Is disability displayed in movies reflect truthfully people with disability? Or is it more complicated issue than what we think? For many people, disability subconsciously appears to be an object that represents a person rather than a condition that a person have. In order to understand this, we need to introduce the concept people-first language. According to The Arc “People-First Language emphasizes the person, not the disability. By placing the person first, the disability is no longer the primary, defining characteristic of an individual, but one of several aspects of the whole person.” So, it is basically avoiding dehumanizing, devaluing and disrespecting of that person. Therefore, in order to have a concrete understanding of disability and its meanings, we need to proceed through the process of analyzing.
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For instance, in the movie Me Before You, while this movie was considered a heart-breaking by many people, it was massively criticized and considered as an absolute insult by other group of people particularly the community of people with disability, since it triggers three major factors, which are identity, normalcy and disability model. The identity is what makes each one of us special, recognizable and distinguishable from other people. It involves various things such as culture ethnicity language, etc. So, if we combine all of these things together we can define the identity of a person, and this ideology is also known as intersectionality. Despite disability being a single part of a person with disability personality and identity, it is mistakenly used by many people to identify the person in a way that show that person as an object. For example, if we look at the movie Me Before You, when Lou had her first interview with Will’s mom, she said that her job is not going to be as hard as Will feels, which implies that she looked at him as an object of suffering. In addition, when Lou asked Will to go outside and participate in several activities, he declined arguing that he is no longer his younger self. Moreover, when she asked him to go with her to Paris, he said that he did not want to ruin his old memory in there. Thus, these scenes in the movie indicate clearly that Will deny his identity because of his disability and he believe that being dead is better than living as a person with disability. So, the idea that people with disability deny their identity and prefer being dead over living is a clear misrepresenting of people with disability. Furthermore, it implies that people with disability are a metaphor of pity and suffer, which is obviously not true. According to Ellen Clifford in an article written by Cavan Sieczkowski “The message of the film is that disability is tragedy and disabled people are better off dead,” she told BuzzFeed. “It comes from a dominant narrative carried by society and the mainstream media that says it is a terrible thing to be disabled.” By having these different offensive scenes, many people from the community of people with disability started to write a negative reviews on the movie, which illustrates how effective the identity factor in this issue. When it comes to disability, normalcy plays a significant role that affects …show more content…
It was criticized mainly by people with disability, because it triggers disability through three major factor, which are identity, normalcy and disability model. Identity was displayed through making Will an object of suffer and pity, normalcy by alienating him from the society and disability model through making him as a person who is suffering and wish to be dead. In my point of view, I believe that this movie was an Ableist movie, because it uses phrases that are offensive to people with disability in addition to show a miserable life for Will. Moreover, I think many people will like this movie despite its offensiveness, because of society misunderstands people with disability. To me it is similar to racist jokes or Halloween costumes, many people like to hear these jokes or wear these costumes in spite of its offensiveness. This is true for both cases because it involves minorities that are not well understood by the society. So to overcome these types of stereotypes, people need to learn more about the culture of people with disability in addition to representing them in mainstream media in the most appropriate
For instance, in the movie Me Before You, while this movie was considered a heart-breaking by many people, it was massively criticized and considered as an absolute insult by other group of people particularly the community of people with disability, since it triggers three major factors, which are identity, normalcy and disability model. The identity is what makes each one of us special, recognizable and distinguishable from other people. It involves various things such as culture ethnicity language, etc. So, if we combine all of these things together we can define the identity of a person, and this ideology is also known as intersectionality. Despite disability being a single part of a person with disability personality and identity, it is mistakenly used by many people to identify the person in a way that show that person as an object. For example, if we look at the movie Me Before You, when Lou had her first interview with Will’s mom, she said that her job is not going to be as hard as Will feels, which implies that she looked at him as an object of suffering. In addition, when Lou asked Will to go outside and participate in several activities, he declined arguing that he is no longer his younger self. Moreover, when she asked him to go with her to Paris, he said that he did not want to ruin his old memory in there. Thus, these scenes in the movie indicate clearly that Will deny his identity because of his disability and he believe that being dead is better than living as a person with disability. So, the idea that people with disability deny their identity and prefer being dead over living is a clear misrepresenting of people with disability. Furthermore, it implies that people with disability are a metaphor of pity and suffer, which is obviously not true. According to Ellen Clifford in an article written by Cavan Sieczkowski “The message of the film is that disability is tragedy and disabled people are better off dead,” she told BuzzFeed. “It comes from a dominant narrative carried by society and the mainstream media that says it is a terrible thing to be disabled.” By having these different offensive scenes, many people from the community of people with disability started to write a negative reviews on the movie, which illustrates how effective the identity factor in this issue. When it comes to disability, normalcy plays a significant role that affects …show more content…
It was criticized mainly by people with disability, because it triggers disability through three major factor, which are identity, normalcy and disability model. Identity was displayed through making Will an object of suffer and pity, normalcy by alienating him from the society and disability model through making him as a person who is suffering and wish to be dead. In my point of view, I believe that this movie was an Ableist movie, because it uses phrases that are offensive to people with disability in addition to show a miserable life for Will. Moreover, I think many people will like this movie despite its offensiveness, because of society misunderstands people with disability. To me it is similar to racist jokes or Halloween costumes, many people like to hear these jokes or wear these costumes in spite of its offensiveness. This is true for both cases because it involves minorities that are not well understood by the society. So to overcome these types of stereotypes, people need to learn more about the culture of people with disability in addition to representing them in mainstream media in the most appropriate