Tag: ownvoice

The Try Guys Try Closed Captions

From left to right: Eugene Lee Yang, Keith Habersberger, and Zach Kornfeld, modeling their new squad tracksuit collection. Credit: The Try Guys

The Try Guys are an entertainment group of YouTube producers. As their name suggests, their philosophy is to try new things, no matter how much they may suck at doing them. They started at Buzzfeed in 2014 but left in 2018 to start their own production company, 2nd Try LLC. Originally they had four members, but today they are a trio: Keith Habersberger, Zach Kornfeld, and Eugene Lee Yang. Their videos and experiences have resonated with millions of people around the globe, inspiring them to try new things.

I started watching The Try Guys when I was a teenager. They were appealing because they weren’t afraid to touch on sensitive topics and call attention to double standards. I remember watching “The Try Guys Shave Their Legs For the First Time.” The guys were complaining throughout the video how hard it was to shave. Keith was doing awkward yoga to reach the hard spots on the back of the leg while Zach kept cutting himself. They finally finished a two hours later. While they all enjoyed having shaved legs, they didn’t like the itchiness when it grew back. As Zach said, “It’s like shaving 20 faces.”

Keith Habersberger featured in YouTube thumbnail for “Try Guys Shave Their Legs For the First Time.” Credit: The Try Guys

As a young woman, it validated my own frustrations with body image and trying to meet beauty standards. As I watched more videos, I was inspired by seeing them have fun and trying new things even if they were super bad at them.

While the majority of their content tends to be comedic, they also tackle more serious issues. For example, they created an educational DUI miniseries. Each episode tackles a different aspect of dangerous driving: driving drunk, driving high, driving while texting, and driving tired.

Eugene Lee Yang featured in YouTube Thumbnail for “The Try Guys Test Drunk Driving.” Credit: The Try Guys

It is eye-opening to see the same people driving on the same course under different influences. Each influence has a different impact on the driver and the way they drive. That is to say, one influence is not better than another. It’s all dangerous driving and the Try Guys do a good job at showcasing why it is dangerous to drive under influences.

In another educational miniseries, they took on ageism. First they tried old age makeovers to combat their fears regarding old age. Then they tried an old-age body simulator and wore it for a day. It provides a lot of insight into the stigmas about getting older and barriers that affect daily life.

Zach Kornfeld featured in YouTube Thumbnail for “The Try Guys Old Age Makeovers.” Credit: The Try Guys

As a teen, I would check obsessively for their next video. Sometimes multiple times a day. However, there was one problem. None of their videos had closed captions meaning I could only understand bits and pieces. One day, I was watching a new Try Guys video. I could not understand anything. I was scrolling through the comments to try to gather context clues or find quotes of what was said. Nearly every comment was about how funny the Try Guys were. The more I scrolled, the more depressed I became.

At this time, I happened to be taking my third ASL class. I was becoming comfortable with my disability and more confident in myself in general. A thought popped into my head: Why don’t I ask for them to add closed captions?

I quickly dismissed the thought. I had never in my life asked for accommodations. Accommodations typically needed to be thrust upon me because I was terrified of drawing attention to my disability. But the theme of the Try Guys is to try things you’ve never done before. The thought staid.

Another week passed and a new video was posted without closed captions. What would happen if I asked? I shook my head. I knew exactly what would happen. My request would be buried under hundreds of others, lost in the confines of the internet. Not to add, I would probably get a lot of mean comments. Still, there was a small voice in my head. Maybe the Try Guys would see the comment. Maybe they would care enough to implement it. After all, what do I have to lose?

I wrote a comment, thought better of it and deleted it, rewrote it, and deleted it again.

“Hey Try Guys!” I typed. “I have been a fan for a while. I love your videos, but I find them difficult to understand as I am deaf. Everyone talks about how funny you are. Would you consider adding closed captions to future videos so I can laugh along with everyone else?”

My cursor hovered over the post button. Once I clicked that button, there was no going back. The comment would be there forever and ever whether I liked it or not.

I clicked. 

The first comment came in minutes. “Are you serious? The world doesn’t revolve around you!” It was quickly followed by another. “Small businesses don’t have the means to deal with closed captions. It’s rude to even ask!”

I would have deleted my comment then and there but that was not an option on this platform. I knew in my head that it is okay to ask for accommodations but I felt ashamed. How much work goes into making closed captions possible? I had no idea. Maybe they’ll compromise, I told myself, maybe they’ll share one video with closed captions a month or something. There’s still hope.

I checked my post the following morning. I had a few new comments, all of them berated me for asking and made snide comments about my deafness. “I hate people like you who demand the world caters to you.”

Ding. Another new comment. I refreshed the page.

“I also need closed captions.”

That small line brought tears to my eyes. Being deaf is often a lonely experience. I have to remind myself that I am not the only deaf person in the world, but sometimes it’s hard not to believe it. It’s always heartwarming to hear about other people struggling with the same things I do.

Ding. “I’m hearing, but I always watch things with closed captions anyway.”

Ding. “Me too.”

Ding. “I have a friend who is deaf. I tried to share a Try Guys video with her, but she couldn’t understand it.”

Ding. “You guys don’t understand what a hardship this could be for the Try Guys!”

Ding. “Not deaf, but I use cc too.”

Ding. “Everybody! Like and comment on this so the Try Guys will see it and add closed captions!”

By the end of the first day, I had 20 comments. People were arguing over my request. By the end of the second day, I had nearly 60. On the third morning, the comments ticked over 70. Surprisingly, most of the comments were positive. People were sharing their own stories of needing and using closed captions. One person even thanked me for having the courage to ask. Even though my post was getting attention, it was steadily becoming buried under more popular ones. My hope was dimming. There was little chance The Try Guys would see my request.

Should I try again? I could keep trying on every video until my request was seen. I thought about all the negative comments I had received. I wasn’t sure if I could go through it again.

At the end of the day, I checked my notifications. Only five new comments. I read through them and screamed when I reached the last one.

The Try Guys: “Hi Rachel! Closed captions are a great idea! We’ll discuss that at our next meeting.”

I couldn’t believe it! The Try Guys had seen my request! Three days ago I didn’t believe I could have made a difference. My mind was racing. Could this happen? Are the Try Guys going to add closed captions? I felt invincible.

A week and a half later, the Try Guys released a new video. I held my breath and clicked play. Closed captions appeared at the bottom. Victory! Finally, I could laugh with everyone else.

I am happy to say that every Try Guys video since that day has been released with closed captions. Over the next several months, I noticed they were experimenting with their closed captions. True to their name, they kept trying new things. My personal favorite was the color-coded closed captions, which were used shortly after they left Buzzfeed. Blue captions meant Keith was talking, green captions were Zach, purple was Eugene, and so forth. However, the color-coded captions were short-lived. In hindsight, color-coded captions are not the most accessible for people who have color blindness or other vision issues.

For a time the Try Guys used YouTube’s automatic closed captions. While YouTube automatic captions are certainly better than they used to be, they still leave a lot to be desired. They are only about 60-70% accurate at the best of times (1). For example, whenever something funny happens (or Keith becomes comedically upset), the captions stop working because there is too much noise to decipher anything that is being said. Another downside to YouTube’s captions is that they take time to generate, meaning it can take a full day to a couple of weeks for captions to become available.

These days the Try Guys have standardized their use of closed captions; two lines of white text in a sheer black box in Arial font. This is the industry standard format.

These days I do not watch the Try Guys as much as I used to, partly because they release so much content and I’ve matured out of their targeted age group. With that being said, I still enjoy watching many of their videos. Currently, my favorite series is “Without a Recipe.” As the title suggests, the Try Guys hit the kitchen and make an item without a recipe. None of them are professional cooks, so hilarity ensues. Each episode cuts between experts talking about how to make the item and at least one of Try Guys unintentionally doing the exact opposite. It’s a cross between “The Great British Baking Show” and Netflix’s “Nailed It.” Some examples of things they’ve made without a recipe are pies, bagels, brownies, and many more. 

Zach Kornfeld, Keith Habersberger, and Eugene Lee Yang featured in a YouTube Thumbnail for “The Try Guys Cook Bagels Without A Recipe.” Credit: The Try Guys

Never be afraid to try something new, even if it scares you. I tried asking for accommodations on a social media platform. I was terrified to do it, but my request ended up influencing a company that currently has 8.04 million subscribers and over 2 billion views (2) at the time of publishing this article.

So if ever in doubt, just try.

References

  1. University of Minnesota Duluth. “Correcting YouTube Auto-Captions.” Information Technology Systems and Services, University of Minnesota Duluth, 2022, https://itss.d.umn.edu/centers-locations/media-hub/media-accessibility-services/captioning-and-captioning-services/correct#:~:text=YouTube%20automatic%20captions%20typically%20provide,%2C%20or%20multi%2Dsyllable%20words.
  2. SPEAKRJ. “The Try Guys YouTube Subscriber Statistics.” SPEAKRJ, https://www.speakrj.com/audit/report/UCpi8TJfiA4lKGkaXs__YdBA/youtube/live#content.

Writing Habits: Life Lessons from Nanowrimo

Happy Halloween Listen Up readers. It’s hard to believe that October is nearly over and that it’s time to plan Thanksgiving and start buying Christmas gifts! I’m sure you’ve all got some fun plans coming up. This weekend my family is having a Halloween get-together. I’m in charge of making the mummy hot dogs and Mom is making a pumpkin-shaped veggie tray!

As fun as October has been, I’m excited for November which happens to be National Novel Writing Month. Commonly known as “Nanowrimo,” hundreds of thousands of writers around the world seek to write 50,000 words (a novel-length manuscript) in just 30 days.

Credit: Nanowrimo

Nanowrimo began in 1999 with 21 participants. Last year there were over 383,064 writers who took up the challenge. You may have been seeing signs appearing at your local library or coffee shops inviting Nanowrimo challengers to come in and write. Nanowrimo is a powerhouse of writing resources, community, and challenges.

Nanowrimo is a nonprofit organization funded by donations that go directly into the creation and support of writers. All services are free and the programs are run by volunteers. A few of the programs they have are the Young Writers Program, Camp Nanowrimo, and Nanowrimo. They also have a shop where anyone is welcome to donate or purchase items to support the programs.

I would not be the writer I am today if it weren’t for Nanowrimo. When I started writing, I was very sporadic. Some days I wrote a paragraph, other days I wrote several pages, and then weeks would go by where I wouldn’t write at all. I was making the same mistakes that all beginner writers go through, which is waiting for inspiration to strike or wasting time trying to phrase a sentence just right before putting it on the page. It’s a natural thing to do because we have an instinct to get things down “right” the first time.

In comparison, professional writers can sit down and almost immediately throw words on the page. Some writers refer to this as “word vomit,” referring to writing down first, unedited thoughts. These thoughts frequently have poor grammar, forgotten punctuation, or are a rumbling of disjointed ideas. In other words, professional writers’ first drafts are so horrendously bad and embarrassing, many vow never to let them see the light of day! I refer to my first drafts as a “dump doc” rather than a first draft.

Nanowrimo is essentially a 30-day marathon of word vomiting. There are other ways to practice word vomiting of course. For example, try setting a timer and writing nonstop until the timer rings. Nonstop as in your pen never stops moving or that there is never a pause in keystrokes. If you are new to word vomiting, I recommend starting with 3-5 minutes and working your way up to longer periods of time. It doesn’t matter if you spend the whole time writing the same word over and over. Sometimes I’ve tried word vomiting a story out, and I get distracted by my thoughts, so I write my thoughts down instead.

This particular exercise was a favorite of my high school creative writing teacher. We would do it once or twice a week. This was the same teacher that introduced me to Nanowrimo. That’s right—one of my high school assignments was to write a novel in 30 days, on top of my other homework. (Granted we were graded on an effort scale and I think there were only three students in the class that managed to get past 50,000 words).

My first Nanowrimo experience was terrible. I hadn’t planned anything out. I was required to write when I had no ideas. I had to write when I wasn’t inspired. I had to throw words on the page when I had a million other things to get done. Some days I wanted to quit writing altogether.

However, I finished the month with a glorious 36,000 word manuscript. It was split between two different stories and had a few random journal entries in which I vented my frustrations of writing. I was embarrassed about everything I had written since it was poor workmanship. I swore I would never, ever, under any circumstances, do Nanowrimo again.

Later on, I began to recognize the impact of Nanowrimo in my life. First off, I got a massive confidence boost from writing such a large manuscript. It was the most I had ever written at once. Then I began to notice other little things, such as writing essays. My friends would spend days thinking about possible topics, but wouldn’t start writing until the last minute. I, on the other hand, had an easier time with it by writing my first thoughts down and working out a topic from there. In general, I was less shy about wasting paper and words in writing classes. I decided Nanowrimo wasn’t so bad after all.

I took the same writing class again. When Nanowrimo came around, I got a total of 52,000 words. My third attempt was during my senior year where I reached a beautiful and golden 58,000 words.

In total, I have done Nanowrimo five times and succeeded twice. The last two times I attempted it, I was in the thick of college. Since November is the final third of the semester, it becomes increasingly difficult to balance schoolwork and life. I could not stay on top of everything while trying to write a novel. Sadly, I gave up on doing Nanowrimo during this time.

Since I have graduated this year, I am excited to once again take on the Nanowrimo challenge! (For this reason, my next blog post will not be until December.)

There are still a few days left before Nanowrimo starts! Writers can join the event through the website, track their progress, set their own word count goal (if 50k is too much or too little), stay informed of Nanowrimo events happening in their local area, get pep talks, free access to writing resources, and participate in an amazing community of writers. The newsletter alone delivers pep talks, writing tips, resources, and publishing advice. While Nanowrimo is in November, you can use the Nanowrimo event features throughout the year to set goals and track your progress.

Here are three tips of my own for doing Nanowrimo and getting writing done in general:

1) The golden rule of Nanowrimo is don’t edit. Forget the backspace key exists. Take it off your keyboard if you need to. If you want to rephrase how something is said, retype the whole sentence in the way you want it to be rather than editing the original. The first draft is to figure out the story for yourself. Revising it comes later.

2) Don’t get fixated on a single scene or sentence. Rewriting (as explained above) a sentence or two is okay, but if you find yourself getting stuck, try typing a summary of the moment instead. You’ll be able to come back and fill it in later while getting enough on the page to keep moving forward.

3) Remember, the goal is quantity, not quality. Everyone wants to be a good writer and so when we write something down that isn’t good at all, it’s hard and makes us start to doubt ourselves and our abilities. Writing is a unique art form in this sense. Every piece of literature starts as something terrible, but even the worst piece of writing becomes art through the practice of revision.

Think of it this way: every story you’ve ever read, laughed at, cried over, fell in love with, or threw across the room was once a terribly confusing, poorly-phrased, and disjointed first draft. Your story is going to be someone’s favorite and they aren’t going to care how bad the first draft is as long as it gets written. The first draft of anything is laying a foundation. It’s like building a house. First, you have to tear up the ground and dig a bunch of holes, making a big mess. It must be done in order to lay the groundwork for the building.

4) Be your own inspiration. Many people, not just writers, make the mistake of waiting for inspiration to strike before doing something. The truth is that motivation follows action. You have to act before you are inspired because acting on what you aspire to do is exactly what will give you the motivation and inspiration to keep moving forward. And this applies to everything in life, not just writing.

5) It is far easier to write from something than it is to write from nothing. That is the goal of Nanowrimo—to teach writers to get that “something” on the page. Once we get something onto the page, we are setting ourselves up for success because we have something to revise. That’s also why a good number of people find it useful to plan their story beats and fill out character sheets because it gives them something to start with.

We, as people, often hold ourselves to an invisible standard. We spend our lives trying to be perfect and beat ourselves up when we fail. We say to ourselves, “I should be better. I know better.” What we fail to realize is that the act of struggling with something is what gives us the experience to do it better. Struggling means you are learning. Struggling means that you are growing. Nanowrimo is not only about getting words on the page, but about working through the challenges we experience on the way. If you take on the challenge, you will become a better writer.

The last thing I’ll share is a personal motto of mine. I repeated it to myself frequently when I’m writing. I am a person that tends to doubt myself a lot. Anytime I feel overwhelmed or lost on a piece of writing, I say “It doesn’t need to be long. It doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to be done.” This quote helps me to write but also to get up the courage to publish my words. I rarely feel like my blog posts reach a “finished” stage, meaning I have to publish them before I feel like they are ready, even though I spend hours rewriting. Each post gets rewritten between four to seven times before publication. I have to pick between meeting my deadlines or risk never posting at all. I like to repeat this quote to myself because it gives me courage.

I’ll see you guys in December! Happy Thanksgiving and happy writing!

Are you going to sign up for Nanowrimo this year? Let me know in the comments! Doing 30-day challenges have a lot of health benefits! Check out this Tedtalk to learn more!

Writing Disabilities, Part 4: Villains and Disabilities

Happy October Listen Up readers! It’s time to start getting ready for the holidays or, if you are a fellow writer, it’s time to prepare for National Novel Writing Month! To celebrate both of these, today’s blog post starts with a creative experiment! Take out some markers or colored pencils and a sheet of paper. Take five or ten minutes to draw a monster.

If you chose to skip the drawing, this experiment will also work with a monster you’ve seen in a movie, TV show, or book. Let’s begin!

Explain why the monster is a monster. What characteristics make it a monster? Is it the way it looks? The way that it is shaped? The way that it hunts? Write down why. Lastly, does your monster have physical deformities, scars, or any disabilities?

If you answered “yes” to the last question, you don’t need to feel guilty. The truth is the majority of people have been taught to associate disabilities with villains and monsters since the time they have been engaging in stories. The literary world has a longstanding trend to use disabilities or other physical differences as a way to highlight or reflect other negative characteristics, which may not be otherwise apparent in a character. Since we start to see this as kids, we end up learning to unconsciously associate disabilities with these villainous characters. As we get older, those associations become built into stigmas that surround disabilities today.

Let’s talk about a few examples. Think about your favorite stories as a kid. How many can you name that have physical differences to “mark” the villain? How many villains are mentally unstable or become unstable as the story goes on?

Scar from The Lion King and Captain Hook from Peter Pan not only have physical differences from the perfect-bodied heroes, they don’t even have a name outside of their differences. The Wicked Queen in Snow White takes becomes more and more mentally unstable as her efforts to kill Snow White are repeatedly foiled.

Another example is The Hunger Games. The villain in this series isn’t a specific person but rather a society. Throughout the series, Katniss meets several characters marked with disabilities, all or nearly all of them had their disabilities inflicted by evil acts of the Capital. Even though the Capital isn’t a person or disabled, readers are taught to associate the Capital with disabilities because it highlights the cruelty of the Capital.

Perhaps the greatest example I can give is the Star Wars franchise. Almost everyone associated with the dark side is disabled or has physical differences. Scars, deformities, missing limbs, mental disabilities, among many other examples. On the other hand, the Jedi and their allies, are always able-bodied. This ablest mindset is reinforced particularly when Obi-Wan speaks of Darth Vader. “He’s more machine now than man: twisted and evil.” This statement implies that Darth Vader is no longer a person because he has multiple disabilities and needs several pieces of assistive technology for his daily life. Secondly, it implies that he is not worth saving because of his disabilities.

What about Luke Skywalker? Luke, one of the main characters of the franchise, acquires a disability in Episode V. That’s where things start to get interesting from a literary analysis standpoint. Even though Luke is an example of a disabled hero, he appears completely able-bodied for the rest of the second trilogy. Furthermore, Luke became disabled because of Darth Vader. In other words, it is a case of the hero being permanently marked by evil. It’s not really disability representation, but rather meant to be a symbol of evil.

It’s a complicated subject and I imagine I will be writing a whole blog post series on Star Wars, especially because they have been trying to address the ableist nature of the franchise by bringing forth more characters with disabilities, such as in The Bad Batch and Rogue One.

Azula in The Last Airbender

Another way to look at the subject of disabilities and villains is with the nullification of disabilities theory. Disabilities are often seen as undesirable or as a weakness, which ends up being significant because villains are designed to lose. With the nullification of disabilities theory, we start to see how disabilities are used to play a role in power status.

An example is Azula from The Last Airbender. Azula is easily one of the strongest and most cunning characters on the show. However, the closer she gets to her goal to be the Fire Lord, she becomes more and more mentally unstable. In other words, the closer she gets to power, the more disabled she becomes. In the grand finale, Azula almost succeeds in killing two of the show’s main protagonists as a testament to how powerful she is. Azula, in her prime, I don’t think she would have been defeated by the good guys. But her mental health was disrupted to a point that she was making rash decisions in battle and over-committing to moves, which ultimately led to her defeat. Azula would not have been defeated unless she had a disability.

To summarize the basis: bad guys, or villains, have disabilities and/or physical differences. The good guys, or the heroes, are always able-bodied (some may say perfect-bodied). I recognize that part of this is due to beauty standards. A lot of people don’t see disabilities as something that can be beautiful. But most often disabilities or physical differences are used as a metaphor for evil. Especially mental disabilities.

This subject has affected me for a long time. Recently I was reflecting on my childhood and I recalled that I would often call myself names such as “mongrel,” “cursed,” “monster,” “half-breed,” and the like. I was at a critical point where I was beginning to build a larger awareness of my disability and becoming aware of how it made me different. I wondered why I was disabled. I wondered if I had done something bad in a past life, so I had to be punished. I wondered if my parents had angered God, so he punished them by cursing me.

Now that I am an adult, I understand that none of these things are true. But as a kid, I was building awareness of my place in the world. It’s natural to question why things are the way they are and sometimes we come to the wrong conclusion. My conclusions, as wrong as they were, were the only way that I could make sense of my disability with the knowledge and examples that I had seen demonstrated in the world around me. Disabilities were marks of evil. I was disabled, therefore, I must be the result of evil.

Monsters and villains, more often than not, are designed to create fear. I, for one, refuse to believe the best way to highlight negative characteristics is to rely on disabilities or physical differences to cue the reader to the presence of evil. It’s been a longstanding tactic for many writers, but it’s time to start addressing the messages these tactics are setting. It’s also not okay to use disabilities as character “flaws.” Disabilities run so much deeper than what you see. Disability is an identity just like skin color, religious affiliation, gender identity, or sexual orientation. It has history and cultures built around it. The experience of disability is unique from person to person as well. Even if the two people in question have the same disability, they will find unique ways to adapt.

As you go out shopping for Halloween costumes this year, take note of what costumes seem to emphasize physical differences. Are they imitating disabilities as something to inspire fear or suggest evil? Pay attention to movies and how villains are presented. Are they given physical differences or disabilities, whereas the hero is not? Being aware of these issues is the first step toward building a better representation, and therefore, a better future.

For further reading: here is a link to an awesome article that talks more about the harmful implications of tying disabilities to villains and other harmful forms of disability representation. I found it very informative.

What are your Halloween plans this year? Comment below and let me know! I have yet to decide on a Halloween costume myself.

Movie Report: Marvel Cinematic Universe Doctor Strange directed by Scott Derrickson

Genre: Superhero, Action, Science Fiction/Fantasy
Released: October 20, 2016
Rated: PG-13 for sci-fi violence and action

Brief Summary
Doctor Steven Strange is at the height of his career as a neurosurgeon when a car crash damages his hands. In a desperate search for a cure, Dr. Strange ends up learning magic at Kamar-Taj and comes to realize that the world is in peril.

*Disclaimer: This post will focus exclusively on Dr. Strange based on the MCU movie. I will not be covering any comics or TV shows.

Credit: Marvel

Welcome back Listen Up readers! If you’ve been wondering where I have been lately, check out my last post “The Power of Voice.” This week I am excited to analyze the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Doctor Strange. Writing on this character has been my most difficult blog post yet. Originally, I was planning to use this film as an example of my nullification of disability theory. In preparation, I rewatched the film and realized while this film does have moments of arguable nullification, as a whole, the film does an amazing job at acknowledging Dr. Strange’s disability.

If you’ve been with me for a while, then you might recall mentions of Dr. Strange from previous posts. As I was going from memory, I wasn’t all that accurate. The way I remembered the story was Dr. Strange’s disability disappears after he learns to use a sling ring, thus the nullification of disability by power gain, which is to say, reinforcing the stereotype that a character can’t have a disability and be powerful at the same time. In addition to differences before and after using the sling ring, the film uses a lot of dark colors after Dr. Strange becomes disabled. After he gains power, however, colors become notably brighter and colorful. This gives the impression that life with a disability is dark and dreary.

Dr. Strange practicing writing shortly after acquiring his disability. Credit: Marvel

This interpretation has several questionable messages, which I had been preparing to write on before I rewatched the film and realized I was missing a lot of points. The film is pretty consistent with portraying Dr. Strange’s disability and the color differences are more or less a reflection of his inner state rather than mirroring the rise and fall of his disability. So let’s dive into my revised take on this!

First off, I will be making some assumptions about Dr. Strange’s disability based on a couple of scenes that take place shortly after he acquired it. In one scene, Dr. Strange is seen struggling to hold a pen and print his name. In another, he attempts to shave, slowly bringing a shaking razor to his face. At the last moment, he decides against it. Based on these scenes, I’m going to assume he has issues with dexterity and grip strength.

Dr. Strange’s writing practice worksheet. Credit: Marvel

Since Doctor Strange is an action film, I paid particular attention to how he fought. Grip strength is of vital importance to throw a proper punch. The tighter a fighter can close their fist, the less prone they are to injuries. If a fighter can’t close their fist properly or if they lack the coordination to land the punch across the first two knuckles of the hand, they are at high risk of broken bones, sprains, and other types of injuries. Grip strength is also important for holding weapons. Dr. Strange, with his disability, is going to have to learn to fight without his hands and conventional weapons. The few times he does use his hands to fight, such as when trying to handle the thugs that jump him in Nepal or when he hits the door of Kamar-Taj after he is thrown out, Dr. Strange screams in pain: supporting my theory that he can’t use his hands in a fight.

Which begs the question, how does he fight?

Shortly after beginning his training, Dr. Strange learns to conquer weapons with magic. He seems to favor having magic tendrils stretched between his hands, which he uses to block blows instead of his bare hands. The tendrils can also be used offensively as a type of whip. A weapon made of magic means he doesn’t need to hold onto it, thus it can’t be knocked from his grip. It makes so much sense and I appreciate the thoughtfulness and consideration on behalf of the writers and fight coordinators. Dr. Strange’s fighting style stays pretty consistent throughout the movie, but there is some variety.

For example, in another part of the movie, Dr. Strange is training with weapons and grappling with Mordo My first reaction to this was to say that the limits of his disability were being nullified, but then I thought about it a little more. Every martial art style in the world has moves that are practiced in the studio but never used in a real fight. The difference between them is the artistic versus the practical. I’ve seen bo staff forms where people jump up and land in a split. Cool? Of course! Practical in a fight? Not so much. If someone is throwing a punch at you don’t dodge it by doing a split. However, being trained to do the splits means you can kick higher and with more control. Therefore, while there are few, if any, practical reasons to use a split in a fight, it is still important to learn the move.

Mordo and Dr. Strange training. Credit: Marvel

Dr. Strange does train with weapons and practices grappling moves in training, but he never uses these moves in a real fight. (With one exception: when he is fighting in the astral plane, his disability doesn’t carry over and his style changes to straight grappling and brawling.) As a martial artist myself, it was cool to see how much thought and effort went into composing Dr. Strange’s fighting style. In later MCU movies, his use of magic has improved so much that he doesn’t need to fight close combat.

In hindsight, because he has to rely on magic more than any other person to be able to attack and defend himself, his disability lends itself to developing a deeper mastery of magic than his ablebodied peers. This idea is recapped in one of my favorite parts of the film when Dr. Strange is talking with the Ancient one, watching the snowfall.

[Ancient One] “When you first came to me, you asked me how I was able to heal Jonathan Pangborn. I didn’t. He channels dimensional energy directly into his own body.”

[Dr. Strange] “He uses magic to walk.”

[Ancient One] “Constantly. He had a choice, to return to his own life or to serve something greater than himself.”

[Dr. Strange] “So, I could have my hands back again? My old life?”

[Ancient One] “You could. And the world would be all the lesser for it.”

In other words, without his disability, Dr. Strange never would have reached a higher potential. Another thing I love about this conversation is that it pushes back against the cure agenda, which is an enormous ethical, political, sociological, and economic debate. The cure agenda, as it sounds, seeks to prevent, cure, or eliminate disabilities with various methods including, but not limited to: abortions of fetuses with disabilities, assisted suicide, sterilization, and social pressures to conform to ablebodiness. The cure agenda operates on the assumption that people with disabilities will always be “lesser,” and secondly, that if a disabled person had a choice, they would always choose to be ablebodied. Of course, the cure agenda is downright offensive to me and many other members of the disabled community. It is, sadly, a modern matter of life and death. You can read more about the harm a cure agenda can lead to in this blog post: “Disability History, Part 3: Aktion T4 and the Holocaust.”

The last aspect of the film I will cover today is Master Hamir, who is another character with a disability. Viewers might remember that he was introduced near the beginning of the film when Dr. Strange mistakes him for being the Ancient One, but his disability isn’t revealed until later. When Dr. Strange stubbornly blames his inabilities to do magic on his disability, the Ancient One asks Master Hamir to provide a demonstration to show that hands are not a requirement to perform magic. But here is what upsets me: when Master Hamir pulls back his sleeve to reveal his missing hand, it’s presented in a way that’s meant to shock the audience. The camera focuses only on his scars and missing hand. This emphasis essentially says that his disability is the defining feature of the character.

Master Hamir. Credit: Marvel

To go into this a bit deeper, people with disabilities face an ongoing struggle to get acknowledgment past their disabilities. Now, make no mistake, many of us are proud to be disabled. It is a part of our identity and it shapes how we see the world. But we are more than our disabilities.

To explain this idea better, I’ll share a story from my own life. Back in the summer of 2018, I was job hunting. As a deaf/disabled person, there are extra barriers in my way to getting a job interview. Many companies conduct a phone interview before conducting an in-person interview. This was the case with my local grocery store. They called me and started asking me a lot of questions. Of course, I had to ask multiple times for things to be repeated. “Sorry, I have a hard time hearing on the phone,” I would say, “Would you repeat that please?” Eventually, the caller said, “Yeah, this isn’t going to work out,” and hung up on me. After that, I was invited to an interview at a local bread baking company. I was lead through the kitchen to an office in the back. Along the way. I noticed the radio was blasting above the noise of the machinery and chatter of the workers. I did the interview and was offered a job on the spot. I politely declined because the noise level meant I wouldn’t be able to communicate effectively.

Yet another employer invited me to a group interview. Since I am not comfortable talking about personal accommodations for my disability in a group setting, I asked for a one-on-one interview. I didn’t receive a reply until two months after the initial interview, by which time I had found other employment.

Then one day, I received a call from Joanns asking me to come in for an interview. It was the second interview I’ve had in months and I was excited at the idea of working in an art supply store. I was particularly excited about the employee discount on fabric!

It was one of the best interviews I’ve ever had. I was chatting and laughing with the interviewer. She asked about my art projects and I showed her pictures of my quilt projects and paintings.

“Rachel, I am very impressed with you,” she said with a smile, “I think you’d be a perfect fit for this job. Do you have any more questions for me?”

I smiled, knowing that I nailed the interview. But now was the scary part. Bringing up my disability. Because there are so many stereotypes associated with being disabled, I wait to discuss it until the employer has a chance to get to know me a little and after we discuss my qualifications. I have found this technique usually works quite well for me. Usually.

“Actually, I do have something else I’d like to discuss.” I said. “I have a disability.”

She raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“I’m deaf.” I pulled back my hair, turned my head, and pointed to my red hearing aids. “So that means that sometimes I have a hard time understanding what other people say.”

When I turn back to her, her smile is gone. Her eyes racked me up and down like I had told her I was some kind of alien from outer space. I had a sinking feeling in my stomach. At this point, most employers start asking questions about my disability to better understand it and my needs. Instead, she sat in silence.

“You don’t look deaf.” she finally said.

I was flabbergasted. What was I supposed to say to that? What do people think a deaf person “looks” like? Trying to save the sinking ship, I asked if she had any questions or concerns about my deafness.

“No.” she stood up from the table and walked toward the door. I realized the interview was over.

“Um,” I stood up to follow her, still trying to salvage the interview. “If I get the job, when should I expect a call?”

She walked me to the front of the store. “We’ll call you.” She refused to look me in the eyes, holding the door open. It wasn’t enough for her to walk me out of the interview, she had to walk me out of the store.

Refusing to show weakness in front of her, I thanked her for the interview and got inside of my car. And then I cried. Big heaving sobs that made me so dizzy I thought I might pass out. I had no idea what I was supposed to do in this situation. I wasn’t even sure if it was illegal for her to walk me out of an interview for being deaf (it was). I didn’t have any money for an attorney, I was a college student for crying out loud. What’s more, even if I did take the matter to court and I was hired, I had no interest in working with the company anymore. But the worst part of it all? Living the fear that I always had as a child, of being denied job opportunities and more because of my disability. That’s what hurt the most. It was a nightmare that became real.

Sometimes it does not matter how talented you are, how many skills you have, how many qualifications, or how much experience you have—when you have a disability, that is the only thing some people will choose to see.

That’s why I was disappointed by how Master Hamir is portrayed only for his disability. He’s an image, not a person. I know exactly what that feels like and it is not a good feeling. It’s being invisible in all but one aspect.

Obviously, I have made some personal connections with Master Hamir and maybe that’s all it is. But I feel strongly that if Master Hamir had a few lines to speak or if he had been shown in the background fighting or teaching others, if there was more to his image than just his disability, I’d probably see him in a different light. As it stands, the way his disability was presented is disappointing.

To end on a positive note, one of the things I loved about the film is all these little, inmate moments and scenes where Dr. Strange is learning to adapt to his disability. He holds a cup of tea with two hands to keep it steady. After he learns to use an electric razor, he starts wearing brighter clothes, showing that he’s growing into his disability. And I love the closing scene where Dr. Strange holds his broken wristwatch in his hands. And in future movies, he frequently wears gloves which can be a form of assistive technology for his hands.

Dr. Strange with a new, more colorful robe and clean haircut after a scene where he learns to use an electric razor. Credit: Marvel

In relation to the scenes I originally interpreted as being nullified because Dr. Strange’s disability seems to disappear, I’ve realized I have overlooked a factor. Not all disabilities are constant. His hands could be steadier one day, but not the next. These scenes might not be reflecting a disappearance of his disability, but rather the inconsistency of it. I have included a few photos below of particular scenes that made me question whether or not his disability was being nullified. Comment below and let me know what you think of these scenes!

Dr. Strange and Won, the serious librarian of Karma-Taj. Dr. Strange is seen holding several heavy textbooks in his hands with no pain or struggle. Credit: Marvel
In this particular fight scene, Dr. Strange is falling, but catches himself on a door handle with one hand. I don’t think I could hang from one hand, let alone catch myself. This move takes a serious amount of strength and trust in your grip. I found myself questioning whether or not Dr. Strange would really be able to do this. Credit: Marvel
Dr. Strange eating an apple and flipping through the pages of an advanced textbook. He has no trouble flipping pages and his hands appear to be steady as a rock in this scene. As I am someone who flips pages for a living (as a medical coder and biller), I have trouble more often than I care to admit, to separate and flip pages. I imagine for someone with Dr. Strange’s disability, flipping pages might be a more difficult task. However, this is also the scene that I think falls the most under my interpretation of disabilities having varying from day to day. Credit: Marvel

Dr. Strange’s next appearance in the MCU will be in Spiderman: No Way Home on December 17, 2021. If you haven’t seen the official trailer for it, here is the video link. He will also be getting a second movie Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness on March 25, 2022, which is rumored to be the next biggest film in the MCU because it will change everything we think we know.

Credit: Marvel

Thank you all for reading today’s post and especially thank you to my readers who have been reaching out to check up on me and for encouraging me to keep writing.

Thank you for your patience as I have not been able to post as previously scheduled. I am still struggling with my mental health, but I am working on building better strategies to manage it. However, I am not sure what my posting schedule will be for the next while. The good news is that I am still working on writing and will be covering some exhilarating topics in the near future! Make sure to sign up for email notifications at the bottom of Listen Up’s home page or follow Listen Up’s Facebook page to stay updated on the latest posts.

Movie Report: Netflix’s The Dragon Prince

Genre: Children’s fantasy animation
Released September 2018 – current (the fourth season is expected to be released later this year or early in 2022)
Rated PG

Brief Summary
The world of Xadia is divided between the humans, who practice dark magic, and the elves, who use primal magic. The border between them is protected by the King of Dragons, whose only egg was destroyed years ago by the humans.
Callum and Prince Ezran find the last dragon egg and set out on a journey with elf Rayla, to return the egg to the Dragon King and restore peace to Xadia. But there are many who do not want them to succeed and do everything they can to stop them.

Credit: Netflix

When I was about ten years old, I set out on a quest to find a book with a leading deaf character. I didn’t want just any random book. I specifically wanted a medieval fantasy story, with a female, deaf knight, and involved dragons. I was so determined to find this story that I got up the courage to ask the school librarian for help. We didn’t find anything available in the library, so I looked on the internet, which also had nothing. I came to realize that if I wanted to read a story about a deaf knight and dragons, I would have to write it.

Well, that all changed when I got to watch Netflix’s original series The Dragon Prince, which has General Amaya, one of the highest-ranking military official in Katolis, entrusted with guarding the human side of the Border, sister of the late Queen Sarai, Aunt to two of the show’s main protagonists Callum and Ezran, and who happens to be deaf and uses American Sign Language (ASL) to communicate.

General Amaya, front and center, with her trusted advisor Commander Gren (left) and her nephew Callum (right). Credit: Netflix

Getting my childhood dream at the age of twenty-two, you bet I cried. While it wasn’t the first deaf character I have come across, General Amaya was the first portrayal of a deaf person in a position of power and who plays a big role across the story that I have experienced. In general, the whole show is amazing on so many levels. It was literally designed to push for diversity and representation. For that reason alone, it comes across as special and meaningful because so many minorities are being represented at once—and in positions of power! You have LGBTQ+ queens and assassins, so many powerful female leaders, and people of color by the dozen (among both elves and humans).

Not only is General Amaya deaf, but she uses real sign language—like proper grammar and everything. It’s not just a few token signs to help sell the part. And—something else that is noticeable—when she speaks, there are no subtitles to translate what she is saying. You have to know sign language to understand. I think this choice has a powerful impact because it allows the audience to see her differently. Plus there are some hilarious jokes you’ll only catch if you know sign language.

I did some more research into this. The ASL was so good, I wanted to know if there was a deaf person involved in the creation of this character. It turns out that one of the show’s co-creators, Aaron Ehasz, asked the question “What if [General Amaya] is deaf?” Ehasz also worked on another famous show Avatar: The Last Airbender, and is responsible for the tough-loving, sassy Toph, a blind earthbender. In creating General Amaya, Ehasz and the other producers reached out to several Deaf and Hard-Of-Hearing organizations, met with several deaf people, and worked with several ASL interpreters to make sure Amaya’s signing was authentic.

General Amaya is also in a position of power—one of the King’s most trusted advisors and one of the highest-ranking Generals in the Katolis Army. Serving in the military alone is something extremely meaningful and powerful for the Deaf and Hard-Of-Hearing community. In America, disabled citizens are not allowed to join the army or serve in any related military role. Now, that might come off as strange to you and maybe you can think of a few examples of disabled veterans who are actively working in the military. That’s because the US military has a loophole. If a soldier in the military acquires a disability during active service, the military will make all accommodations necessary for them to continue doing their job. So there are people with disabilities serving, but only able-bodied people are allowed to join.

“If the US military can retain their disabled soldiers, why can’t they accept disabled citizens?”

Keith Nolan

This becomes even more questionable when looked at from a global standpoint. America is one of a small handful of countries that do not allow people with disabilities to serve, in contrast to the rest of the world where they are allowed and even encouraged to serve. Or, if you look at this issue from a historical standpoint, there have been deaf soldiers serving in every single war in US history up thru WWII.

Credit: Keith Nolan

Keith Nolan, a deaf man and a teacher at the Maryland School for the Deaf, has been fighting for years to get the military to open for the Deaf and Hard-Of-Hearing. He participated in an ROTC program for two years and was able to earn the rank of a cadet private before he was barred from advancing any further simply because he was deaf. Nolan also traveled to several other countries to interview deaf soldiers actively serving in military roles and wrote a 98-page paper on why the Deaf should be allowed to serve.

“If you remember back in US history, African-Americans were told they couldn’t join the military, and now they serve. Women as well were banned, but now they’ve been allowed. The military has and is changing. Today is our time. Now it’s our turn. Hoorah!”

Keith Nolan

Nolan’s activism was successful up to the point that a bill, named after him, was drafted and sent to congress. The bill would open up a test program for the Deaf in the Air Force. If it went well, it would open the doors to regular service and test programs in other branches of the military. Unfortunately, the bill suffered from bad timing. Obama was a big supporter of Nolan, but the bill didn’t reach congress until Trump was in office. Trump has never been supportive of disability civil rights. Thus the bill ended up getting swept under the rug.

The topic of deaf in the military hits home for me. I remember the first time I was ever asked the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I was in kindergarten and still learning how to write. All the other kids were writing down that they wanted to be doctors, lawyers, firefighters, veterinarians, but I decided I wanted to be a soldier. I still have that assignment tucked away in one of my memory boxes.

It’s not something I talk about a lot. I used to tell people that I wanted to be a soldier, but apparently, I have such a reputation for being kind, that my friends and family laughed at the idea of me being a soldier. Growing up, it never crossed my mind that I wouldn’t be allowed because I was deaf. When I was seventeen years old, I started doing more research as I knew there were early military programs for high school students. That’s when I found out that I would never even been given a chance. That put me in a dark place for a long while. But I still hold out hope that things will change and maybe I’ll still have the chance.

To learn more about Keith Nolan’s story, you can listen to his TEDtalk, check out his website, or read more about the Keith Nolan Air Force Deaf Demonstration Act of 2018.

Coming back to The Dragon Prince, that’s one of the reasons that General Amaya is such a powerful representation. She is an example of something the Deaf community is actively fighting for. She represents hopes and dreams and inclusion and recognition.

Now, I wish I could leave this blog post at that, but if you recall my last blog post, I introduced my own literary theory about the nullification of disabilities. As much as I hate to throw General Amaya under the bus, she does fall prey to this.

General Amaya is introduced to viewers as a nonverbal character, meaning she relies on sign language for communication. So either people know sign language to communicate with her, like her nephews Callum and Ezran, or as it turns out, she has an interpreter, Commander Gren, to communicate with those who don’t know sign language. Everything is great.

That is until General Amaya assigns Gren to stay at the castle and keep an eye on Viren, while she goes on to check the border. Now, of course, deaf people do not require an interpreter at all times. There are plenty of other ways to communicate. The issue with this is that the writers didn’t show how Amaya communicated without an interpreter. Do her soldiers all know some sign language and that’s how they communicate? Is there another interpreter? General Amaya is in a powerful position where she is communicating with others all the time. By removing Gren and not showing how she communicates otherwise, it ends up nullifying her disability by refusing to acknowledge and respect the limitations of her disability.

Commander Gren signing with General Amaya, Credit: Netflix

Unfortunately, it gets worst. After she leaves Gren, she seems to gain the ability to lipread everything. There are scenes where Amaya is in a room full of people speaking verbally and she follows the conversation without any questions.

I have said it before and I’ll say it again, lipreading is extremely inaccurate! Lipreading at best—at best—can give you 30% of what someone says, depending on the language. If it is a tonal language (meaning words change based on the tone of voice, such as with Mandarin), you’ll get even less. In addition, lipreading has so many factors—how expressive someone’s face and body is, how fast they talk, if they mumble their words, and we haven’t even gotten to accents yet or being in the right mindset to lipread. Lipreading is exhausting work. I’ve had times where I am so tired at the end of the day, trying to lipread is like trying to understand a foreign language. When I reach this point, I say “I can’t understand English right now.” People laugh at that because they think I’m being funny, but really, I’m being serious. Basically what I’m saying is relying on lipreading alone is the crappiest form of communication on the face of the planet. It only works when it is put together with other things—like knowing the context of the conversation.

Yet, General Amaya doesn’t seem to have any of these issues. But wait—it gets worst (again). In Season 3, General Amaya is taken captive by Sunfire Elves. Now, the elves have a completely different set of cultures and languages than humans do. Yet, despite having no experience with elvish dialects and accents, General Amaya seems able to lipread most of what they say. Not all of it though, as they do bring in a non-native sign language interpreter into the story when they are interrogating General Amaya in a ring of fire.

To draw from my own experiences, I have a lot of opportunities to work with people who speak Spanish as a first language. In some cases, I have worked with the same people for years and let me tell you, even though I’m familiar with the Mexican accent, I struggle to lipread it. It’s like trying to lipread a foreign language. That’s why I’m saying General Amaya being able to lipread the Sunfire elves doesn’t make sense. These elves have a completely foreign accent and English is not their first language, so it doesn’t make sense that she can lipread what they are saying. In addition, she is not always at her best. In the ring of fire scene I mentioned above, she’s weak and beaten down, which would affect her ability to lipread in the first place because it takes so much mental effort to try to piece together what someone is saying even under fair conditions.

So in short, General Amaya, as awesome as she is, is a good example of nullification by refusing to acknowledge and respect the limitations of a disability. When the limits of a disability are not respected, it ends up reinforcing stereotypes. In this case, it encourages the myths that lipreading is 100% accurate and that all deaf people have an innate ability to lipread. These myths, which are already common beliefs among able-bodied people, then affect the lives of deaf people. I hate it when people just expect me to lipread what they say and refuse to listen to the accommodations that I actually need to communicate. Like when I ask for something to be written down, they refuse and point at their mouth and keep repeating what they say. In other cases, I’ve had people grab me, pull me into their face so that they speak directly into my hearing aid as if that’s going to make things clearer. It’s frustrating and uncomfortable. But it’s also frustrating because I can’t fault others for doing this as they have never been taught otherwise.

With all that said, I still love General Amaya. She is my favorite character in the series and it is so cool to see how much she is involved in the story! She’s not some token side character. She’s almost a main character at this point. I will never forget the moment that I first saw her appear on screen, the way I did a double-take when she started signing, the way the realization hit me, and the tears started flowing—this is the story I’ve been waiting for my whole life to hear, the story I’ve been looking for since I was ten. She is such an amazing character, representative of so much more than just being deaf, and her signing is authentic ASL. Her portrayal is not perfect, as I pointed out the issues with her lipreading, which leads to the nullification of the disabled experience and which directly impacts people’s perceptions and understanding of disabilities. Because like it or not, most people are introduced to disabilities through a screen, that’s why increasing accurate representation and visibility is so important to the disabled community.

The Dragon Prince is an amazing story to watch and it has so many unique elements in it. It is one that I highly recommend. And it is family-friendly too. I am excited to see the next season, which is expected to be released sometime this year or early in 2022.

What’s on your “to be watched” list? Got any recommendations for me? Comment below and let me know!

Writing Disabilities, Part 2: The Nullification of Disabilities

I was first introduced to disability studies through a critical literary studies class, a basic requirement for English majors where students learn different theories or “lenses” for analyzing literature. This includes theories such as deconstructionism, Marxism, Colonial and Racial studies, among several others. But I noticed that we weren’t assigned to read the last chapter of our textbook, which was about contemporary fields of study and included a small section on disability studies. Naturally, I was curious and read it. While the scant twelve pages had a lot of interesting points to ponder, I found it disappointing. The reason I was disappointed was that it failed to explain trends I have observed over the course of my life about characters with disabilities. I ended up creating my own theory to explain these trends and presented it as part of my final presentation for the class. Since then, I have been revised it countless times. Today, I’m proud to finally share it with you!

This theory is called the nullification of the disabled experience or the nullification of disabilities for short. The gist of it is to examine the relationships between power and disabilities. Because disabilities are associated with many harmful stigmas and with the lower class, disabilities and power are not presented together. Take for example the 32nd president of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, whom I mentioned in a previous blog post. Roosevelt had polio and was paralyzed from the waist down, thus used a wheelchair and other mobility devices. However, he refused to be photographed with his wheelchair because of the stigmas associated with being disabled. He wanted to appear as normal as possible so people would take him seriously and not assume he was weak and feeble. He would use braces under his pants and walk with the aid of a family member to help hide his disability from the public, even though his disability was common knowledge. Roosevelt was essentially trying to “nullify” his disability in the eyes of the public to maintain power, trust, and status.

Roosevelt serves as a good example of how disabilities and power have conflict. Anyone can tell you that the appearance of power is important. The way disabilities are present in stories is equally important. Because of the conflicts between disability and power, they are often not presented as coexisting. When one appears, it often nullifies the other. This can happen in several ways. For example, if a character has a disability, then gains power—the disability becomes ignored or washed away. On the flip side of the coin, a character can be in a position of power, from which they are removed when they acquire a disability. Or another common narrative, a character seeks a cure or must otherwise overcome a disability in order to be powerful enough to defeat the big bad evil force of the story. But the simplest way a disability becomes nullified is when the limitations of a disability are ignored.

The last one is probably confusing to you. After all, isn’t part of the reason I run this blog is to help people see past the limitations of disabilities? This is true; I run this blog is to fight against the stigmas and stereotypes surrounding disabilities. But fighting against stigmas is a little different than acknowledging limitations. (Granted there is an overlap). The point here is that acknowledging and remember the limitations of a disability is a sign of respect. Ignoring limitations silences our struggles and denies that discrimination exists. But going too far to the other side by letting our limitations take center stage, will also encourage stereotypes and stigmas, which further results in overshadowing the capabilities and contributions of those with disabilities.

Think of it this way. I am a deaf person. My coworkers acknowledge the limitations of my disability by making sure they get my attention before speaking to me. They make sure to pull their face masks down so I can lipread. When I worked in a factory, my coworkers would stop machines to eliminate background noise before communicating with me. By taking these steps and accommodating my needs, they are being very respectful. It is an act of empowerment to acknowledge, accept, and respect my limits. Whereas if they don’t pull down their face masks or take steps to communicate better with me (ignoring my limitations) comes off as disrespectful.

Interestingly enough, this is the critic’s argument against the social model of disabilities. The medical model focuses only on limitations through the person’s body whereas the social model only looks at society and cultural factors. The social model doesn’t acknowledge the limitations of individuals’ bodies.

Bringing the idea of acknowledging limitations into the field of literature, I cannot tell you how many times I have seen disabled characters in TV shows or movies portrayed so accurately and amazing in the beginning, but as time goes on their limitations are ignored more and more. Which ends up nullifying the disability because the character is doing things that they shouldn’t be able to do. For example, lipreading. Lipreading is extremely inaccurate and yet, most Deaf characters I have seen on the screen can lipread every single word flawlessly. It drives me crazy! Lipreading is so much more complicated than it is presented on screen and it encourages stigma. (Check out this four-minute video that explains the complexities and issues with lipreading so much better than I ever could).

Representation like this is a slap to the face for the disabled community. Disabled individuals do not have the luxury of choosing when our limitations apply and when they don’t. By ignoring limitations when they become inconvenient, writers and directors end up nullifying the disability. It’s like saying, “We are representing a minority community—but they’re only sometimes disabled because being able-bodied is much more convenient and powerful for the story.”

I recognize this may not be the intention of the writers and directors, but it happens regardless. This is why—to be inclusive—there needs to be more people with disabilities involved in the workforce and especially in the creation of characters with disabilities. They are the ones who are going to spot inconsistencies and inaccessibilities that nullify what it is like and what it means to have a disability.

Maysoon Zayid, an actor, writer ,tap dancer, disability advocate, and comedian

As I was writing this post, I recalled a hilarious TEDtalk given by Maysoon Zayid who has cerebral palsy: “I got 99 problems . . . palsy is just one.” In college, she participated in the theater program. When the theater announced they were going to put on a play where the leading role was a character with cerebral palsy, Zayid thought she had been born to play it. She went through the whole audition process and didn’t get the part. Instead, it went to an able-bodied peer.

Understandably upset, she met with the director to ask why. He gently explained the reason she didn’t get the part was because she couldn’t do the stunts.

“Excuse me!” she said. “If I can’t do the stunts, then neither can the character!”

This illustrates an important point in the representation of disabilities. I briefly mentioned this in a previous blog post about the representation of disabilities in Hollywood. 5% of all roles in Hollywood are for disabled characters. Of that 5%, only 2% of those roles go to disabled actors. The other 98% are played by able-bodied actors. This means that the disabled community (which comprises about 30% of the US population and well over a billion people worldwide) is being represented by .001%.

Because disabilities are often invisible and because anyone can acquire a disability at any given time, Hollywood gets away with able-bodied actors in disabled roles. Whereas other minorities—people of color, women, and those with alternative sexual orientation or gender identities—usually have visible characteristics, so Hollywood can’t get away with it as easily. Respecting, remembering, and acknowledging the limitations and the capabilities of those with disabilities is an act of empowerment. And the best way to learn about those limitations and capabilities is to learn directly from us.

So that is how disabilities can be nullified by ignoring limitations. Another way nullification happens is when a disabled person gains power, their disability will disappear—or vice versa, when a person in power gains a disability, their power disappears. Naturally, this sends several problematic messages about disabilities. A great example of this comes from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Dr. Steven Strange.* Strange starts off being in a position of power as a genius (albeit arrogant) surgeon. Later, he gets in a car crash which destroys his hands and ends his career. Strange’s life is presented as hopeless, dark, and dreary. Thus, when he became disabled he lost his power and his status—nullification of power by acquiring a disability. In pursuit of a miracle cure, Strange ends up in Nepal training in the mythic arts where he struggles a lot and blames his inability on his hands. When he does finally get the hang of magic with the use of a sling ring, from that point onward, we never see him struggling with his disability again. He appears able-bodied. So when Strange regained power, his disability seemingly disappears. That’s the nullification of disability by power gain, which results in ignoring the limits of his disability. The next time (and I believe the only time) his hands noticeably shake following his gain in power isn’t until several movies later in Avengers Endgame when Strange hands over the timestone to Thanos.

I have so much more to talk about with Dr. Strange, so look out for a blog post in the near future where I will dive deeper into everything I said above and more!

*September 2021; Writing on this character has been my most difficult blog post yet. Originally, I was planning to use this film as an example of my nullification of disability theory. In preparation, I rewatched the film and realized while this film does have moments of arguable nullification, as a whole, the film does an amazing job at acknowledging Dr. Strange’s disability. Check out my revised take on Dr. Strange here!

Image: Marvel Studios

The message that this sends is that a person with a disability cannot hold power or be in a position of power. Furthermore, it reflects an expectation that a disabled hero cannot accomplish the same thing as an able-bodied hero.

To go further, the nullification of disability by gaining power is also common with temporary disabilities. Even an injured character—an example of a temporary disability—is often quickly healed or cured of anything that could make them less powerful or seemingly incapable of achieving their goal. For example, most science fiction and fantasy tend to have technology or magic with the ability to instantly or almost instantly heal injuries.

I think a big reason behind this is that when a writer has a character with a disability because they haven’t been taught very much about disabilities or have lacked access to the subject, they think of the disabled character as “useless.” Thus, finding a way to restore that “usefulness” quickly and reliably takes precedence.

I will admit this is something that I struggle with as a fantasy writer. Injuring characters is a great way to ramp up the stakes and build tension in a scene. For example, in one of my works I have a high-stakes chase scene with a character who ends up taking an arrow to the shoulder. Originally, I had planned for the healer on the team to instantly restore him to an able-bodied state because he has to fight in another big battle shortly after the chase. Without that instant heal option, I have to think about my story differently. How long a wound like that would take to heal naturally? I could give him a minor flesh wound (so he has time to heal naturally) or he could be fighting with his injury—which might not be such a bad idea because I can see it adding tension if done right, especially if he ends up having to sneak around the King’s patrols.

Now, I am not saying that no one should write stories with an “instant heal” or “restoration of able-bodiedness” option. If that is where your imagination takes you, I encourage you to follow it. For me, it has become a personal choice not to have instant heal as an option because I am so interested in exploring the disabled experience on the page. My intention in sharing this side of the coin is to show that there are other options. Instant heals, I feel, are something that has been done over and over. It has become something of an expectation. It’s been ingrained in stories since writing was invented and was probably around for thousands of years before that through oral storytelling. (Fun fact: the Bible is based on stories originally written in cuneiform, the oldest discovered writing system in the world which was first used around 3400 BC).

I, for one, refuse to believe that disabled characters cannot be in positions of power, nor that they cannot participate and play valuable roles in high stake plots. Writers haven’t been taught to explore the perceptions of power in regards to disabilities. Since literature embodies, reflects, and critiques culture, based on what I have seen, there seems to be a deep fear within our culture about disabilities. It is time to start exploring that fear, to question it, and to make apparent what we are really afraid of. What will happen when disabilities are allowed to linger on the page and be seen? What happens when disabled heroes are allowed to save the day?

At this point, hopefully, you are starting to see possible applications of the nullification of disability theory. If you feel that you are struggling with the concept, that’s okay. Critical literary theory usually makes more sense in application than in explanation. This post is meant to serve as an introduction. Over the coming weeks, I will be applying the nullification of disabilities theory to several different works of literature.

Don’t forget to like this post and/or leave a comment below!

FOR FURTHER READING

Goddess in the Machine – discusses a disabled character who is in a position of power and how the limitations are acknowledged

Netflix’s The Dragon Prince – nullification by ignoring limitations

The Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini – nullification by overcoming a disability and power gain

James Cameron’s Avatar – is it nullification?

Disability History, Part 4: NAD v. Netflix

A lawsuit that shook the internet

Good morning Listen Up readers! Today I am excited to talk about a civil rights lawsuit that helped to make the internet more accessible to people with disabilities. This lawsuit in particular has impacted my life in a big way and it’s cool that I got to witness it happen in my lifetime.

To briefly review, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed in 1990 and established civil rights for disabled people in American. Well, what happened right after that? The explosion of technology and the widespread use of the internet. Because it was drafted before this, the ADA didn’t have guidelines for accessibility in the digital world. This meant that many powerhouses, such as Netflix, were not being made accessible.

Movies have consistently been a huge part of my life. My Mom, in particular, has always loved movies. When my brothers and I were toddlers, my parents would rock us to sleep while watching episodes of Star Trek. As we got older, we would watch movies like Star Wars, What’s Up Doc, Titanic, and The Matrix. Every weekend my family would settle down on the couch, eat cardboard pizza (our nickname for frozen pizza), and watch movies. On Sundays we would watch AFV and Extreme Home Makeover. In those days, there was no streaming entertainment. Even YouTube wasn’t invented yet. If we wanted to watch a new movie, we would either have to buy it in a store (ordering things online was uncommon), see it in theaters, or rent it from a local video store. I still remember wandering through the racks at 3D Video, our local video store. It was a lot like going to a used bookstore, but with VHS tapes lining the shelves instead of books.

When Netflix began, it was the world’s first online DVD rental store. It started in 1997, four months after the invention of the DVD. Since Netflix offered more choices to its consumers, an ever-expanding library, and provided videos in newer technological format, it quickly became popular. We could rent up to two movies at once which would be delivered by mail. Mom always picked the first movie, then the second one would be picked by someone else. There were some spectacular fights over who got to pick the next movie.

In 2007, Netflix introduced a streaming service, which allowed subscribers to watch movies on anything with an internet connection. Waiting for movies to come in the mail was a thing of the past! My family was on board with it from the start. But I noticed there was a problem with Netflix’s streaming service.

Nothing was closed captioned.

As a deaf person, I have to have closed captions. I can’t understand any movie or video otherwise. As a child, I generally spent more time with my nose in a book than staring at a screen, simply because it was hard to understand what was being said. I remember one particular day, I had just come home from school and I laid down on my parent’s bed to flip through channels for something interesting to watch. I stumbled upon a game show where the contestants were dressed in oversized diapers and baby bonnets. Then they had to run through a playroom-themed obstacle course. I watched for almost ten minutes, trying to understand what was being said before I realized they were speaking Spanish.

One of the difficult things about growing up with a disability is isolation. I was never around other deaf people. I never learned how to handle different situations because I’m deaf. I had no deaf people to learn from. No one taught me how to advocate for myself—or when I needed to advocate for my needs. I like to sum it up as “No one taught me how to be deaf.” This isolation means that I grew up not knowing what kind of technology is available to me to use. As an adult, I still don’t know what kind of accessibility options are out there are for me. Every day I’m still learning how to be a deaf person in a hearing world.

As it was, I didn’t know closed captions were a thing until I was about twelve or thirteen years old. When I did discover them, it was by accident! I remember being bored while watching TV (as it was difficult for me to understand the characters talking) and started playing around with the TV remote, pressing random buttons to see what they would do. One of the buttons turned on the closed captions. I was stunned at the white words scrolling across black banners on the screen. I thought it was weird and changed the channel. The words changed too. That’s when it hit me that the words being displayed were what was being said. I could understand everything. I had big fat, tears of joy rolling down my face that day as finished I watching an episode of The Brady Bunch.

After that, I turned the closed captions on everything. Because of the ADA, movies made after 1990 had to have closed captions available. I learned how to turn closed captions on DVDs and how to use the TV captions for VHS. I insisted on the captions being turned on whenever my family watched movies. Later I learned the difference between English subtitles versus subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing (the latter includes sound in addition to speech). Closed captions opened up my world. What’s more, that was the first time in my life that I started advocating for myself and my needs as a deaf person. Which is a vital life skill to have when you have a disability.

So when Netflix started streaming caption-less videos, it affected my life. My family would keep watching movies, but without captions, I was lost on the story. It is boring to watch a movie that you can’t understand. I often preferred to do my own thing rather than watch a caption-less movie. It was a lonely experience. Not that my family excluded me from the activity, rather they often begged me to join them—but I would be so bored and upset if I did, that I found I’d rather be lonely.

“Why aren’t there closed captions?” I would say. “It doesn’t feel fair. They really ought to have closed captions.”

It turns out I was not the only deaf person to say this. Netflix was sued several times by various deaf individuals who recognized Netflix was violating the civil rights of disabled people. But Netflix won each lawsuit.

In addition to not providing closed captions on their streaming service, Netflix decided to raise the price of their mail-only service while lowering the streaming service price. Since DVDs generally have closed captions, this further discriminated against the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. This price gap earned the nickname “the deaf tax.”

Word of this reached the National Association of the Deaf (NAD), a non-profit organization that seeks to promote and protect the civil, human, and linguistic rights of deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals in the United States. The NAD made several public statements and open letters to Netflix over the subject of closed captions. Now, at the time Netflix was working on closed captions, but progress was extraordinarily slow. In 2010, nearly 7,000 movies and TV shows were available to stream. Only 300 of these had closed captions. Clearly, captions were not a priority.

The NAD decided it was time to take things to the next level.

“While Netflix is making progress, which is great it is painfully slow. Further, Netflix does not provide a means for consumers to identify captioned Watch Instantly videos, except by trying to watch them. Looking for a captioned video on Netflix is literally like ‘looking for a needle in a haystack.’

. . . The NAD calls on Netflix, again, to caption all of the videos on its Watch Instantly services now. No exclusion, no discrimination, no special discounts, no exceptions. We do not want to pay more and get less. We want equal access” (1).

Rosaline Crawford (Director of Law and Advocacy for the NAD) in an open letter to Catherine Fisher (Director of Communications for Netflix) on December 17, 2010

In June 2011, the NAD filed a lawsuit against Netflix.

“We have tried for years to persuade Netflix to do the right thing and provide equal access to all content across all platforms. They chose not to serve our community on an equal basis; we must have equal access to the biggest provider of streamed entertainment. As Netflix itself acknowledges, streamed video is the future and we must not be left out” (2).

Bobbie Beth Scoggins, President of the NAD

Netflix had already won several lawsuits over this topic. Their defense was that the ADA was drafted to increase access to physical spaces. Since they were an online service, they had no obligation to make their business accessible. Unfortunately, it was a strong case. As I mentioned before, the ADA had nothing about accessibility for web services or virtual products simply because it was written before these things were invented.

The NAD acknowledge that the ADA was written before the digital age, but argued that it didn’t mean the internet is an exception to the ADA, but rather, lawmakers needed to redefine what a physical space meant in a digital world. People with all sorts of disabilities were being left behind and excluded, which is what the ADA was supposed to prevent.

One year later, on June 19, 2012, the judge ruled in favor of the NAD. Netflix was required to pay nearly $800,000 in legal fees. Their entire library was required to be closed captioned within two years and new content could not be uploaded unless it contained closed captions.

“In a society in which business is increasingly conducted online, excluding businesses that sell services through the internet from the ADA would run afoul of the purpose of the ADA. It would severely frustrate Congress’s intent that individuals with disabilities fully enjoy the goods, services, privileges, and advantages available indiscriminately to other members of the general public” (3).

Judge Ponsor, on ruling for NAD v. Netflix

The lawsuit made waves through the internet. Netflix was a multi-million-dollar business and the powerhouse of streaming entertainment. They were one of the biggest businesses at the time. When they lost the lawsuit, it sent a message to all the other digital giants who thought they were exempt from the ADA.

In the following years, these giants took steps to became more accessible. YouTube continues to work on improving its closed captions and encourages creators to add closed captions to their videos. Hulu, HBO Max, and Amazon Prime worked to add closed captions to all their content. Even Facebook took strides to be more inclusive. When Disney+ came out, everything they had to offer already had closed captions. Accessibility is being recognized as a fundamental need rather than an optional suggestion.

However, there are still a good number of companies that have yet to make themselves accessible. Today, while the ADA has website guidelines, there are no enforceable legal standards for web accessibility. In 2017, regulations were drafted to include digital accessibility in the ADA. Unfortunately, when it came to approving these regulations in 2020, Donald Trump chose to ignore them. As of today, these regulations have yet to be approved and enforced. Until they are, the civil rights of disabled people will always be questionable for web-based services and products.

As for me, I would have been in my last years of high school before Netflix became accessible to me and I could rejoin my family to watch movies. Now, I watch just as much Netflix as anybody else (which is to say, too much)! And every Friday night, you’ll find me sitting beside my family, watching the latest episode, and reading the closed captions.

Don’t forget to watch the Oscars tonight! Three disabled films have been nominated (a record)! For the first time in history, the Oscars stage will look different as it has been redesigned to be accessible to actors and directors with disabilities. The nominees include Sound of Metal (available only on Amazon Prime), Feeling Through (available for free through YouTube), and Crip Camp (available only on Netflix).

References

  1. Crawford, Rosaline. NAD Calls out Netflix on “Deaf Tax”. 17 Dec. 2010, http://www.nad.org/2010/12/17/nad-calls-out-netflix-on-deaf-tax/.
  2. “NAD v. Netflix.” Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, 7 Mar. 2014, dredf.org/legal-advocacy/nad-v-netflix/.
  3. Leduc, Jaclyn. “NAD v. Netflix ADA Lawsuit Requires Captioning for Streaming Video.” 3Play Media, 26 Mar. 2021, http://www.3playmedia.com/blog/nad-v-netflix-ada-lawsuit-requires-closed-captioning-on-streaming-video/.

Movie Report: Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution

Genre: Documentary
Released Date: March 25, 2020
Rated R for sexual references and some language

2020 Sundance Film Festival Audience Award
2020 Miami Film Festival Zeno Mountain Award
2021 36th Annual International Documentary Association Award, Best Feature
2021 Oscar Nominee

Summary
Whenever a bunch of disabled people gets together, it spawns a unique culture. Crip Camp is no exception. A documentary about Camp Jened, which served as the seedbed for the Disability Civil Rights Movement, the bonds these campers made had a global impact. These stories are told in the words of the activists themselves, including Judy Huemann, Jim LeBrecht (who is also the director and producer of this film), and many others. The film includes first-hand footage of the Capitol Crawl, Section 504 protests, and the age of institutionalization. This film is humorous, heart-breaking, victorious, and beautiful.

I’m going to be honest. When I first heard about Crip Camp, I was ecstatic. It was shortly after I was introduced to disability studies and this film was one of the things that introduced me to my history as a disabled person. It is comprised of activists telling their stories interview-style, as well as a compilation of first-hand recordings made by the activists as they participated in these ground-breaking protests and events. For me, it was powerful to watch because it was the first time in my life that I got to see footage of the Disability Civil Rights Movement. And yes, this film made me cry as well as laugh out loud.

Camp Jened was a camp specifically for disabled teenagers that ran from 1951 to 1977. Whereas in the outside world, each of the campers had to deal with discrimination and barriers, Camp Jened was the opposite. Instead of being kept isolated and barred from living life, trying to hide their disabilities as best as they could, campers found independence and connection.

“At the camp you could do anything that you thought you wanted to do. You wouldn’t be picked to be on a team back home. But at Jened, you had to go up to bat!”

Lionel Je’ Woodyard, Camp Jened Counselor

Campers would help each other out. If you couldn’t play soccer with your feet, but you could crawl, then that was how you played. If you couldn’t crawl, then fellow campers would help drag you after the ball. And this was true of everything, not just sports. In this way, Camp Jened created a culture of inclusivity. They would find a way to make things work.

“It was so funky. But it was a utopia! When we were there, there was no outside world.”

Denise Sherer Jacobson, Camper

But camp also provided a place for connection. Campers were able to talk about difficult subjects, such as overprotective parents, sexuality, and the struggle for independence. People with disabilities are often not able to be as independent as they would like to be. For example, growing up I didn’t have a deaf-friendly alarm clock. I had to rely on my Mom to wake me up for school. While she did it without complaint for years, I was frustrated because I didn’t have the luxury of getting up when I wanted to. If I wanted to wake up earlier and Mom didn’t want to—I didn’t have a choice. I was seventeen years old when I got a deaf-friendly alarm clock. I found out about it shortly after joining a deaf basketball team. Being able to get up whenever I wanted to was a freedom I’ve never experienced. The freedom of being independent.

This is my current alarm clock. It comes with a special vibrator that goes under the mattress.
Instead of using sound, I am awakened by vibrations.

Another example of struggling for independence comes from Judy Heumann’s book Being Heumann. She talked about how her mother would always choose her outfits for her, even if Judy wanted to wear something different. But because Judy couldn’t reach her clothes and needed help to get dressed, and her mother was often busy helping Judy’s siblings get ready for school, she often didn’t have a say in what she wanted to wear. While everyone experiences a different version of struggling for independence, it is a common experience throughout the disabled community.

“At camp we tasted freedom for the first time in our lives. Camp is where we had freedom from our parents dressing us, choosing our clothes for us, choosing our food for us, driving us to our friend’s houses. This is something we would have naturally grown out of, like our nondisabled friends, but we live in an inaccessible world, so we have not. We loved our parents, but we relished our freedom from them.
“. . . The freedom we felt at camp was not just from our parents and our need for their daily assistance in order to live our lives.
“We were drunk on the freedom of not feeling like a burden, a feeling that was a constant companion in our lives outside of camp.”

Judy Heumann, Being Heumann pages 24-25

Having these kinds of discussions, connecting with other people with disabilities, and experiencing a culture of complete inclusivity, had a lasting impact on these teenagers. As Jim LeBrecht said, “What we saw at camp was that our lives could be better. The fact of the matter is you don’t have anything to strive for if you don’t know it exists.” They wanted the world to be more like Camp Jened. They kept in contact and started forming organizations. That’s how the Disability Civil Rights Movement started. Many of the campers from Jened participated in the Capitol Crawl, Section 504, and many other protests.

These protests, as I have mentioned in previous blog posts, changed the world. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was the first civil rights bill for disabled people in the world. The ADA was based on Section 504, which is an incredible story in itself and the first legislation of its kind in the world as well.

Camp Jened also brought together disabled people from many different backgrounds. Some were kept isolated at home, others were allowed to go to school with non-disabled peers, some were enrolled in special education classes, and others came from institutions.

Institutionalization started around the 1800s. At this time, because so many people were living in poverty, institutions were established to provide housing and access to food and water. But it was also a way to segregate the undesirable person from society. Institutions were intentionally built outside of cities, away from society. But institutions in this age were more focused on education and teaching valuable life skills.

With the 1900s came the rise of eugenics. The quality of institutions dropped as it was believed that people with disabilities would never contribute to society. In Germany, institutions were used as part of a program called Aktion T4, which served as the precursor to the Holocaust. In America, it was common practice for families to abandon disabled children at institutions so as not to deal with the social stigmas surrounding disabilities. Many families would never visit their child, opting instead to tell friends, relatives, and siblings that they lost the baby.

Images from these institutions might be mistaken as photos from the Holocaust. Understaffed and overfilled with patients, many of these facilities were dirty and cramped. Patients were malnourished and abused. Some didn’t even have clothes and most would sit in the dark emitting mournful cries.

Crip Camp includes a news story about an institution called Willowbrook. Footage includes children sleeping on the floor in hallways and bathrooms, naked or nearly naked, some covered in their own feces. Willowbrook was so understaffed that each of the children had three minutes to be fed. Jim LeBrecht recalled that one of the campers at Camp Jened was from Willowbrook.

“I remember being in the dining hall and this guy comes in. He was basically eating as much as he could. He was just… kept on shoveling it in until the point where he threw up. It was kind of like somebody coming in from the wild.”

Jim LeBrecht

Ending institutionalization was also a huge part of the Disability Civil Rights Movement. Today, institutions still exist, but there are a very limited number of them. In addition, lot more laws and government oversight are in place to make sure they are healthy and safe places. It helps that we live now in a society that no longer seeks to segregate disabled people from nondisabled people.

Crip Camp is an amazing and powerful film that shows a side of history most don’t know. Currently, it is only available on Netflix. It has been nominated for the 2021 Oscars, which will be taking place one week from today. There have only been two Oscars awarded to disabled people to date. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this will be the third. There is a huge lack of disabled representation in films and this goes a long way in the fight for visibility.

“Even though [more than] 20% of the population has a disability, 2% of roles in Hollywood are for disabled characters and of that 2%, only 5% are played by people with disabilities. The rest are played by actors without disabilities.”

Marlee Matlin, 2017 Oscar for Best Actress
Marlee Matlin is an American actress, author, and Deaf activist

This means of all the roles in Hollywood .001% are played by disabled actors. Even though the disabled community is the largest minority on the planet, we are still invisible. And we want more than representation, we want authenticity. We don’t want to be represented by discriminatory stereotypes or by able-bodied actors. We want to be shown as ourselves and as people because that is who we are. When people see who we are and what we are capable of, barriers start burning down.

One last thing that I will talk about is how Crip Camp talks about sexuality. Too often, people with disabilities are not expected to be in relationships or be sexual. We are predominately seen as disabilities, not as people. One of the campers in the film talks about her various relationships, including having an affair with the bus driver. Later she had to go to the hospital for stomach pains. The doctor, assuming it couldn’t be anything other than appendicitis, operated on her. The appendix was healthy, however, and the stomach pains persisted. Only after the doctor had exhausted all other options, did he realize that the camper had an STD. It never crossed his mind that a disabled person could be sexually active.

Because so many people share the same perspective as this doctor, it was one of the most powerful moments of the film. It challenges everything audiences think they know about disabilities.

Camp Jened doesn’t just represent the past. It also represents the future.

Who do you hope wins wins at the Oscars this year? Comment below and let me know!

Book Report: Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist by Judith Heumann with Kristen Joiner

Genre: Autobiography
Published February 25, 2020

Brief Summary
Judith (Judy) Heumann has been front and center throughout the disabled civil rights movement in the 1960s and forwards. She talks about what it was like growing up as a disabled person, from being denied an education, denied access, and denied her teaching license because being in a wheelchair was considered a fire hazard. Judy went on to become one of the leaders of the Section 504 protest—the longest sit-in of American history. This book tells her story in her own words.

The original cover

Good morning Listen Up readers! This week I am excited to introduce you to Judy Heumann and the Section 504 protest!

Judy holds a very special place in my heart. When I first started learning about the disabled community, disability studies, and relearning what it means to be a disabled person, I came across Judy’s TEDTalk, “Our fight for disability rights—and why we’re not done yet.” As I was listening to her talk about growing up and the protests she participated in, I was overcome with emotion. It was the first time in my life that I heard my history. In school, the disabled civil rights movement was never mentioned. I had no idea how or why I had rights. Judy’s talk was the first time that I heard the names of protesters and the stories of the protests. This history, these stories, are my heritage. And getting that heritage at the age of twenty-two changed my life. Especially as someone who has spent half my life wishing I was dead. I realized that there were thousands of people who fought for me, who thought I was worth fighting for, and they succeeded. Now, I run this blog about disabilities, literature, and culture. I imagine it’s the first step of many I will take in fighting against historical silencing and oppression.

The new paperback cover, released February 23, 2021

Section 504 was part of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. It was a tiny section created by a few supportive senators who wanted to sneak in a civil rights provision into the bill. It is important to note that disabled people had been left out of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It was legal to discriminate against someone with a disability. Businesses didn’t have to accommodate disabled employees or customers. Schools refused to teach disabled children. There were unethical laws such as the “ugly laws” (which outlawed the appearance of a “diseased, maimed, mutilated, or in any way deformed [person], so as to be an unsightly or disgusting object.” But the worst thing that was going on, society was in complete denial that this discrimination existed. Basically, if you were a person with a disability, you were not seen as a person.

“School is how we pass knowledge, skills, and values on to children–for the good of society. In America, school is considered so important, that, since 1918, it has been compulsory.
“For everyone except us.”

Being Heumann, page 21

Section 504 reads “no otherwise qualified handicapped individual in the United States, as defined in section 7(6), shall, solely by reason of his handicap, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” It not only acknowledged that discrimination against disabled people existed, but it would force any organization receiving federal funds to become accessible and not discriminate against disabilities. This meant schools, universities, city streets, police stations, hospitals, the government itself—all these things that had been cut off from the disabled community would have to be accessible.

The sneaky tactic worked. The bill passed, but it still needed a signature from the secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare. When Section 504 was understood, it made a lot of people unhappy. No other civil rights act had involved costs before and people didn’t see why the world needed to be made accessible. In 1977, four years after the bill had passed, the disabled community decided to take action.

“In general, institutions don’t like change because change takes time and can entail costs. In particular, the institutions didn’t see the need for spending resources to adapt their buildings, programs, or classrooms for disabled people. It would be too costly, they argued, an unfair financial burden–and how many disabled people really went to university, or participated in x, y, or z specific activity anyway?
“Right there was our catch-22: because the country was so inaccessible, disabled people had a hard time getting out and doing things—which made us invisible. So we were easy to discount and ignore. Until institutions were forced to accommodate us we would remain locked out and invisible–and as long as we were locked out and invisible, no one would see our true force and dismiss us.”

Being Heumann, page 80

Community is a really strong theme throughout this book. In fact, on the first page of her book, Judy says “for any story of changing the world is always the story of many.” The disabled community is very unique because our community isn’t built on blood. For colored people, they have friends and family that share the community experience. Religious groups too. I grew up in a Mormon household and was part of a large Mormon community. But the disabled community isn’t typically bound by blood (granted there are some cases where things like deafness runs in families). We come from every background. Some of us are black, some of us are gay, some of us are Muslim, some of us are atheists—there is no boundary that disability hasn’t crossed. We are the most diverse community on the planet. This intersectional nature of the disabled community played a big role in getting Section 504 signed.

“For too long, we have believed that if we played by the rules and did what we were told, we would be included in the American Dream.
“We have waited too long, made too many compromises, and been too patient.
“We will no longer be patient. There will be no more compromises.
“We will accept no more discrimination.”

Judy’s speech at the Section 504 rally; Being Heumann, page 92

Judy and her friends hosted a rally in San Francisco, near the office of Health, Education, and Wellness who was in charge of enforcing Section 504. They decided to march into the building and talk to the Regional Director, Joe Maldonado. Unfortunately, Maldonado had never even heard of Section 504, meaning that the government had zero intention of ever enforcing it. Our rights were such a low propriety that even the people charged with enforcing them didn’t know about them. Judy addressed the crowd behind her, “We need you to stay with us in the building until the government signs the regulations for 504!”

“For people with disabilities, a sleepover is not as simple as tossing some sandwiches and a toothbrush into a backpack. In addition to personal assistance, a fairly high number of us also require various types of daily medications and have things like catheters that need to be changed, or the need to get turned at night to avoid bedsores. Many people of course had come without a personal attendant, any kind of food, or even a toothbrush.”

Being Heumann, page 98

Seventy-five protesters committed to staying on the first day. Now, this was a coordinated event. Section 504 rallies and sit-ins were happening around the country in Washington D.C., Boston, Seattle, New York, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Chicago, Dallas, and Denver, but the San Francisco protest is the only one the held out. Others were starved or waited out by officials who used tactics such as fake bomb threats, cutting off the power, water, access to food, and communication.

“We were being talked about as if we were a foreign army. The public was stunned. People weren’t used to thinking of us as fighters—when they thought about us at all. And I don’t say that in a bitter way, but in more of an honest way. We were a people who were generally invisible in the daily life of society. I mean, think about it. If you didn’t see us in school, because we weren’t allowed in; or in your place of employment, either because we couldn’t physically access it or because we couldn’t get hired; or on your form of public transportation, because buses and trains weren’t accessible; or in restaurants or theaters, for the same reason—then where in your everyday life would you have seen us?”

Being Heumann, page 103

So why was the San Francisco sit-in successful? The truth is that it wouldn’t have been successful without the help of other minority communities. For example, when government officials cut off access to food, the Black Panthers fought their way past security to bring food and mattresses every single day. This was an incredible sacrifice on their part since they didn’t have a whole lot of funding, but here they were dedicating time, money, and resources for a cause that wasn’t their own. When asked why they replied “You’re fighting to make the world a better place. That’s what our goal is too.”

In addition, there was a local church group that held an ongoing vigil outside the HEW building. Since the protesters couldn’t be seen in the building, having a vigil outside gave news crews something to film and talk about, while bringing awareness to the importance of getting Section 504 signed.

At last, Judy and the other protest leaders were invited to meet in Washington D.C. with various senators to put pressure on Joseph Califano (the current Secretary of HEW) and President Carter to sign Section 504. On Thursday afternoon, April 28, Section 504 was signed and the news spread the next day. On the morning of April 30, well over a hundred protesters walked out of San Francisco’s HEW office.

“I was told there was jubilation on the fourth floor of the San Francisco Federal Building—victorious shouting, hugging, laughter, and, ultimately, crying.
“Because, as it turned out, people didn’t want to leave the building.
“They’d made friends, had fun, fallen in love, and felt fully free to be themselves. And in the process, something magical had happened. In the cocoon of the building, a metamorphosis had occurred.
“’We all fell in love with each other,’ CeCe Weeks explained to a reporter.
“’I’ve discovered that I count as a person,’ a protester told another reporter.
“’Instead of seeing myself as a weak person, I found my strength reinforced by others like me,’ said another.
“. . . They decided to spend one last night together in the building to celebrate.”

Being Heumann, page 147

The Section 504 protest remains the longest sit-in of American history, beginning on April 5 and lasting twenty-six days. It marked the beginning of major social change. It also happened to be the first piece of civil rights legislation for disabled people in the world. Section 504 then paved the way for the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the official bill of rights for disabled people in America, which was another global first. In 2006, an international treaty based on the ADA was adopted, called the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). The CRPD established civil rights for disabled people by any country that signed it. Currently, the CRPD been signed and ratified in more than 163 countries.

“Section 504 had redefined disability. Instead of looking at disability as a medical issue, it had made disability a question of civil—and human—rights.”

Being Heumann, page 159

This is how Section 504 changed the world. Disabilities are universal. No matter where you go in the world, or where you are from, no matter what culture you come across, no matter the color of skin or religious practices, you will always find people with disabilities. Section 504 is not the only event Judy talks about in her book. She also talks about the Capitol Crawl and more current events, such as during the Trump administration trying to weaken the power of the ADA. Sadly, disabled civil rights are constantly under fire.

A recent example of this (which is not in Judy’s book): when Covid-19 first hit America, several states began to draft triage legislation for use in the case that hospitals were overrun. This legislation would help to take pressure off the doctors on deciding who could receive care when resources are scarce. The two groups at the bottom of the list for care were 1) people over the age of sixty and 2) people with disabilities. When I learned about this, I was shaken to my core. And I was angry that my government, who is supposed to support and protect my rights, had decided that I, and millions of other people like me, were expendable in a time of crisis. I was terrified of getting sick and being turned away at the hospital for being deaf. And I had no idea how I could raise my voice and fight against that discrimination. When I told my family about what was happening, they didn’t believe me. “Oh, that’s not going to happen,” they said. It’s that denial that ableism exists that has kept disabled people segregated from participating in society for centuries. All of these things combined made me feel invisible and small—like an ant in the wrong place that somebody was trying to crush under their foot.

I am not currently aware of any triage legislation that has been enforced in America during the pandemic. When these first drafts came to light, several independent law agencies across the country took a stand against it, recognizing that it was a violation of civil rights for both the elderly and disabled. But in other parts of the world, this kind of legislation has been and currently is in use.

Ableism is a very serious matter. A life-and-death matter more often than you think it would be. And before you dismiss that, remember that the problems and issues of disabled people have been dismissed time and time again. So listen, listen up to disabilities. We are fighting to be made visible. We are fighting for the recognition that our problems do, in fact, exist and our needs to be addressed because the world so often dismisses us. People with disabilities are the largest minority in the world and we are the most underrepresented. Our stories are not being told. America loves the narrative that we are charity cases, weak, rare, and a source of objectified inspiration. But we are not charity cases. We are not rare and we are not weak. We are people with dreams and families and lives. We are people that love doing things, even if we do them differently than you’d expect.

Because, above all else, we are human beings.

Don’t forget to leave a like or a comment below. I love hearing from you guys. Thank you for all the support! Being Heumann is a great read for an overview of disability civil rights movement and learning about the disabled identity.

Book Report: All the Way to the Top by Annette Bay Pimentel, Jennifer Kellan-Chaffins, and illustrated by Nabi H. Abi

Genre: Children’s Nonfiction
Published March 10, 2020
2021 Schneider Family Book Award Young Children’s Honor Book (American Library Association)

Brief Summary
Jennifer has been a disabled rights activist from the age of six years old. It started when she wasn’t allowed to go to school, then when she could go to school, she was barred from eating in the cafeteria with the other students. She wanted to make the world a better place and starting joining protests, leading up to the Capitol Crawl which was the protest that forced the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Follow Jennifer on her true story to crawl all the way to the top!

Welcome, Listen Up readers! Thank you for your patience as I wasn’t able to post last week. I was super excited to introduce this book about the Capitol Crawl on March 13, the thirty-first anniversary of the event. Even though I missed the deadline, I’m still excited to share this book with you! All the Way to the Top is written by Annette Bay Pimentel, a forward by Jennifer Keelan-Chaffins, and illustrated by Nabi H. Abi. This book tells the true story of Jennifer Keelan-Chaffin and her involvement in the Capitol Crawl. The Capitol Crawl was a disability rights protest that took place on March 12-13, 1990. Over 1,000 people took part in the march from the White House to the U.S. Capitol to demand that the government pass the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which would establish civil rights for people with disabilities.

At the foot of the Capitol, several of the protesters dropped their crutches or slid from their wheelchairs to crawl up the steps. For some, it took the entire night to crawl up the steps. It was a physical demonstration of inaccessibility in action that showed exactly why the ADA was needed. People with disabilities were discriminated against in employment, in education, in public services, and even in architecture—all because they were left out of the civil rights act of 1964.

The Capitol Crawl forced the hand of the government and the ADA was signed within four months. But the protest may not have achieved its end goal without Jennifer. Some protesters suggested that Jennifer not do the crawl, as images of a child crawling up the steps could incite pity rather than serve as a call to action. All the Way to the Top follows Jennifer’s journey in experiencing discrimination, learning about the Disabled Civil Rights movement, becoming an activist herself, and finally, her participation in the Capitol Crawl.

On the day of the protest, Jennifer felt a sense of duty. She needed to crawl up the steps for all the kids like her. For all the kids who were barred from school. For all the curbs that prevented her from going places. So she got out of her wheelchair and made for the steps. She accidently cut her lip on the first step. The news crews who were filming the protest turned the camera lens to Jennifer. The image of an eight-year-old girl with cerebral palsy, bleeding, slowly fighting her way up 365 steps to advocate for her rights and other children, was shown all across the country. It was that image that finally pushed congress into passing the ADA. You can hear Jennifer talk about her experience here on Youtube.

The ADA changed the world for people with disabilities. Architecture was required to be accessible, so curbs were cut and textile markers were laid down. Buildings were required to have wheelchair ramps and elevators. It was illegal to fire someone or refuse to consider them for a job if they had a disability. Handicap buttons were installed to open doors. Braille was added to signage. Schools especially had to be made accessible too.

While for most of my life I’ve been completely oblivious to the fact, I’ve benefited from the ADA in many ways. When I went to school, making sure that I had appropriate accommodations was a big deal. I was given a seat at the front of the classroom so as to have a good view of the teacher’s lips. I also had a neck loop system, which linked my hearing aids directly to a microphone the teacher had pinned to her shirt. It also included speech therapy. Parent-teacher conferences were follow-ups on how my accommodations were working out. Now that I am in college, I have transcribing—meaning a person is in the room typing up everything that is being said for me to read on an iPad at my desk. There is a bit of a delay between something said and when I get to “read” it so it is not perfect, but it works for me a lot better than a neck loop. I honestly don’t know how I got through school without transcribing.

Without the ADA, I likely wouldn’t be allowed to go to school or college. I would have a hard time finding employment. A lot of businesses and services would turn me away simply for being disabled, such as the gym, the bank, my karate studio, and even busses could deny passage for a disabled person.

Reading with a couple of my nieces and nephews

When my nieces and nephews are a little older, I’m excited to share Jennifer’s story with them. They are not quite ready to graduate from board books yet, but they’ll be there soon. My feeling about this story and all of its beautiful illustrations can be summed up in a quote from the foreword of the book:

“I recognized that I had a very important responsibility placed upon me. I wasn’t just representing myself, I was representing my generation and future generations of children with disabilities who also felt left out as they struggled for the same rights as everyone else.”

Jennifer Keelan-Chaffins, Forward of All the Way to the Top

It is our responsibility to teach the next generation to continue to fight for a better world and for better rights. For me, I feel a sense of purpose that I’m suppose to help educate others on the subject of disabilities. Everyone benefits when we focus on making the world accessible to a wider range of people.

All the Way to the Top is available on Amazon.

What are some accessibility requirements that you’ve experienced or noticed in the world around you?