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yukieI've been meaning to write this for a while but I never ended up doing so because I kept flaking out. But - yeah, it's gnawing my mind.
So.
Before I start, I want to link a couple things. Thing One is Derailing for Dummies, which is a gloriously sarcastic examination of the kind of condescending stuff that privileged people who have no idea will spout off to - oh, anyone in a minority group. I'm also going to link to its deeply awesome predecessor. Finally, I'm going to link to this article, which discusses markedess/unmarkedness, concepts I'm going to touch on when I get going. Most of these resources deal with discrimination based on ethnicity, which is NOT exactly the same as the discrimination I am discussing - but it's born of the same flawed societal baggage. Intersectionality!
What I'm going to be on about is depiction of people with disabilities (PWD), and why this can seem risky. It's really not, BUT you have to slow down a bit and consider what your work might be saying, whether accidentally or not.
...I should touch on accidental fail here. Because we live and grow up in this society, and we take in its messages from the get-go, we've all 'drunk the kool-aid' (so don't bother with the dance of the fabulous iconoclast. I learned many a glorious smackdown for that kind of hipster silliness at my goddamn hippie university for artfreaks, so yeah), and we transmit the messages we took in without thinking. A friend of mine used this analogy for accidental fail: you're carrying seven boxes of kung po chicken downstairs en route to a gaming session, and you're stoked and in a giddy mood so you're ding the Cuban pete dance and not paying attention to the fact that the stairs are uneven and the rug at the bottom is torn. So you catch your foot on the rug, and PRESTO! Your GM is now covered in kung po chicken. You didn't mean to pelt your GM with chicken, but the fact remains - because you weren't watching your step as you ought to have been, your GM got covered in laser chicken sauce, which if it hits right REALLY burns. The right thing to do at this point is apologize and help clean up and make the effort to watch your step from here on out. Getting all defensive and wailing about why the GM was sitting where they were and why it shouldn't be such a big deeeeeal is POINTLESS. It's also hella babyish. YOU threw the chicken, whether you meant to or not. YOU are the badass ninja who has to clean up the mess because you were not taking care and using common sense.
Accidental failure is like tripping with chicken. Even if you didn't mean to fail, you did, and getting defensive does nothing but make you look immature and full of yourself, so don't. It's normal to feel bad and be mortified, but the only cure - the ONLY CURE for that guilt is 'you know, I fucked up and I'm sorry, I'll be more careful from now on'. No but-yous. Stuff your ego, it doesn't matter. Your hurt feelings because the GM yelled at you for chickenpelting them? They don't matter. You may have had the best of intentions, but that doesn't matter. I'm not saying this to be mean, or to say that you-the-metaphorical-chicken-flinger are morally bankrupt. I'm saying this because you are not the party who is covered in chicken, so you really have no business complaining about the meanness of the person who IS.
Okay, enough with the poultry metaphor, on with the bulk of this post. I have no doubt people are going to wonder about my qualifications and why I have any business writing this post. Well, I have a genetic lung/digestive system issue as well as a learning disability. Also, I have family members with mobility issues and physical disabilities, my father's got the same learning disability as me, I was a Leader-in-Training at an Easter Seals camp for one summer and because of how my brain works, I WATCH A LOT OF SHIT and SEE A LOT OF SHIT. I'm not just plunking my lower cheeks on someone's desk and pulling an Ace Ventura ("ASSHOLE-A-MIO~") - I have actual experience with disability. So please refain from telling me I don't know what I'm talking about, or accusing me of making shit up or attention whoring or overreacting. You can disagree with me, for sure, but do not speak to me as if I were a stupid three-year-old.
That sort of behaviour is oft called 'splaining in the blog circles I run in. You can have dudesplaining (wherein an arrogant guy decides that it's his job to educate a woman about how her life and experiences REALLY are), whitesplaining (see previous example, though sub in white person telling Black or Asian or Middle Eastern or any other person with melanin how it REALLY is and criticizing their sensitivity - see D4D about THAT one), hetsplaining (straight person preaching at LGBTTQI people), and yes - there is ablesplaining. Do people do this because they are mean at heart and just plain dicks? No, they don't. They do it because of how society treats marked people - people outside the 'default'.
For this society, the 'default' is a particular type of white, able-bodied, cisgendered, heterosexual guy. This is a very very narrow category and I don't know anyone who fits into it without his feet sticking out or his head popping the lid off the box. The 'default' dude probably doesn't exist. But this is what society has decided over the years is our default. We came to this point because our history's full of colonialism and racism and other grody shit (see The Unapologetic Mexican's the haunted land for a better explanation than I could ever give about a big chunk of this phenomenon - and I want to reiterate AGAIN that racism and ableism are not exactly the same thing and that my experiences with discrimination don't mean I totally totally understand T.U. Mexican's experiences with racism). Along with the innate racism and sexism of society, you get a lot of other baggage that's based on the same shaky grody platform of the hand-me-a-barf-bag parts of our history (and they are legion).
Society thinks that I, as a PWD, am worth less than someone who's able bodied. It thinks that I am demanding special rights when I say that people should be allowed to stay home when they are very ill because 'powering through' hurts me and others who have to inhale my snot vapour when I sneeze (I am eternally grateful that I have a boss who will tell me to go the hell home when I'm sick). It thinks it has the right to come up to me out of the blue and without even KNOWING me, demand I never ever have children because I am weakening the gene pool by doing so (I beg to differ - I'll get into WHY later XD). It thinks it has the right to flip the fuck out and scream when I mention that I have a libido - and man, do they ever flip the fuck out and scream MORE when they find out that men and women in wheelchairs can also have a libido. It thinks that since I have a physical issue, and a learning disability with associated anxiety issues, that I must be COMPLETELY STUPID and mentally undeveloped and that it therefore has the right to talk to me like I'm a stupid baby.
I'm not exaggerating. I'm not making shit up or looking to get offended (yeah because being offended is FUN - what the hell are you smoking~?) or blah be bleedly berh bloo (yes, I am making fun of that attitude, and I don't really care how 'mean' that is). I'm really, really not shitting you. Perfect strangers have told me I shouldn't have children. They've told me that my existence is a strain on the economy (it's usually some loser who's scamming and abusing the dole doing this too - bud, I have a job, get bent) because the government covers my medication (again - my meds are why I can work, so I'm not spanking the economy to death, o ye pearl clutchers). I'm not the only one this has happened to AT ALL. One of my cousins has CP; his mobility's affected by an odd gait but he's broken records sprinting. He is a flippin' paralympic athlete. He's also damn smart and hilarious but people will watch him walk and then when they talk to him they start in with the loud slow monosyllables. The campers at Merrywood said the same (I cannot call them kids, as a lot of them were older than me-at-fourteen) - they joked like hell about it, made fun of stupid people, shared stories of how they owned jackasses. And I know a lot of people are going to get ANGRY about this - about the tales of owning. They'll take it personally somehow!
Let me reiterate: you're not the one covered in kung po chicken.
A lot of people will treat PWD poorly. They will honk at visually-impaired folks crossing the road and mess with working dogs, bitch when the bus has to kneel and ramp out to accept a wheelchair and whine when they have to give up their seats (I don't have any scorn for people with knee issues or ankle issues or sore backs who are upset, but rather able-bodied folks who have just been deprived of a seat and won't be in pain at all from standing) and complain about THOSE PEOPLE taking THEIR MONEY and accuse everyone with an invisible disability (*raises hand* HI) of lying because they can't SEE what's wrong with them and they've never HEARD of that condition so BAW, spout off about how mentally ill people are all dangerous criminals or fakers or weaklings who need to suck it up, talk to anyone and everyone with any disability in that infuriating condescending 'splaining tone, tell us that we are wrong about our experiences, tell us that we are being childish, tell us that we need to watch our tone (see D4D again in re: the Tone Argument), and generally act like fucking douches.
Not everyone is like this, but a lot of people are.
So if I sound cranky - that's why. if some PWD are annoyed by your offer of a helping hand - that's why. Do NOT even bother going off all boohoohoo boohooohoohoo about your hurt feelings and how PWD are all such UNGRATEFUL DICKS. You may have meant well, your tone of voice may have been benign, you may have been respectful and addressed them as an equal but you were probably the unlucky person who came in after a DAY OF RAGING BULLSHIT. It's not a personal attack. You are not a bad person. You just were unlucky enough to be the decent person after a wall of dicks, and after dealing with a wall of dicks it's really hard to see the good side of people. No, nobody's got the right to smack another person with a baguette because they're unhappy, but neither does someone have the right to up and decide that EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN A MARKED CATEGORY SUCKS AND SHOULD DE AND DOESN'T DESERVE THEM AS AN ALLY BECAUSE THE ONE DUDE THAT ONE TIME WAS MEEEEAAAAAAAAN. You-the-able-bodied-person are the one with privilege here. You don't generally have to deal with hearing pudgy old dudes in bad suits huff about their tax dollars being wasted on your life and well being. You have every right to wonder what the fuck, but you do not have the right to scold and stomp and fume and huff and piss and be a jerk. You don't. You wouldn't do it to an able-bodied person, so don't do it to one of us.
We are not worth less than you.
It comes down to society genuinely seeing us as 'less'. I mean, for crying out loud, people make stupid unfunny jokes about STEPHEN HAWKING and he's got an IQ somewhere out in the stratosphere. He's EPIC but there's all these numbnuts all going hur hur hur he talks with a computer and has robotvoice let's make fun of that and imply that because he can't talk he's a fuckin' freak - it's like, the fuck. You really cannot treat people badly and then call them ingrates when they tell you to knock it off and have some respect.
So don't even bother writing some straw-PWD into your work so you can teach the rest of us a lesson about how we should behave and vicariously punish us for not giving you the cookies you think you have coming. Like - this is SO pathetically common. PWD in writing and media usually exist to be straw people or ~*Lessons*~ to an able-bodied character. The only PWD I can think of on TV right now who is actually A CHARACTER IN THEIR OWN RIGHT is House. House is a genius and a dick and he's based on Sherlock Holmes and he walks with a cane. He's the star of the show. it's HIS SHOW. it still kind of boggles my mind that he's treated as a CHARACTER and not a VERY SPECIAL LESSON or a straw-whatever or a plot device. And when he's a dick it's dealt with as it would deal with an UNMARKED-CATEGORY character being a dick. Now, if House was a woman she'd probably be called a raging byotch but that's another rant for another time. So yeah. We have House. He's the only one I can think of. He's allowed to be pissed off. The issues he has with pain and mobility are SHOWN. The show isn't perfect by any means but I was surprised at the fact that this cranky dude with a cane was THE HERO OF THE SHOW and the writers didn't do that sappy-dappy-doo businss that usually surrounds PWD characters. House isn't relegated to a Very Special Episode. He's not just THERE to teach another character a lesson about a warm-n'-fuzzy concept.
I really wish more depictions were like that. I mean, shit - in many of the books I've read, PWD are either cured in the end or they die (*annoyed muttering about people-are-not-plot-devices-goes here*). The idea that PWD can have happy, long, fulfilling, FUN lives WHILE STILL HAVING A DISABILITY is just so completely fucking BEYOND some people's grasp! That doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to the day they can cure my issues, but in the meantime - yes, I am living a happy life. I have to do more work to maintain my health, but it's a small price to pay for me. (As an aside: I am allowed to say that for me, personally, something is a small price. I'm not going to speak for other people. Also, a privileged person should avoid saying that [blahbleeglugnargh] is a small price to pay/a necessary evil, because chances are that person has no fucking idea what the price is and aren't subject to the evil.)
So yeah. The reason it seems risky portraying PWD in media is because of the society we live in. it's not that we are sensitive/mean/looking to be offended/jerks. (Well, some of us are jerks, but some of ANY group are jerks.) We do not have to be grateful for condescension and insults. We don't have to be happy that you bothered to consider us at all. We really don't. If you're writing anyone as an insulting caricature (intentionally or not) and your work is et up with unexamined stereotypes, and people get rightly annoyed with you because you're participating in dehumanizing them by proxy (art imitates life imitates art and by perpetuating crappy stereotypes in media we normalize them and foster their persistence)...YOU THREW THE CHICKEN.
Most privileged people absolutely do not mean to be *ist. They do not want to be jerks. They do not MEAN to be jerks. They want to do the right thing. They want to treat people with respect. They are generally decent - it's just that the problematic stuff in media usually doesn't jump out at them because they're not the subject of it. And if it's pointed out, denying its existence is useless.
Please note that someone saying 'your work is problematic' is not them saying 'you suck and need to die'. Please also note that it is not worse for people to point this out than it is for you to have produced it. The idea that pointing out fail is the REAL problem is bunkum and I'm shocked that so many adults use this "NUH UH! NUH UH! YOU SMELL!" tactic. Pointing out racism is not racist. Get real and grow up. You're embarrassing yourself by having tantrums about this. Clean up the chicken and apologize and move on.
Society's bigotry is not 'over'. We've come a long way, yes, but we have a long way to go, so lecturing the marked folks about how they should be grateful when they point out current fail is just absurd. Seriously, Kurt Schwitters's Dada poetry makes more sense than that argument, and its stankier cousin the 'WE GAVE YOU YOUR RIGHTS AND IF YOU DON'T BEHAVE WE'LL TAKE THEM AWAY YOU INGRAAAAATES' rant.
Yes, one DOES have to pay more attention in portryaing someone in a marked category. Because we're not the default - it's like this. One straight able-bodied white dude in media is not interchangeable with another straight able-bodied white dude, because he's unmarked - straight white dudes as a whole are,one straight white dude does not represent them all - so you can have a bunch of white dudes running in circles singing the Tiki Bird song and wearing lampshades on their heads, and any one of those guys is usually unlikely to be seen as representative of all white guys anywhere ever. Conversely - one black guy in a movie is a stand-in for all black guys. He's not the 'default'. The black guy in the movie is the 'ambassador' for all black guys. Ditto female characters (see - if I just said 'character' a lot of people would assume 'dude', this is how this works). And - aside here - THIS is one reason why female characters are subject to such hardass critique. Another reason is society's epic sexist undercurrents, of course. Back on track - because one marginalized-person character is the stand-in for all people of that type, the ambassador to the 'normal people's world' (these are big fat sarcastic air quotes)...well, in depicting that type of character in a problematic manner, you're by extension saying ALL people of type X are like Y.
You are probably not doing it on purpose, but this is what is happening.
So yes, I do have a right to be annoyed if you're vicariously smacking me down via Uppity PWD Bitch #3 who gets what's coming to her and learns to be properly grateful! I do have a right to be irritated at authors who are whining through their work about those mean people in wheelchairs! it's not problematic in and of itself to depict a PWD as flawed, but for the love of $deity - make sure your PWD is a CHARACTER, okay? Don't give me this paper-doll bulltinky. Write a character who happens to have a disability. WE ARE NOT OUR DISABILITIES. I HAVE cystic fibrosis (and yes I am doing well, my lungs are good, thanks ^^), it does not define who I am. I personally take issue with some aspects of the CCFF (which is largely run by people without CF - we're in thee but not the majority last I checked), and I know that there are people who will call me ungrateful for that. I'm not; I take issue with some aspects of it. There is a big difference. But I digress.
I will not accept being held to unreasonable standards with ever-moving goalposts because of a chromosomal fart. I will not accept seeing other people held to this type of standard because of their level of ability, their gender, their sexual orientation, or their ethnicity. The same system that sucks so much ass at me sucks at them and the suck is DIFFERENT SUCK but it's based upon the same flawed, cruel, stupid, ancient bullsnarl. All bigotry stems from the idea that such-and-such type of person is LESSER. I don't HAVE to accept that. I have the right to say 'knock it off, what you're doing affects me personally in this manner'. And I will speak up when I see other kinds of fail ricocheting around, or do my best to (because some days I just have a big lack of spoons and I really can't deal emotionally with shit and I don't like exploding into this tiny supernova of squirrely wrath and tearing people down and eating their ego with cheese sauce when I can't deal with shit and thus setting off yet another round of 'oh those people are MEAN!', so on spoonless days I sit on my hands and wait, and try to speak out when I am spoon'd again), because it connects to the issues that affect me.
And even if it didn't, I should say something anyhow, because why the fuck are we SETTLING for bullshit? Why are we settling for media that depicts dudes as stupid and wang-led and incapable of housework and self control! - that shit does NOT come out of progressive camps, okay, Homer Simpson is not a product of the progressives. He's Fred Flintstone's spiritual successor, and if anyone tells me that dirty feminists and stuff ran the media in 1960...yeah, I'm going to LAUGH. Like, the mainstream media, for the most part, DEPICTS US ALL AS STUPID WORTHLESS ASSHOLES! WHY are we settling for this!? It's ridiculous!
That's why I 'make such a big deal'. Because I do think people deserve to be treated with respect - ANY people, anyWHERE. And for the most part, in media, we aren't. And, as anywhere, some animals are more equal than others.
Depicting stereotypes perpetuates them. Kicking the shit out of them and refusing to depict them unthinkingly (if you're going to depict them BOY HOWDY you better work hard at deconstruction) stops them from being normalized.
I do not have to deal with being told to behave myself or I'll be punished and ignored and so will all others of my group. I am not a child. I am not a lesser being. I could drink horrible water and not get cholera at ALL and possibly skip a shit ton of other badness because of how my body works - from my cell membranes to my stomach acid (it's really quite epic and I have to take pills to buffer it some, so I suspect that it FRIES most invaders) and I think that's fucking cool and you now what, PEOPLE WHO CARRY THE GENE FOR CF ALSO DON'T GET CHOLERA VERY OFTEN EITHER. So my kung fu is superior. (This is when I get a bit silly, but my point remains.) And even if that wans't the case - so the fuck what? I deserve to have the same quality of life as someone without CF. So does any other PWD deserve to have the same quality of life as an able bodied person. So, too, does any marginalized person have the right to a life just has happy and fulfilling as that of a privileged person.
I was not born with a disability because I sinned in a past life or my parents were awful. That 'generational curse' shit is beyond offensive and for the love of circus peanuts it even SAYS IN THE BIBLE THAT DISABILITY ISN'T PUNISHMENT FOR SIN, AND THIS COMES FROM THE MOUTH OF THE BIG J HIMSELF. (Yes, I know parts of the bible are contradictory; I read it when I was bored in elementary school yay Catholic classrooms always having a bible - and this post isn't about the bible anyhow, so.) So knock that off. Misfortune is not a result of someone being a bad person. The idea that someone is marginalized because they did something to deserve it is a giant lie that needs to expire in a fucking pit of flames and then be beaten into a pulp with a giant rocket-powered wrench made out of ants. And then pulverized with a steamroller dropped from on high by Dio Brando himself. That idea is BULLSHIT. Not all perks and drawbacks are deserved. This is not X/1999, our destiny is not foreordained. Life is not fair and balanced yet. Not by far.
Until it is, we have to pay more attention. Treat people as they would like to be treated (and if anyone - ANYONE complains about 'special treatment' here I'm going to laugh and laugh and laugh at the point-misisng and privileged wankery...wanting the same rights as a privileged person isn't wanting special treatment and if you're judging an entire group by one diva you're being a childish, unreasonable, naive, unrealistic individual who needs to get with the program; you don't get to punish the rest of us because one snowflake was a dick, Sunny Jim). If you say you want to treat people with respect, walk the talk. Show your intent. DO IT. Discuss it. Call it out. Make it right. Listen. Act like a grown-up, and don't treat marginalized folks like children.
The only way to not be called out for fail is not to fail. (I just revealed myself to be a huge nerd here.) Watch your step on the stairs and you won't end up bombarding people with metaphorical kung po chicken. FORGET your ego, it's not important. (Ego is not the same as confidence.) The only cure for the guilt is action. Apologize, and do more better next time.
Do I fuck up in depictions of marginalized people too? Oh, you bet your pants, Mytho, but I learned through trial and error (lots of error) that my work is not ME PERSONALLY, that I can say stupid things and not BE stupid, and that the only cure for that stomach-turning quease you get when fail is pointed out? Is listening up and fixing it.
If you are not willing to do the homework, don't present yourself as a serious writer/artist. And even if you don't WANT to be one of those, there's really no excuse for being critically lazy. Google is a wonderful thing. So is listening to your friends who know about these things. Yeah, some critiquers ARE just doing it to be jerks but whining like Ozzie at Magus is only going to make them mock you MORE so just go 'well damn okay' and let the trolls stew. And don't paint all critiquers as trolls. XD
I'm never any good at concluding these things, so I'll just stop here and reiterate: listen to the people who know these things, and treat others with the respect you'd want. Watch your step on the doom stairs and you won't lose your chicken.
So.
Before I start, I want to link a couple things. Thing One is Derailing for Dummies, which is a gloriously sarcastic examination of the kind of condescending stuff that privileged people who have no idea will spout off to - oh, anyone in a minority group. I'm also going to link to its deeply awesome predecessor. Finally, I'm going to link to this article, which discusses markedess/unmarkedness, concepts I'm going to touch on when I get going. Most of these resources deal with discrimination based on ethnicity, which is NOT exactly the same as the discrimination I am discussing - but it's born of the same flawed societal baggage. Intersectionality!
What I'm going to be on about is depiction of people with disabilities (PWD), and why this can seem risky. It's really not, BUT you have to slow down a bit and consider what your work might be saying, whether accidentally or not.
...I should touch on accidental fail here. Because we live and grow up in this society, and we take in its messages from the get-go, we've all 'drunk the kool-aid' (so don't bother with the dance of the fabulous iconoclast. I learned many a glorious smackdown for that kind of hipster silliness at my goddamn hippie university for artfreaks, so yeah), and we transmit the messages we took in without thinking. A friend of mine used this analogy for accidental fail: you're carrying seven boxes of kung po chicken downstairs en route to a gaming session, and you're stoked and in a giddy mood so you're ding the Cuban pete dance and not paying attention to the fact that the stairs are uneven and the rug at the bottom is torn. So you catch your foot on the rug, and PRESTO! Your GM is now covered in kung po chicken. You didn't mean to pelt your GM with chicken, but the fact remains - because you weren't watching your step as you ought to have been, your GM got covered in laser chicken sauce, which if it hits right REALLY burns. The right thing to do at this point is apologize and help clean up and make the effort to watch your step from here on out. Getting all defensive and wailing about why the GM was sitting where they were and why it shouldn't be such a big deeeeeal is POINTLESS. It's also hella babyish. YOU threw the chicken, whether you meant to or not. YOU are the badass ninja who has to clean up the mess because you were not taking care and using common sense.
Accidental failure is like tripping with chicken. Even if you didn't mean to fail, you did, and getting defensive does nothing but make you look immature and full of yourself, so don't. It's normal to feel bad and be mortified, but the only cure - the ONLY CURE for that guilt is 'you know, I fucked up and I'm sorry, I'll be more careful from now on'. No but-yous. Stuff your ego, it doesn't matter. Your hurt feelings because the GM yelled at you for chickenpelting them? They don't matter. You may have had the best of intentions, but that doesn't matter. I'm not saying this to be mean, or to say that you-the-metaphorical-chicken-flinger are morally bankrupt. I'm saying this because you are not the party who is covered in chicken, so you really have no business complaining about the meanness of the person who IS.
Okay, enough with the poultry metaphor, on with the bulk of this post. I have no doubt people are going to wonder about my qualifications and why I have any business writing this post. Well, I have a genetic lung/digestive system issue as well as a learning disability. Also, I have family members with mobility issues and physical disabilities, my father's got the same learning disability as me, I was a Leader-in-Training at an Easter Seals camp for one summer and because of how my brain works, I WATCH A LOT OF SHIT and SEE A LOT OF SHIT. I'm not just plunking my lower cheeks on someone's desk and pulling an Ace Ventura ("ASSHOLE-A-MIO~") - I have actual experience with disability. So please refain from telling me I don't know what I'm talking about, or accusing me of making shit up or attention whoring or overreacting. You can disagree with me, for sure, but do not speak to me as if I were a stupid three-year-old.
That sort of behaviour is oft called 'splaining in the blog circles I run in. You can have dudesplaining (wherein an arrogant guy decides that it's his job to educate a woman about how her life and experiences REALLY are), whitesplaining (see previous example, though sub in white person telling Black or Asian or Middle Eastern or any other person with melanin how it REALLY is and criticizing their sensitivity - see D4D about THAT one), hetsplaining (straight person preaching at LGBTTQI people), and yes - there is ablesplaining. Do people do this because they are mean at heart and just plain dicks? No, they don't. They do it because of how society treats marked people - people outside the 'default'.
For this society, the 'default' is a particular type of white, able-bodied, cisgendered, heterosexual guy. This is a very very narrow category and I don't know anyone who fits into it without his feet sticking out or his head popping the lid off the box. The 'default' dude probably doesn't exist. But this is what society has decided over the years is our default. We came to this point because our history's full of colonialism and racism and other grody shit (see The Unapologetic Mexican's the haunted land for a better explanation than I could ever give about a big chunk of this phenomenon - and I want to reiterate AGAIN that racism and ableism are not exactly the same thing and that my experiences with discrimination don't mean I totally totally understand T.U. Mexican's experiences with racism). Along with the innate racism and sexism of society, you get a lot of other baggage that's based on the same shaky grody platform of the hand-me-a-barf-bag parts of our history (and they are legion).
Society thinks that I, as a PWD, am worth less than someone who's able bodied. It thinks that I am demanding special rights when I say that people should be allowed to stay home when they are very ill because 'powering through' hurts me and others who have to inhale my snot vapour when I sneeze (I am eternally grateful that I have a boss who will tell me to go the hell home when I'm sick). It thinks it has the right to come up to me out of the blue and without even KNOWING me, demand I never ever have children because I am weakening the gene pool by doing so (I beg to differ - I'll get into WHY later XD). It thinks it has the right to flip the fuck out and scream when I mention that I have a libido - and man, do they ever flip the fuck out and scream MORE when they find out that men and women in wheelchairs can also have a libido. It thinks that since I have a physical issue, and a learning disability with associated anxiety issues, that I must be COMPLETELY STUPID and mentally undeveloped and that it therefore has the right to talk to me like I'm a stupid baby.
I'm not exaggerating. I'm not making shit up or looking to get offended (yeah because being offended is FUN - what the hell are you smoking~?) or blah be bleedly berh bloo (yes, I am making fun of that attitude, and I don't really care how 'mean' that is). I'm really, really not shitting you. Perfect strangers have told me I shouldn't have children. They've told me that my existence is a strain on the economy (it's usually some loser who's scamming and abusing the dole doing this too - bud, I have a job, get bent) because the government covers my medication (again - my meds are why I can work, so I'm not spanking the economy to death, o ye pearl clutchers). I'm not the only one this has happened to AT ALL. One of my cousins has CP; his mobility's affected by an odd gait but he's broken records sprinting. He is a flippin' paralympic athlete. He's also damn smart and hilarious but people will watch him walk and then when they talk to him they start in with the loud slow monosyllables. The campers at Merrywood said the same (I cannot call them kids, as a lot of them were older than me-at-fourteen) - they joked like hell about it, made fun of stupid people, shared stories of how they owned jackasses. And I know a lot of people are going to get ANGRY about this - about the tales of owning. They'll take it personally somehow!
Let me reiterate: you're not the one covered in kung po chicken.
A lot of people will treat PWD poorly. They will honk at visually-impaired folks crossing the road and mess with working dogs, bitch when the bus has to kneel and ramp out to accept a wheelchair and whine when they have to give up their seats (I don't have any scorn for people with knee issues or ankle issues or sore backs who are upset, but rather able-bodied folks who have just been deprived of a seat and won't be in pain at all from standing) and complain about THOSE PEOPLE taking THEIR MONEY and accuse everyone with an invisible disability (*raises hand* HI) of lying because they can't SEE what's wrong with them and they've never HEARD of that condition so BAW, spout off about how mentally ill people are all dangerous criminals or fakers or weaklings who need to suck it up, talk to anyone and everyone with any disability in that infuriating condescending 'splaining tone, tell us that we are wrong about our experiences, tell us that we are being childish, tell us that we need to watch our tone (see D4D again in re: the Tone Argument), and generally act like fucking douches.
Not everyone is like this, but a lot of people are.
So if I sound cranky - that's why. if some PWD are annoyed by your offer of a helping hand - that's why. Do NOT even bother going off all boohoohoo boohooohoohoo about your hurt feelings and how PWD are all such UNGRATEFUL DICKS. You may have meant well, your tone of voice may have been benign, you may have been respectful and addressed them as an equal but you were probably the unlucky person who came in after a DAY OF RAGING BULLSHIT. It's not a personal attack. You are not a bad person. You just were unlucky enough to be the decent person after a wall of dicks, and after dealing with a wall of dicks it's really hard to see the good side of people. No, nobody's got the right to smack another person with a baguette because they're unhappy, but neither does someone have the right to up and decide that EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN A MARKED CATEGORY SUCKS AND SHOULD DE AND DOESN'T DESERVE THEM AS AN ALLY BECAUSE THE ONE DUDE THAT ONE TIME WAS MEEEEAAAAAAAAN. You-the-able-bodied-person are the one with privilege here. You don't generally have to deal with hearing pudgy old dudes in bad suits huff about their tax dollars being wasted on your life and well being. You have every right to wonder what the fuck, but you do not have the right to scold and stomp and fume and huff and piss and be a jerk. You don't. You wouldn't do it to an able-bodied person, so don't do it to one of us.
We are not worth less than you.
It comes down to society genuinely seeing us as 'less'. I mean, for crying out loud, people make stupid unfunny jokes about STEPHEN HAWKING and he's got an IQ somewhere out in the stratosphere. He's EPIC but there's all these numbnuts all going hur hur hur he talks with a computer and has robotvoice let's make fun of that and imply that because he can't talk he's a fuckin' freak - it's like, the fuck. You really cannot treat people badly and then call them ingrates when they tell you to knock it off and have some respect.
So don't even bother writing some straw-PWD into your work so you can teach the rest of us a lesson about how we should behave and vicariously punish us for not giving you the cookies you think you have coming. Like - this is SO pathetically common. PWD in writing and media usually exist to be straw people or ~*Lessons*~ to an able-bodied character. The only PWD I can think of on TV right now who is actually A CHARACTER IN THEIR OWN RIGHT is House. House is a genius and a dick and he's based on Sherlock Holmes and he walks with a cane. He's the star of the show. it's HIS SHOW. it still kind of boggles my mind that he's treated as a CHARACTER and not a VERY SPECIAL LESSON or a straw-whatever or a plot device. And when he's a dick it's dealt with as it would deal with an UNMARKED-CATEGORY character being a dick. Now, if House was a woman she'd probably be called a raging byotch but that's another rant for another time. So yeah. We have House. He's the only one I can think of. He's allowed to be pissed off. The issues he has with pain and mobility are SHOWN. The show isn't perfect by any means but I was surprised at the fact that this cranky dude with a cane was THE HERO OF THE SHOW and the writers didn't do that sappy-dappy-doo businss that usually surrounds PWD characters. House isn't relegated to a Very Special Episode. He's not just THERE to teach another character a lesson about a warm-n'-fuzzy concept.
I really wish more depictions were like that. I mean, shit - in many of the books I've read, PWD are either cured in the end or they die (*annoyed muttering about people-are-not-plot-devices-goes here*). The idea that PWD can have happy, long, fulfilling, FUN lives WHILE STILL HAVING A DISABILITY is just so completely fucking BEYOND some people's grasp! That doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to the day they can cure my issues, but in the meantime - yes, I am living a happy life. I have to do more work to maintain my health, but it's a small price to pay for me. (As an aside: I am allowed to say that for me, personally, something is a small price. I'm not going to speak for other people. Also, a privileged person should avoid saying that [blahbleeglugnargh] is a small price to pay/a necessary evil, because chances are that person has no fucking idea what the price is and aren't subject to the evil.)
So yeah. The reason it seems risky portraying PWD in media is because of the society we live in. it's not that we are sensitive/mean/looking to be offended/jerks. (Well, some of us are jerks, but some of ANY group are jerks.) We do not have to be grateful for condescension and insults. We don't have to be happy that you bothered to consider us at all. We really don't. If you're writing anyone as an insulting caricature (intentionally or not) and your work is et up with unexamined stereotypes, and people get rightly annoyed with you because you're participating in dehumanizing them by proxy (art imitates life imitates art and by perpetuating crappy stereotypes in media we normalize them and foster their persistence)...YOU THREW THE CHICKEN.
Most privileged people absolutely do not mean to be *ist. They do not want to be jerks. They do not MEAN to be jerks. They want to do the right thing. They want to treat people with respect. They are generally decent - it's just that the problematic stuff in media usually doesn't jump out at them because they're not the subject of it. And if it's pointed out, denying its existence is useless.
Please note that someone saying 'your work is problematic' is not them saying 'you suck and need to die'. Please also note that it is not worse for people to point this out than it is for you to have produced it. The idea that pointing out fail is the REAL problem is bunkum and I'm shocked that so many adults use this "NUH UH! NUH UH! YOU SMELL!" tactic. Pointing out racism is not racist. Get real and grow up. You're embarrassing yourself by having tantrums about this. Clean up the chicken and apologize and move on.
Society's bigotry is not 'over'. We've come a long way, yes, but we have a long way to go, so lecturing the marked folks about how they should be grateful when they point out current fail is just absurd. Seriously, Kurt Schwitters's Dada poetry makes more sense than that argument, and its stankier cousin the 'WE GAVE YOU YOUR RIGHTS AND IF YOU DON'T BEHAVE WE'LL TAKE THEM AWAY YOU INGRAAAAATES' rant.
Yes, one DOES have to pay more attention in portryaing someone in a marked category. Because we're not the default - it's like this. One straight able-bodied white dude in media is not interchangeable with another straight able-bodied white dude, because he's unmarked - straight white dudes as a whole are,one straight white dude does not represent them all - so you can have a bunch of white dudes running in circles singing the Tiki Bird song and wearing lampshades on their heads, and any one of those guys is usually unlikely to be seen as representative of all white guys anywhere ever. Conversely - one black guy in a movie is a stand-in for all black guys. He's not the 'default'. The black guy in the movie is the 'ambassador' for all black guys. Ditto female characters (see - if I just said 'character' a lot of people would assume 'dude', this is how this works). And - aside here - THIS is one reason why female characters are subject to such hardass critique. Another reason is society's epic sexist undercurrents, of course. Back on track - because one marginalized-person character is the stand-in for all people of that type, the ambassador to the 'normal people's world' (these are big fat sarcastic air quotes)...well, in depicting that type of character in a problematic manner, you're by extension saying ALL people of type X are like Y.
You are probably not doing it on purpose, but this is what is happening.
So yes, I do have a right to be annoyed if you're vicariously smacking me down via Uppity PWD Bitch #3 who gets what's coming to her and learns to be properly grateful! I do have a right to be irritated at authors who are whining through their work about those mean people in wheelchairs! it's not problematic in and of itself to depict a PWD as flawed, but for the love of $deity - make sure your PWD is a CHARACTER, okay? Don't give me this paper-doll bulltinky. Write a character who happens to have a disability. WE ARE NOT OUR DISABILITIES. I HAVE cystic fibrosis (and yes I am doing well, my lungs are good, thanks ^^), it does not define who I am. I personally take issue with some aspects of the CCFF (which is largely run by people without CF - we're in thee but not the majority last I checked), and I know that there are people who will call me ungrateful for that. I'm not; I take issue with some aspects of it. There is a big difference. But I digress.
I will not accept being held to unreasonable standards with ever-moving goalposts because of a chromosomal fart. I will not accept seeing other people held to this type of standard because of their level of ability, their gender, their sexual orientation, or their ethnicity. The same system that sucks so much ass at me sucks at them and the suck is DIFFERENT SUCK but it's based upon the same flawed, cruel, stupid, ancient bullsnarl. All bigotry stems from the idea that such-and-such type of person is LESSER. I don't HAVE to accept that. I have the right to say 'knock it off, what you're doing affects me personally in this manner'. And I will speak up when I see other kinds of fail ricocheting around, or do my best to (because some days I just have a big lack of spoons and I really can't deal emotionally with shit and I don't like exploding into this tiny supernova of squirrely wrath and tearing people down and eating their ego with cheese sauce when I can't deal with shit and thus setting off yet another round of 'oh those people are MEAN!', so on spoonless days I sit on my hands and wait, and try to speak out when I am spoon'd again), because it connects to the issues that affect me.
And even if it didn't, I should say something anyhow, because why the fuck are we SETTLING for bullshit? Why are we settling for media that depicts dudes as stupid and wang-led and incapable of housework and self control! - that shit does NOT come out of progressive camps, okay, Homer Simpson is not a product of the progressives. He's Fred Flintstone's spiritual successor, and if anyone tells me that dirty feminists and stuff ran the media in 1960...yeah, I'm going to LAUGH. Like, the mainstream media, for the most part, DEPICTS US ALL AS STUPID WORTHLESS ASSHOLES! WHY are we settling for this!? It's ridiculous!
That's why I 'make such a big deal'. Because I do think people deserve to be treated with respect - ANY people, anyWHERE. And for the most part, in media, we aren't. And, as anywhere, some animals are more equal than others.
Depicting stereotypes perpetuates them. Kicking the shit out of them and refusing to depict them unthinkingly (if you're going to depict them BOY HOWDY you better work hard at deconstruction) stops them from being normalized.
I do not have to deal with being told to behave myself or I'll be punished and ignored and so will all others of my group. I am not a child. I am not a lesser being. I could drink horrible water and not get cholera at ALL and possibly skip a shit ton of other badness because of how my body works - from my cell membranes to my stomach acid (it's really quite epic and I have to take pills to buffer it some, so I suspect that it FRIES most invaders) and I think that's fucking cool and you now what, PEOPLE WHO CARRY THE GENE FOR CF ALSO DON'T GET CHOLERA VERY OFTEN EITHER. So my kung fu is superior. (This is when I get a bit silly, but my point remains.) And even if that wans't the case - so the fuck what? I deserve to have the same quality of life as someone without CF. So does any other PWD deserve to have the same quality of life as an able bodied person. So, too, does any marginalized person have the right to a life just has happy and fulfilling as that of a privileged person.
I was not born with a disability because I sinned in a past life or my parents were awful. That 'generational curse' shit is beyond offensive and for the love of circus peanuts it even SAYS IN THE BIBLE THAT DISABILITY ISN'T PUNISHMENT FOR SIN, AND THIS COMES FROM THE MOUTH OF THE BIG J HIMSELF. (Yes, I know parts of the bible are contradictory; I read it when I was bored in elementary school yay Catholic classrooms always having a bible - and this post isn't about the bible anyhow, so.) So knock that off. Misfortune is not a result of someone being a bad person. The idea that someone is marginalized because they did something to deserve it is a giant lie that needs to expire in a fucking pit of flames and then be beaten into a pulp with a giant rocket-powered wrench made out of ants. And then pulverized with a steamroller dropped from on high by Dio Brando himself. That idea is BULLSHIT. Not all perks and drawbacks are deserved. This is not X/1999, our destiny is not foreordained. Life is not fair and balanced yet. Not by far.
Until it is, we have to pay more attention. Treat people as they would like to be treated (and if anyone - ANYONE complains about 'special treatment' here I'm going to laugh and laugh and laugh at the point-misisng and privileged wankery...wanting the same rights as a privileged person isn't wanting special treatment and if you're judging an entire group by one diva you're being a childish, unreasonable, naive, unrealistic individual who needs to get with the program; you don't get to punish the rest of us because one snowflake was a dick, Sunny Jim). If you say you want to treat people with respect, walk the talk. Show your intent. DO IT. Discuss it. Call it out. Make it right. Listen. Act like a grown-up, and don't treat marginalized folks like children.
The only way to not be called out for fail is not to fail. (I just revealed myself to be a huge nerd here.) Watch your step on the stairs and you won't end up bombarding people with metaphorical kung po chicken. FORGET your ego, it's not important. (Ego is not the same as confidence.) The only cure for the guilt is action. Apologize, and do more better next time.
Do I fuck up in depictions of marginalized people too? Oh, you bet your pants, Mytho, but I learned through trial and error (lots of error) that my work is not ME PERSONALLY, that I can say stupid things and not BE stupid, and that the only cure for that stomach-turning quease you get when fail is pointed out? Is listening up and fixing it.
If you are not willing to do the homework, don't present yourself as a serious writer/artist. And even if you don't WANT to be one of those, there's really no excuse for being critically lazy. Google is a wonderful thing. So is listening to your friends who know about these things. Yeah, some critiquers ARE just doing it to be jerks but whining like Ozzie at Magus is only going to make them mock you MORE so just go 'well damn okay' and let the trolls stew. And don't paint all critiquers as trolls. XD
I'm never any good at concluding these things, so I'll just stop here and reiterate: listen to the people who know these things, and treat others with the respect you'd want. Watch your step on the doom stairs and you won't lose your chicken.
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Date: 2010-07-21 12:58 am (UTC)I'd have something more intelligent to say, but mostly I'm in the "I LOVE YOU AND I WANT TO HUMP YOUR BRAIN" stage of thought right now.
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Date: 2010-07-21 12:59 am (UTC)XD the chicken thing is - yeah, I love that guy's brain. And it WORKS too, it's - yeah.
I'm glad i did no fale XD
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Date: 2010-07-21 02:52 am (UTC)It reminds me of the airplane fail (That I don't think ever got resolved properly) Invisible disabilities are usually the worse because people just assume that if they can't see it it cannot be real. :/ Just word.
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Date: 2010-07-21 05:55 am (UTC)And my learning disability ha ha ha ha ha ha. Apparently, in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary (SPECT and EEG scans show major differences in how a neurotypical mind and a mind with ADHD fire off and when), my learning disability is the result of my parents not disciplining me enough...
I enjoy the looks on the faces of people whom I inform them that my dad let me get away with dick-all and often scared me into line with cop jargon (i was a brainer kid and understood it too). :s I love my dad but he did screw me up a ton... And he's got ADHD too so THAT was great when we started banging heads. XD
it actually runs on both sides of my family. My mom says I was doomed from the get-go. She doesn't think it's a bad thing though, or that I'm a bad kid. Just ADHD is a pain in the ass sometimes. And so am I XD But so is ANYONE.
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Date: 2010-07-21 07:16 pm (UTC)All people are not liars who are trying to get one over on you. I would rather be nice and trust someone if they say they have limitations.
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Date: 2010-07-22 08:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-23 02:58 pm (UTC)I really think people should get basic medical information in schools.
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Date: 2010-07-21 04:36 am (UTC)Oh, Default Dude - also known as Commercial Guy and Sitcom Dad. Let's flesh him out a little - he's also middle-class and Protestant (of the kind who went to church as a kid and will get dragged to church once he's married, but ditches while he's single). There are two flavors of the default dude - swinging single (see: beer commercials) and married with two children and a lawn (see: home improvement commercials, sitcoms). This guy has a wife who's prettier than he deserves, loves sports, and is completely incompetent at housework (see: King of Queens). Despite this, he's either somehow smarter than his wife in a condescending sort of way (see: King of the Hill) or he's a total idiot (see: Family Guy). This guy's an asshole. Good thing he doesn't really exist.
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Date: 2010-07-21 05:49 am (UTC)I know ZERO guys like that. Zilcho. El niente. Bo-diddly squat. Sure I know guys who fail@ousework - but they're cool to learn (see: guy friend of mine who makes 'screaming dying germs!' noises while cleaning toilet - he sounds like the gremlins) and they fail because no one taught them...
...My sentence trailed off and ceased to have a point but yeah. Guys like that - I knew guys who TRIED to be like that and they made everyone miserable when they failed to be like that. Like, they BOUGHT that shit, they thought it was POSSIBLE. And then life was liberal with the nerf darts.
buuut I'm glad i was coherent. XD
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Date: 2010-07-21 04:39 am (UTC)Oh, and word. :)
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Date: 2010-07-21 05:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-21 01:52 pm (UTC)I remember when some certain people decided that I didn't have Asperger's because I *gasp!* showed the desire to be social. Bitch please, you aren't a professional and you have no idea what I deal with (you meaning the people who did this to me).
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Date: 2010-07-21 06:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-21 07:22 pm (UTC)There's Toph and Teo in Avatar too. It's a short list.
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Date: 2010-07-22 12:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-22 01:02 am (UTC)I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 04:26 pm (UTC)"It was a hot Oklahoma day and we were in Lance's Jeep Renegade, on our way to do a writing workshop for Indian inmates at MacAllister Prison. Seemingly out of nowhere (though I know there had to be a context for it), Lance turned to me and asked, "Joe, are you carrying around any guilt about anything?"
I thought about it for a minute, maybe longer. Silence is a pretty good thing to seek help from when you get asked a tough question like that. Finally I had my answer. "No," I said. "I'm not."
Lance smiled at that. "Brother, that's good," he said. "One of my elders asked me once what you should do with a cup of water that is not good to drink." He held his hand as if holding that cup and then tipped it over, pouring it out. "That's the Cheyenne way."
Don't keep carrying something is of no use to anyone.
And what does that have to do with the pages that follow? Simply this: that an awful lot of Americans fel guilt about what their ancestors did to American Indians. That guilt either makes them feel sad or it makes them angry and ready to deny it. It makes them turn away from the truth because they find it too painful or don't want to accept it. Guilt works that way. It clouds your vision with sorrow or twists your thoughts with defensive anger." (Our Stories Remember: Page 7)
I think there's a lot of truth to what you say and I think the split chicken analogy is a good one.
At the same time, I think that minorities (including the minorities I am a member of) have to be careful with their own [righteous] defensive anger. It encourages people (including myself) sitting in the privileged seat to turn on the defensiveness that comes from guilt, that comes from a feeling of powerlessness to portray people of a certain group fairly or deal with them. It encourages people of privileged to stop dealing with them at all, to burn bridges instead of crossing them. When you bring someone a box of chicken and spill it all over them, saying sorry is the right thing to do. But when someone responds with, "What kind of asshole carries around chicken! Clearly you're too clumsy to even try carrying around plate of food!" all that remains is the anger that the chicken was for them, that your good intentions are being spit on. That makes you not want to say sorry. that makes you not want to buy chicken for that person ever again--that is, why should I make "The Princess and the Frog", put my best foot forward to portray a minority in a fair and nuanced way, when what I get is this (http://hollywood-animated-films.suite101.com/article.cfm/frog_princess_damage_control)? If I had stuck with a white princess, there would be grumbling, but just the sort of grumbling that comes from a group of people who are just getting what they expect again.
It's true that it's not fair for people who are being shat on to to have to smile and put their best foot forward when they feel they're being shat on again. But at the same time, if their reaction is anger, you will only ever get anger and defensiveness in return. Sadly, in order to stop the cycle, it is usually the victims of ism who have to invite the perpetrators to empty their cups.
Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 05:47 pm (UTC)You are approaching, still, from a position of privilege and you need to examine that. The "WHAT KIND OF ASSHOLE" is quite the remarkable strawman as well and frankly I'm surprised to see you using that. You protest abut having the best of intentions and passive-aggressively imply that people in marginalized groups are being ingrates when the good intentions of the privileged fall flat.
In saying 'it is your anger that is the problem/you are buring the brudges/you are unkind and aggressive and we only have the best of intentions' you are blaming the victim,, and I'm quite angry to see this argument being put forth.
Go to D4D. Read that page. I do't think you did, because if you had you wouldn't be posting a comment with yet another version of the tone argument and with a stereotypical condemnation of my iritation. Where did I condemn the person with the chicken as a horrible clumsy ass? Nowhere. Don't bother with your straw men here; they are flammable and I have matches.
It is unacceptable to put the onus entirely on the marginalized group because all that does is perpetuate the cycle of ever-moving goalposts. I am either "too angry" (as you seem to be implying I am here) or "not angry enough and so obviously not that invested". There is no way to win. Turning the other cheek does not work. And even if I do address an issue politely, chances are I'm going to be accused of all manner of specious nonsense. Having an agenda/being a liar/being oversensitive.
People in marginalized positions are held to much more stringent standards than people in privileged ones, and you have internalized that mindset and are perpetuating a harmful pattern of behaviour here. Does it make you a bad person? No, it does not; I used to do it too. Then I realized I was being grossly unfair, because I was not cutting marginalized people the same slack I am cut. Privileged people can be angry and rude and threatening and abusive, and that is considered an acceptable reaction to a polite approach of 'hey, this is flawed and problematic'.
Which is, incidentally, how I approach tings. You seem to e implying that I'm a ragewad. his isn't so.
I just grew very tired of being abused by people.
Good intentions are meaningless. That was addressed in last year's RaceFail AND this one.
If you are honestly coming into my space and telling me that I am a bad perosn for being angry about being treated as less-than...I'm really not sure what to say. I'm very angry and very hurt by this, because it seems to me that you're viewing me as an uppity, ungrateful fucking little bitch the same way as so very MANY other people do when I show the slightest bit of displeasure.
You are telling an abuse survivor to shut up and deal with it, whether you realize it or not.
I'm not seeing where you got from 'sometimes people fuck up and the best thing to do is apologize' to this claim that marginalized people who get irritated are being unfair, demanding, selfish and ungrateful.
Good intentions are meaningless. Yes, that's not fair, but neither is my being assumed to be an inferior human being. You have perpetuated harmful rhetoric here, and you have in essence told me that I cannot be angry if I ever hope to be treated with consideration.
I know very well that you're going to go and run with the 'well if a privileged person keeps getting attacked (note this accusation of violence) by minorities don't they have a right to be as angry as a minority who's angry at privileged people?' Perhaps, but they should know that by expressing their anger viciously they are perpetuating an ages-old harmful cycle of behaviour.
I am not going to protect you from other commenters here; you have put forth an argument that reveals you really don't give a damn about social justice. You are in essence telling PoC, transfolks, LGBTTQI folks, and disabled folks that we should be nice or we don't deserve to be heard. That our anger is not fair. That we must be docile or we have no right to be heard.
You are perpetuating abuse, Kathy.
I wash my hands of this. You should have known better. I'm very angry with you right now.
AndI'd advise you to never ever appropriate aboriginals' stuff again. Not around me. Not around someone whose fucking best friend in Canada is Métis and who had to see him get called a liar and a sponge and a drunk by the same folks who wanted to cash in on his heritage.
How about a tall ice cold glass of Bitch Please. It's refreshing.
Date: 2010-07-22 05:49 pm (UTC)No, really, fuck you. The onus is on the privileged assholes to stop punching the goddamn babies, not for the babies to stop crying when they're punched. How fucking difficult is this to comprehend? Do we need to make fucking pie charts with sparkles?
Re: How about a tall ice cold glass of Bitch Please. It's refreshing.
Date: 2010-07-22 05:54 pm (UTC)I reiterate that no one is going to save you, and if you deign to bring in 'reinforcements' to tell me that I and my friends are wrong and bad and cruel, they will summarily be banned.
I am allowed to do that, because this is my space.
You blame the victim, you reap the whirlwind.
This is my space. It is a safe space as much as I can make it so, because I am tired of being vulnerable. The rules are mine; I am the deity of this minor kingdom.
You do not get to tell me how to behave, and if that upsets you - fine, feel that anger. Feel it, acknowledge it and then know that anger is a sign of your privilege.
Re: How about a tall ice cold glass of Bitch Please. It's refreshing.
Date: 2010-07-22 06:22 pm (UTC)I didn't say, and don't think, that it is "okay" for privileged people to be upset every time they upset a minority group and do something wrong. What I *do* think is that responses that center around a locus of rage are never going to get anyone to listen. I wasn't upset when I read this, nor was I upset when I replied. I do not think you are ungrateful or uppity. My best friend has Lyme's disease; I have seen her suffer weakness, from a disease that was for many years "invisible," that got doctors to tell her "you're just crazy." I have gone to her house and cooked for her on days when she couldn't get off the couch. I have patiently sat through days when she cried and felt like killing herself because she felt so "useless." I can't imagine what it's like to live a life of counting spoons, and I don't pretend to. But I do know it sucks colossally, and it's not something I'm cavalier about.
I don't think privileged people who speak from a locus of rage are in the right or going to get anyone to listen, either. That is why I didn't tell you that you had no right to complain. You *do* have a right to complain, and you have a right to get angry. At no point have I intended to imply that *any* minority group does not have the right to complain or get angry.
However, if you want someone to listen to you, those things will not work. People never listen when you're angry, whether you are in the position of one who is privileged or one who is abused; whether you are on the side of justice or injustice. This isn't about me whining that minorities should be held to a higher standard than people who are not minorities. That is unfair to minorities (though it is also, sadly, true.) This is more about the fact that the sad thing is, if we keep yelling at each other--no matter WHO is right in this argument, and it very often if not always is minority--you will get nowhere.
If I try to make a polite argument and your response is an emotional "HOW DARE YOU" and "YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT I'VE SUFFERED", EVEN THOUGH YOU ARE 100% TOTALLY RIGHT, it encourages people to stop listening. The fact is, EVEN IF YOU ARE RIGHT, people don't listen to people who are insulting them. The fact is, anger encourages defensiveness. If you just want to vent, fine. anger is great for that, and I have no doubt you're justified. But If you want things to change, anger will not aid you. Anger is something that fuels hatred and divisiveness, never unity or understanding. Never "Wow, I realize now how privileged I am." Anger makes people think, "Leave me alone! I don't want to deal with this anymore." It encourages people of any belief for any reason to ignore.
Even if you're justified in insulting me and ripping me apart, in shouting, "HOW DARE YOU", it makes it harder to take your arguments seriously, to put the hurt feelings aside, harder to think about your argument, because all I can think about is how I made a comment in sincerity, tried to make it thoughtful, polite, and tried to analyze it backwards and forwards five times and read it over three and still in the end admit that I come from a position of privilege, and all you can do is yell at me.
That, too, is hurtful. Even when I am in the wrong, anger is a weapon of hurt, and you have hurt me. If that was your intent, well... you succeeded. But if you intent was to change my mind, you've failed.
Re: How about a tall ice cold glass of Bitch Please. It's refreshing.
Date: 2010-07-22 11:51 pm (UTC)You talk about me being hurtful? Ihate to sound like a kid, but you hurt me first. Your thoughtless comment reminded me of a period in my lie that I would really rather forget, and that triggering almost gave me an asthma attack; you hurt me PHYSICALLY by using the same rhetoric as the people who were supposed to protect me from harm when I reported the abuse. They told me the same thing. That people don't have to listen if I'm angry and that I should forgive and forget.
That's like, the classic Catholic School response to a female student's abuse.
That went on for years and years. I had no help.
When I went for help people told me that I basically had it coming because I wasn't behaving properly.
That was what you sounded like. That is why I was so angry and hurt I stopped being able to breathe properly. Probably shouldn't have commented under the influence of salbutamol, since it makes me very VERY anxious and twitchy.
I doubt you were TRYING to make my bronchi spazz out, but it happened. And yeah, I'll admit I took a pot-shot, because what I saw in your commentary was 'yukie, you should know better than to assume that people have to listen to you.' It really, honestly sounded like that. And the appropriation was just insulting. I didn't think I'd be able to change you mind since every time you approach me like this you seem to be talking down to me. You really don't know how condescending your comment looks form my perspective.
I have TRIED the nice polite route. Ove and over and over again. I've tried 'please stop that' or 'please listen'.
People tell me 'shut up' anyhow.
People just tell me 'you obviously don't care that much'.
Or they ignore me outright. I've tried business letters (and believe you me I make damn sure they're super polite and formal as anything) and the singular time I got a reply from one of those, it was a rude form letter brush off. Did I expect the world changed, no, but I would've peferred a reply that wasn't the business equivalent of a fuck-you.
Unfortunately, you got me on a spoonless lousy heatsick chst-concested sore-throat shitty fucking day, and while I'll apologize for Ventolin-induced paranoia and assuming you were out to bait me into getting sick (salbutamol sulphate is some...uh...unique shit) I won't apologize for telling you that you were way out of line, rude, condescending, and ignorant.
Whether or not you change your mind is up to you. it's not my responsibility to make sure everyone does, and most people have their minds made up from the moment they say boo to me anyhow. XD; I'm 'less' in their minds whether they realize it or not so they just don't pay me heed. No matter how kind I am. No matter how angry I'm not.
I have no way to win, really. I'm either too angry or not enough angry, and the end goal of that kind of catch-22 is making sure people like me just give up on speaking out.
To hear someone whom I know well talking to me like people who hate my guts is scary shit.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-23 12:51 pm (UTC)I have never thought that you didn't deserve to be taken seriously. I never thought that people "shouldn't have to listen to you", and if you thought for some reason that was what I was trying say, I'm sorry. It wasn't. I still don't believe what I said could be fairly construed as condescending or ignorant. To say so belies the fact that I often have to put up with explaining myself to people as well (http://atheism.about.com/od/atheistbigotryprejudice/a/AtheitsHated.htm), though I'm not about to say that being an atheist sucks as much as having CF or an auto immune disorder. Have a chronic disease scores pretty high on the minority suck ladder, since you have to deal with misunderstanding as well as your disease. (Being a racial minority usually sucks more too, since you start off in socio-economically disadvantaged positions and your minority status is visual.)
The thing is, when I read this blog post, I though the purpose of it was to *change people's minds.* If that is not the purpose of the blog post, I have culturally misread your intention as one of discourse instead of one of venting. In the process of doing so, I've caused you to think I am questioning whether you have a right to be upset about something.
I've never thought that's in question--of course you have a right to be upset. My argument here was based only on what I have found from personal experience has helped me out when trying to get other people to understand my being atheist. In those situations, being a Richard Dawkins (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dawkins#Atheism_and_rationalism) tends not to help, whereas taking a more patient approach (no matter how much I wanted to smack some fundy upside the head) did. Of course, I don't have spoons to worry about. Aforementioned friend with Lyme's disease once spoke pretty eloquently about annoyance of "Needing to speak up for yourself but being too tired to speak up for yourself." (Which is why I always speak up for people who have physical ailments when someone else complains they're just crazy/want a free ride.)
Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 07:24 pm (UTC)First: Often, the way privileged people find out that they've done something wrong/insulting/embarrassing is when people in the minority get angry and tell them. If I trip and spill chicken on somebody, and they respond with, "Oh, it's okay, no big deal," I might actually think that it's no big deal. I might do it again, and then get confused and upset when the next person does NOT brush it off. The reason there's so much privilege out there is that most people won't say anything when you spill chicken on them. They're used to it, they don't want to cause a scene. To use the chicken metaphor: as you're walking with your seven orders of kung pao chicken, one box falls off the top of your stack, tumbles over the balcony and lands on somebody's head. You don't notice, they don't say anything. But the chicken still got spilled and the harm was done, even if you didn't notice it and they didn't say anything.
Second: One person has the right to offer forgiveness to another person, but that doesn't mean that all people everywhere have to do that. Lance can turn to Joe, who's working with his minority group, and say, "I don't hold your ancestors' fuckups against you. You are treating my people like people, which is why you're here." That doesn't mean that any other native tribe has to forgive Joe's ancestors. Also: Lance doesn't want Joe to feel ancestral guilt for the Sins of the White Man; that doesn't give Joe a free pass from acting like a douche. That doesn't mean that any other individual in a minority has to "forgive" any other individual for anything, ever. If I spill chicken on YOU, your pal next to you who didn't get hit with the chicken doesn't get to tell me that it's okay. YOU have the right to tell me it's okay, or it's not. You can choose not to feel guilty that your ancestors have been spilling chicken on
Third: Anger is a reasonable reaction for someone who's being hurt/attacked. If I spill chicken on somebody and they scream at me, it's my job to apologize. Period. No matter WHAT their reaction is, and no matter how "out of whack" it seems to me. Maybe they're on vacation and this is the only clean outfit they have available. Maybe they're on the way to work and now they'll have to go home and change and they'll be late and their boss has told them if they're late they're getting fired. Maybe the shirt they're wearing is their favorite shirt, given to them by their late and much-beloved grandmother, and now it's ruined because it's covered in kung pao sauce. Maybe they've had to put up with people accidentally spilling food on them two or three times a day, every day, for their entire damned lives, and so now when someone does it, they get ROYALLY PISSED OFF. My job is STILL to apologize, because I've STILL done something terrible. If that means that the next time I spill food on somebody my reaction is not to apologize but to get defensive, maybe I ought to take a look at my behavior, because, dude, that's pretty fucked up.
tl;dr: it is never your job to tell someone who is not your child that their anger is not constructive or helpful. Ever.
Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 07:49 pm (UTC)And I can definitely see how, in the last example, anger is a justified/understandable reaction.
Of course, my point here (and I think maybe I didn't bring it across as well as I had hoped) wasn't so much that the anger isn't justified--with that I totally agree. More so I feel (and even though part of me agrees with your last paragraph, part of me still maintains) that even if anger is justified, it's still not very productive.
Basically, I think the different between the Kung Pao chicken analogy here and someone in a position of privilege causing offense is this:
when you spill Kung Pao chicken on someone, it's immediate and obvious what you've done wrong.
When you engage in a Xist stereotype, it is NOT always immediate and obvious what you've done wrong, even though it probably should be. (assuming you haven't done something obviously *ist, like calling someone a faggot or a retard.)
In that case, I feel like it's time for some 'splaining of the minorities own. (perhaps poetic justice after all the *splaining they've had to endure. ;) ) I think the spoon essay is a *great* example of this. Many people who I have linked the spoon article have read it and said, "Oh, now I get it! Now I can't imagine how much it sucks to be disabled."
Perhaps a good analogy here would be someone who comes from a strange alien world where spilling Kung Pao chicken is no big deal. (I realize this is an imperfect example at BEST.) Your reasons for getting pissed at this alien are perfectly justified, but you'll have to excuse the alien if they're a little angry and defensive. (The major flaw with this analogy is that being *ist is a big deal even among the "aliens" in the real life example, that is, privileged people. It's just we aren't always able to recognize when we've spilled the chicken.) They don't understand that spilling Kung Pao chicken is wrong. At that point, it may be better to back up and explain to the alien that they have done something grossly in error patiently.
So perhaps the best solution here is something between what you've suggested and what I've suggested... it's okay to get angry about it, but if someone responds defensively, maybe it's more productive (even if I am TOTALLY ADMITTING it's unfair) to explain their stupidity patiently.
Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 09:22 pm (UTC)Another metaphor: You work in a day care. Normally you work with the big kids, but today you're in the two-year-old room. A toddler gets upset and bites you. You patiently explain that it's not nice. Twenty minutes later, another one bites you in the same spot. You're a little frustrated, but you gently tell him not to do that. By the end of the day, you've been bitten in the same spot twenty times, your hand is raw and bleeding and you just want to go home. Then, ANOTHER kid bites you, and you just haul off and smack the crap out of him. Is that fair to the individual kid? No. Is it understandable, considering the day you've had? Totally.
You start out patiently explaining to everyone your position, but after awhile you just want to smack people. Not fair, maybe not as "helpful," still understandable.
Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 09:47 pm (UTC)Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 11:52 pm (UTC)Re: I want to share...
Date: 2010-07-22 11:51 pm (UTC)(Really, after the week I've had, thank you.)
Sorry to butt in
Date: 2010-07-22 11:27 pm (UTC)This does not make me a bad person. It makes me a privileged one. "Turn the other cheek" works only if the people communicating are on even ground. It only works if there is not a position of power or privilege involved. There are levels in all human communication and by claiming that "I don't see them" or "I am colorblind" I am not helping. I'm doing a grave disservice to the struggles of those minorities.
Is it upsetting when people are angry at you for hurting them? Yes, yes it is. But that doesn't erase the hurt. Minorities have been *invisible* for so, so long. Anger, sadly, is a way to get noticed. You cannot put the onus of the receiver of the "ism" to correct someone else. People cannot control what other people do, only the person committing the action can. And people are people, they have limits. You can't expect every struggling person to smile and be thankful. Even really happy, thankful people have their moments.
Re: Sorry to butt in
Date: 2010-07-23 12:01 am (UTC)Whether I'm visibly angry or not I can't win.
Re: Sorry to butt in
Date: 2010-07-23 07:11 pm (UTC)I'm sorry again to butt into your space, you know I'm usually not the sort to say things.