Being Disabled + The Temple + I Can Hardly
Being disabled in a world in which being perceived as able-bodied is the default is complicated. I’m not here to tell you it’s no big deal; nor am I here to drop the hammer on any analysis that isn’t exactly like mine. What good would that do?
“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
and rightdoing there is a field.
I’ll meet you there. -Rumi
There are a few things I would like to notice and discuss, though.
To consider what it means to portray disabled people, it is useful to connect to the purpose of art.
- Art keeps us hopeful.
- Art makes us less lonely.
- Art rebalances us.
- Art helps us appreciate stuff.
- Art is propaganda for what really matters.
That’s cool, Reverend Theresa. What about it?
Wait, wait. Sometimes when I talk about developing new understandings of disability, other people with disabilities will say, “It doesn’t bother me.”
I can appreciate that. The thing I want to make clear is that identifying meaning and rejecting meanings that are less than full human worth and dignity isn’t something that I do because I am bothered. I am not being emotionally upset, losing sleep, or feeling bad about myself. Being disabled is one of the billion possible ways of being human. I embrace that about myself and my community.
Did you notice the aesthetics in these photos?
The people who can’t walk, or talk traditionally, who see differently are dressed like zombies. I’ve talked before about monstrosity and disability, and here’s a place where it pops up again. Junot Diaz frames the issue of representation and monstrosity helpfully:
“You guys know about vampires? You know, vampires have no reflections in a mirror? There’s this idea that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. And what I’ve always thought isn’t that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. It’s that if you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves. And growing up, I felt like a monster in some ways. I didn’t see myself reflected at all. I was like, “Yo, is something wrong with me? That the whole society seems to think that people like me don’t exist? And part of what inspired me, was this deep desire that before I died, I would make a couple of mirrors. That I would make some mirrors so that kids like me might seem themselves reflected back and might not feel so monstrous for it.”
In this, Jesus Christ Superstar, live concert, there is a reflection; and, the reflection is that disabled people are monsters. Certainly, the entirety of the show offers complex messages regarding love, loss, and redemption. In the Temple scene, though, the propaganda in this art is to remind you to be afraid of and disgusted by disabled people.
Excuse me?
Being disabled isn’t the same as being a monster; not at all. I understand that zombies are thickly woven throughout current popular culture, especially as an expression of pessimism and nihilism, making them a handy reference. For what, though? For something to be afraid of? Yeah, don’t make a habit of fear. Look at my face. Talk to it. I will reply. We can go from there.
I probably won’t reply with all the things I can hardly do, either. I can hardly open a pickle jar, unless I whack it with a spoon a few times. Unless you’re asking me for a pickle, though, it’s not all that relevant. The set-up in this number about all the things people can hardly do because they are disabled is really a framework built by people who are able-bodied and are worried that they might also one day be that “monstrous” thing.
It is possible for us, together, to keep shifting frameworks that devalue other people’s human experiences, so that if someone should become disabled, whether by accident, chronic condition, or some other intense experience of having a human body, the future that awaits them doesn’t require them to struggle or do everything the hardest way possible. I imagine supportive, inclusive futures. They start with metaphors that do better than use disability as a cheap metaphor for monstrosity.
