#this convention is stilted and unnecessary and should never have taken off

[naranjapetrificada]

I was just reading a fic with a blind character where his narration still uses those endemic visual descriptors like "the blond man" to describe a character whose hair color they have no reason to know yet.

This tendency already drives me up the wall in general but it's extra fun (derogatory) when someone has put so little thought into writing a disabled character that this could happen. I've also occasionally seen it get dicey before when stuff like skin color is invoked 😬

No one thinks about someone they're having a conversation with/about as "the blond man". Just use the characters' names and pronouns. Mix it up between them as needed. If you feel like it's not clear who a pronoun is referring to, restructure the sentence. I promise readers will be able to keep up.

Your writing will be better for it, with the added bonus of not accidentally attributing sight to a blind character's narration or potentially fetishizing racialized traits like skin color. But mostly your writing will be better for it.