since my return to tumblr I’ve been seeing a lot of ppl talking abt disabilities & I have one piece brainrot real bad so I figured I’d babble a bit
it took me a weirdly long time to realize that... Shanks is disabled??? like. he lost an arm. if the fan theory is correct, he lost his sword arm. and only after losing his sword arm did this man go on to become one of the four most powerful people on the seas.
and he’s not the only one!!! Crocodile’s missing a hand. Tashigi’s probably legally blind without her glasses, which she keeps fucking losing. Fujitora’s blind, Zolo’s sense of direction is so bad it probably qualifies as some sort of intellectual disability — hell, Whitebeard himself, Edward fucking Newgate, is on a ventilator for the entire time he spends on the page/screen. and yet.
none of these people are defined by their disability. Whitebeard is considered the strongest man in the world. Zolo is fucking Zolo. Fujitora’s an admiral, which is the only reason I’m calling him Fujitora in the first place. Tashigi is Smoker’s right-hand man. Crocodile is one of the first truly imposing villains the straw hats come across, and, oh yeah, still making himself relevant nearly a thousand chapters later. and Shanks... well, Shanks is one of the Four Emperors, a.k.a. legally classified as one of the four biggest threats to the current world order. he’s doing pretty okay for himself for a guy who visibly struggles to button his shirts.
it just makes me think. Oda has made a world where disability accommodations are... normalized. in a weird sort of way, but still. hell, this is a maritime setting — having a devil fruit power is a permanent disability, and yet people don’t hesitate to take them on. because everyone is just... used to accommodating them. can’t swim? don’t go overboard, keep someone on watch around the water, bathe with a friend. only one hand? that’s fine, that’s why you keep your first mate around. can’t see? we have superpowers for that. we can handle it. to paraphrase Usopp: you do what you can, and leave the rest to your crewmates.
anyway I really love one piece
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Hob Gadling, who learned he had a deadly peanut allergy when the plant came to England in the 1500′s, but who eats peanut butter anyway sometimes because, fuck it - it’s not like it’s permanent and anaphylaxis isn’t the worst way he’s died by far.
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So I Identify as pro-ship (the original meaning, specifically) because I just don't think it's my business to cast moral judgment on people because of their tastes in fiction, and if someone's ship or fiction makes me uncomfortable I'll just block and move on. I have a lot of personal reasons for this, including but not limited to being raised for the later part of my childhood in a puritan cult in which basically all fiction was "problematic" and made you an evil person for enjoying it. So, I've seen where the anti line of thinking gets you, and even on the internet I've watched the definition of problematic grow and grow over the years-- if fandom keeps going on this way, eventually the label will consume everything.
However, I also take issue with the blanket statement "fiction doesn't affect reality." Because let's be honest, it does. For example, the racism and stereotypes present in fiction have a massive effect on peoples' perceptions of minorities-- this, I think, is by far the biggest negative effect fiction has on reality directly, at least that I've noticed. Unfortunately, this is not what antis are concerned with, and from what I've seen it's only ever really been used as a "gotcha," while the condemnation of problematic media is almost always centered around nsfw content and relationships.
Even in those cases, yes, maybe there are some people who will copy "problematic" fiction, but let's be real-- the people who commit those kinds of crimes would do it with or without fiction. It's not the fiction's fault, nor is it the storyteller's if someone commits a copycat crime. Additionally, I can only think of one or maybe two incidents in which fiction is confirmed to have influenced a crime.
For the vast majority of people, fiction will not affect their real-life values and beliefs that way. Honestly, most pro-shippers I've seen also don't claim that fiction never affects reality, it's just that there's a difference between fiction and reality. Which is objectively true, and if you don't think so, then please reconsider that stance because it's honestly baffling-- especially when most antis don't have a problem with murder, theft, etc. and only have an issue when it comes to sexual themes.
Anyway, as to where I was going with this-- dark or problematic fiction may cause some harm to those who consume it. There are people who will be triggered by it (that's what warnings and avoiding are for). In very rare cases, there might be someone who is inspired by it. But people approach these issues the wrong way.
Fiction can affect reality, but instead of seeing it as radioactive waste, it should instead be treated as an allergen.
Foods that are allergens can literally kill some people-- but for other people, they're helpful. Problematic/dark fiction can be the same way. I process my trauma by both writing and reading certain dark topics, but other people would end up triggered by it-- like how I enjoy peanuts & they're good for me but they could kill someone else.
Look into studies on schools that have banned peanuts-- there's no significant difference in allergy triggers, and it removes a type of nutrition from the diet of those who need it. This sort of ban is not helpful, and not recommended. Problematic fiction is the same way.
People with allergies will know that they either need to look at a label to see if the allergen is listed, or ask the preparer, or just avoid the food if they're not sure. While there are designated allergen-free spaces, those are not the default-- because if you banned everything anyone could be allergic to, there would be no food anyone could eat. People should be able to avoid their allergens, but that doesn't mean no one else can enjoy eating those foods or benefit from them.
Just like you should stick to allergen-free meals if you're allergic to something, you should also stick to verifiably trigger-free media and spaces if you're triggered by certain content. That doesn't mean it needs to be banned, that doesn't even mean it needs to be sequestered away from wider fandom-- it just means that you need to not follow people or engage with people who post the thing that harms you, because guess what? Just because it may harm you doesn't mean it harms everyone.
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