Good Representation in Media of people with Disabilities

In class we talked about how people with disabilities in media have gotten very bad representation. Most characters with disabilities have no personality and their entire character is based off of it. Though people with disabilities are still represented poorly in media, I think we have made progress as a society. Today, as my blog post I would like to showcase the good disabled representation in movies and TV. 

(DISCLAIMER: obviously, I as an able-bodied can't determine whether representation is truly good or not, but this is just a list of characters that I think do not revolve around just their disability)

The first character I would like to talk about is Toph from Avatar the Last Airbender. To give a basic overview of the show. There are four elements, Water, Earth, Fire, Air and there are only certain people called benders that can control these elements, but only the Avatar can master all four of them. The story follows the Avatar's quest to learn all the elements and save the world...yadayadayada....pretty basic story structure. 

TOPH is my FAVORITE character in this show. She is the Avatar's Earth Bending teacher and probably the strongest bender in the show. She is very witty and sarcastic and every scene she's in is amazing.  Her disability is that she is blind, but she's not defined by that at all. Her blindness does not encompass her entire character. She is strong and can handle problems by herself.  

There is even an episode about how she is bothered by people thinking she is defenseless and needs help all the time. The creators made a jab at other media portrayal of blind people. The show portrays her as a normal human being with character traits. She is funny, sarcastic, She gets annoyed sometimes, but most importantly she's capable and independent. Her character is loved by so many fans and I, as an able bodied boy, look up to her and want to be strong like her. 

NOW WATCH THIS VIDEO OF TOPH

The next character is Makkari from Eternals. Makkari similar to Toph is very witty. She is deaf and her power is super speed and she is probably the best portrayal of a speedster in live action. Now one thing that's special about Makkari is that the actor(or actress) that plays her is actually deaf. This is someone who knows what is like to be deaf portraying a deaf person. This is not only good representation but it opens doors for people with disabilities to be superhero. This is why representation is important. Many deaf children may think that only able bodied people can be strong and powerful in movies, but this subverts that shows that anyone can be a superhero.

And yet again her character is not defined by her deafness. She has an actual personality, she has a relationship, and she is a very strong speedster. Just look at the comments this video of her fight with Ikaris. No one cares that she is deaf(in a good way). She is a speedster before she is a deaf person. This was probably the highlight of the movie for me. 

The last character I will be talking about is Auggie from Wonder. Auggie is a boy with treacher collins syndrome which causes disfigurement. Wonder is a great example about how society will automatically bring down people that are different from the norm and even though there was nothing wrong with Auggie's brain, he was still asked to take placement test to make sure he was fit for the school. People automatically assume just because he has a disfigurement, he was dumber than the rest of the school. 

 Though the Wonder revolves around his face deformation and how people treat him differently because of it, the author still shows that he is a normal boy. When I read this in fifth grade, I felt like he was a real fifth grader. Like he liked a lot of the same things I did, like rockets, Xbox, Minecraft, HALO, Star Wars. He is just a normal boy in fifth grade and I saw a lot of myself in him. 

This is just a list of what I think is good representation is disability in movies and TV. Obviously, I could be wrong, but these are just characters I feel like are not brought down or defined by their disability. We still have much more progress to make in order to normalize disability within society, but this is a great start and an example of the good representation that has appeared in the last decade or so.