seem like erasure to me. Do you agree, or do you think it's still a problem?
I really don't know that my audience-- if I ever posted this and ended up with one (I'm not exactly a BNF)-- would notice if I did something wrong. I once found a fic for a different fandom that did almost exactly the same thing (AU where the main character had the same noncanon disability) very badly (the character was very woobiefied and apparently being disabled gave him a needy personality, not to mention his entire role in the plot was now to give other characters a chance to be good and take care of him, as opposed to saving the world and going on adventures and all the rest of the stuff he did in canon) and yet none of the reviews ever pointed out that this was a problem. So I don't trust a typical audience to spot disability-fail at all. That's why I'm asking here.
Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-28 04:53 am (UTC)People generally are not counted
as adaptive equipment. (The
issue of whether it's a problem
to have readily available helpers
is a different one.) Tech and
magic are generally counted as
adaptive equipment.
>> Personally, I'm not sure if I'm qualified to judge this <<
You are entitled to your
informed opinion. If you're
reading about a topic, writing
about it, researching it, thinking
about its implications, then
that gives you grounds to form
an opinion. With issues of
portrayal and controversy, the
more central a person is to the
issue at hand, the more weight
their opinion tends to carry. In
this case, minor impairments or
knowing someone with a disabiliyt
can make non-disabled people a
lot more aware of the challenges,
leading to a more nuanced opinion
compared to folks with no
experience at all. People living
with a serious disability do
consistently tend to notice things
that nobody else will. If a
quarter-inch crack determines
whether or not you can enter a
store, you'll notice it.
Otherwise probably not.
>>I think the erasure wouldn't be a problem if it weren't stealing from the already limited pool of portrayals, you know?<<
That is exactly the problem with
erasure. However, defending the
core material from erasure then
creates another problem: repetition.
The field tends to funnel down
to that more realistic version,
which isn't always what a writer
or a story wants.
>>If there were more portrayals of actual disabling disability, then portraying conditions that are disabilities in the here and now as nondisabling in a hypothetical society or for a wizard wouldn't be as
erasey.<<
So then, a good solution is to
write widely, portraying both
realistic and imaginative versions
of disabled characters and their
coping mechanisms. Somewhat
related to this is the rendering
of exotic handicaps -- for
instance, a sentient dragon with
damaged wings who can no longer
fly, or a character who lacks
magic in a world where everyone
else has it.
>>By the way, how do you feel about situations where a character's got a physical limitation that magically disappears (temporarily) as a side-effect of using their preferred Magical Awesomeness Facilitator? <<
For me, it depends on the exact
rendition. If they can turn off
the disability completely for a
time, I tend to count it as
potentially erasing. If the
disappearance has other
drawbacks, I tend to count it
more as typical adaptive
equipment -- nothing is perfect.
But it's the plot dynamics and
the emotional impact that
matter more to me. Does the
character still feel like a
person living with a disability?
Does it still influence how
they deal with problems and
think about their self-image?
There's a very tiffy example in
the TV show "Birds of Prey." I
liked that Barbara Gordon was
working as Oracle. I was less
keen on her lingering attachment
to being Batgirl and her attempts
to walk. It wasn't implausible,
just ... hit a slightly flat
note with me.
The renditions of Professor X in his wheelchair are far more consistently
satisfying, even the souped-up
hoverchair version. Also the
visits to the Savage Land --
where he can walk, but has no
mutant ability -- work better.
As a literary device, the
plausibility is ridiculous but
the tone is good.
A closer parallel may be Jake
in the movie "Avatar" where he
could walk in his alien body.
It's pretty clear that he'll
want to pick that one
permanently -- but the cost of
doing so is his own humanity.
There's some very good tension
in the movie as he becomes more
attached to that life and wants
to spend more time in it, and
clearly feels "trapped" in his
original body.
>>I feel like if their "real life" (the one that stirs their emotions and that they identify with) is the nondisabled one, that's really problematic.<<
It can be. It's easy to botch
this motif. However, there's
great potential here too, if
you want to go all existential
about "what is real?" and "who
am I?" etc. There's a fair bit
of science fiction here. A
classic is the "Ship Who..."
series where disabled children
are given starships as their
bodies. It doesn't magically
remove all problems; it just
gives them different challenges
to work through. So then you
have to consider -- could we
do this? Why would we? What
would it do to people? And I
picked up on that in one of my
poems, "With Mortal Flesh and Iron Will," where the main character takes a terrible risk ... to
become a tank during a war. The
whole point of that series is
how far people will go to keep
doing what needs to be done,
even with badly broken bodies.
>>But I feel like if, instead of that, they're still doing the same things (or other awesome things) as their disabled self and carefully budgeting time spent without the impairment so they have a TAB body available if they really need it, but still have to use workarounds and do things their normal (disabled) way most of the time, then it's more like budgeting spoons and doesn't seem like erasure to me. <<
Yes, I tend to feel the same.
It's a partial out with drawbacks,
so it has less potential for
erasure than just handwaving
away the problem. It's still
something to keep an eye on,
but doable.
>>I really don't know that my audience-- if I ever posted this and ended up with one (I'm not exactly a BNF)-- would notice if I did something wrong. <<
Well now, that depends on your
audience. What kind do you have?
What kind do you want? If you
are writing a lot about disability,
and you attract readers who are
interested in that, then you can
have conversations like this
with them. I have with some of
mine. (People have flipped out
about some of the stuff I write.)
If you're dealing with random
surfers, you can include notes
about the issues in your stories
and links to further reading.
The Clockwork War series actually
grew out of a discussion about
an article that I linked to.
>>and yet none of the reviews ever pointed out that this was a problem. <<
Most people just don't read that
deeply, and for that matter, don't
pay such close attention to the
world in general. One thing
writing can do is jar people into
noticing new things. If you
want a savvy audience, you can
build one. You don't have to
settle for morons. I've seen my
audience get into arguments over
orbital mechanics, and work out
the correct answer on their own
without turning it into a fight.
But I cultivate that kind of
atmosphere in my blogs; it
didn't happen by accident.
I'd say post your story and
share news about it to places
like this were interested readers
may be found. Ask for feedback.
Include discussion questions if
you wish. If it's not well
received the first time, you
can always rewrite it or write
something else and try to do
better the next time. Your
writing skills, whatever level
they are currently, will improve
faster with feedback than
without it. And there is so
little gimpfic at all, I kind of
hate to see any of it languishing
in someone's desk drawer.
Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-28 09:34 pm (UTC)Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-28 10:12 pm (UTC)service. I majored in Rhetoric
in college, so I'm used to
analyzing literature. People
keep being surprised I apply
that to fanfic. I keep being
surprised that they're not mining
fanfic to see what people like
well enough to keep after it so
very avidly. There are clear
trends.
Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-28 11:03 pm (UTC)Re: Okay...
Date: 2012-10-29 08:05 am (UTC)