#disabiltiy representation

[animerunner]

Okay not done entirely

But continuing on the whole healthy vs unhealthy behaviors tangent. And why the show uses them to help kids learn what is okay with disabled people

Like as much as the Raeda breakup sucked as a fan of them. It was fundamentally important in terms of lessons.

Because it showed that hiding this kind of thing from your partner even if it’s hard to talk about it (I would know. Not because I’ve had a partner. It’s just difficult in gen to open up about something you barely know. Though I’m getting better) isn’t okay. And your partner shouldn’t just have to put up with the behavior because your disabled.

It’s a fundamentally important moment in the show. Because not only do we get to see how Edas changed over the years.

But because it drives two very important lessons home around disability

[neurodivergent-media]

“It was brilliant to see so many talented actors with learning disabilities taking centre stage...

“It was important to see people with a learning disability living full lives because it showed what we can achieve. It was also good to see that they were not shy to talk about adult themes like relationships and independent living.”

[mumms-the-word]

your tags about wyll being another disabled person standing up for stelmane... yeah. like all the characters have amazing links to disability like gale's orb, karlach's heart, astarion's hunger all being chronic illnesses essentially, shadowheart dealing with chronic pain, lae'zel i think is the only one without disability coding like that? but wyll being like obviously physically disabled in a different way to everyone else feels important. and the whole thing of overt physical disability being treated completely differently to invisible disability bc there is no way to hide so you're an obvious target (ask me how i know...) so yeah wyll. ugh 💜

I have MANY thoughts about the various disabilities in the game and the way that BG3 is ultimately a Search for a Cure game that dares to suggest ���but what if you don’t want the cure? We have a path for that”

But yes to catch others up:

Wyll is physically disabled because he is missing an eye, so he is half blind (though for gameplay purposes we don’t see him with a debuff in accuracy or a lower movement range like we see with completely-blind Zanner Toobin)

Karlach has a chronic heart condition, her heart is a literal machine and it causes her a great deal of pain and discomfort and it will eventually kill her

Gale has the orb, it causes heart-pain/chest-pain-like aches and if left unaddressed will literally disabled him in terms of gameplay because he will slow down and all his attack/defense dice rolls take a hit

Shadowheart has the mark on her hand, which flares up at random and comes with a sharp pain. She also has amnesia, which can be considered a disability

Astarion has vampirism, which, depending on how you read it, is itself a kind of disability (though the tadpole negates a lot of the disabling parts of vampirism for him). I don’t read his hunger as chronic illness mostly because regular hunger isn’t chronic illness and he does find ways to manage his hunger; he is however traumatized and likely has a host of mental illnesses that I won’t diagnose him with, though CPTSD seems like the obvious low hanging fruit

Lae’zel’s only known disability or illness is the tadpole. And she treats it like a disabiltiy or an illness rather than an asset. Unlike others, she’s seeking to cure it, point blank, no negotiations

So the game is full of unexpected and intentional disability representation, even when actual disability isn’t like….actually affecting your gameplay. Sometimes it does, like with Gale, but often it doesn’t mess with your dice rolls or attack range or accuracy. The game just isn’t built for that.

But anyway you point is not about the gameplay. It’s about Wyll.

Wyll I think is interesting because out of the Core Six, he’s the only one comfortable with his disability. I think this is partly because it doesn’t cause him pain. (Pain is after all the Great Complicator in disability discussion.) Even when he turns into a devil, which would do wild things to his psyche, he takes it in stride. This might be bad writing or it might be intentional—physical difference just doesn’t fluster him

But anyway he’s so comfortable in his disability that he jokes with you when you join the “One Eye Club.” He speaks of Stelmane post-stroke as a survivor and a person of value. I imagine he doesn’t have much experience with chronic pain or chronic illness but he’s probably dealt with tons of injuries (look at all his scars) even at his young age. He’s an idealist, but I think he also speaks from experience when he says that Stelmane is “no less worthy of life or success because she is disabled”

I think he thinks the same of his friends. Karlach, Gale, Shadowheart, Astarion, Lae’zel, even if they were able to cure their tadpoles or fix their conditions, he would find them no less valuable and worthy before or after their cures. I don’t think he always understands exactly the chronic pain/illness element but he would never ever say that a person is less worthy of simply living or succeeding or becoming a hero or becoming anything they want to be just because they have a disability or illness

Chalk it up to his idealism but I think that makes Wyll one of the more surprising and uplifting characters in the game, among his other surprising and uplifting characteristics. Like…he’s going to believe in you, no matter what. And he’s going to support you however he can. We see that with Karlach, and how much he would prefer his best friend live with her chronic illness in an environment that will lessen her pain than die. He’d probably give up his magic boots off his feet for Gale. He’d probably agree to fight Shar one on one to try and get her to stop plaguing Shadowheart with pain. He doesn’t want his friends to hurt, but he doesn’t think they’re less valuable or weak for hurting, you know?

Anyway we don’t deserve Wyll Ravengard

[queerbolg]

maybe not an original take but i love how the owl house serves as a positive allegory for disability/neurodiversity in academic settings. luz has to learn magic through alternative methods to traditional education because of the physiological differences between her and her peers, but it doesn’t make her any less capable of being a powerful, badass, self-assured, determined witch in the making. though amity and principal bump initally dismiss her due to her lack of innate magic ability, they quickly learn that her means of learning, while different, isn’t any less valid, and cease to doubt her abilities from that point on. i think that’s incredible

[mtntownlesbian]

not sp related but because some of you guys seem to like my ''''political''' (idk what to label this kinda stuff so im gonna just slap that on bc idk disabiltiy and queerness is inherently political) stuff,, i would like to announce that i am making a lesbian visibilty zine! this zine will be covering aspects of history, culture, slang, issues and just in general what being a lesbian is all about!

if you guys would like to know more about this, ill be reblogging this specific post w some updates on my little zine! thank you all so much for the support on my commentary on south parks disability representation - it truly means the world to me that people like my ideas and concepts!

so, uhh ya! thats all i wanted to say - expect some south park doodles to prop up on my page too ✨

[animerunner]

Also before someone goes ‘well we never saw Lilith struggling with Harpy Mode’

Yeah because we didn’t have time. She needed to heal before she could get to a point of getting Harpy Mode.

And the end credits is not enough time to be introducing and explaining that you can have good and bad days with a disability. And even when you have it mostly under control and well medicated you can still have bad days

Maybe if we had a full S3 they could have done it.

But this is a complicated topic. And the end credits isn’t the time or place to be addressing that. 

I wish they could have. Because so many people don’t understand that just because you can have something reigned in. Doesn’t mean you can’t occasionally have a bad day

And this can cause actual problems. Because people don’t get it people don’t always understand why for several day we might be good but the next we have to cancel plans.

Because meds and or having good days doesn’t mean it’s suddenly gone. Just that we’re having good days and the meds are working better

[animerunner]

Also there is just something weirdly personal for me about Eda carving Owlbert after the curse. To partly help connect with it. Because for anyone new here. I’m a wheelchair racer who nicknamed my racer Owlbert after the show because of how much I had connected with Eda. And how it had helped me come to terms with my own disability.

Heck my first big race weekend I threw on the S1 dress for the 10 miler

Like I didn’t think I could actually connect with Eda more. But yet somehow after this info drop. I have.

[animerunner]

I think at least for me why I take a bit of issue with the harpy mode super power argument. Look harpy mode reads like a some sort of aid. And there’s an issue with equating it otherwise for me. Because it feels like I’m weirdly getting labeled also that way from a misunderstanding

Because do you know what it felt like the first time I did this?

After years of being this person?

And mind you the first one was my worst Dopey to date. I spent over it sick to my stomach and in pain from an extreme flare up.

Not because I was sick purely because my condition started flaring on Day 1. And kept glaring .

But this?

Now keep in mind I came into this under trained due to my medical issues. I was nowhere near ready to do the 10 miles

And yet somehow because I stopped fighting my disability I came out of this

Feeling better than I ever had on my feet. And mind you I was an ambulatory athlete for 10 years! 10! Before I finally retired from that status because it was getting so bad

It blew my mind! 10 years of racing on my feet and I never had felt this good.

And all this just because I finally stopped fighting my disability and learned to work with it and through it.

By some of y’all’s arguments I suddenly gained a super power because I stopped fighting my own disability. Which no that’s not what happened.

You would be amazed what happens when you stop fighting.

Some of y’all don’t know what those two extremes are like. Which is fine.

But for the love of god stop assuming you do. The curse is still there. The disability is still there. This is just what happens when you’ve been holding yourself back after years of doing it and finally stop