Pipple Pants

As much as disabled metaphor has its place in media… dead ass sometimes it feels like people only use it for emotional dissonance. Or to avoid representing a real disability. It’s not inherently bad, but sometimes relying on the metaphor holds the representation back.

That’s the whole reason Ghoulia was iffy. Everything about her was great!… except for them saying her symptoms are because she’s a zombie… not only did that draw attention to how they don’t respect any other zombie characters, Thats like using fairy’s as a metaphor for gay people… yeah maybe don’t… (also people who try to defend her by saying she’s NOT disabled… y’all not helping)

Scootaloo’s cool and all but the fact that all the grown (able bodied) adults praising her as disabled rep cant even name her disability, usually acting like it’s some fantasy disorder, when a quick google search would tell you it’s likely a type of disproportionate dwarfism. Idk, if her legs were under grown instead of her wings, maybe more people would connect the dots? (Also people who draw adult scootaloo with big wings kinda peeve me)

Now, the way Steven Universe handles the subject of disability is pretty good… my only criticism is I said subject. That’s the downside of only using disabled metaphor, it becomes vague. They represent the theme well, but no one in particular… amethyst reps the concept of discovering you’re disabled, becoming insecure about it, then learning to accept yourself, which is a real experience BUT what’s more common is: feeling like something wrong with you and being insecure about that, discovering your disabled, that discovery being a weight off your chest as you start to understand yourself better. Of course allot of people get internalised ableism when they find out they’re disabled, it’s not a breezy experience, but imo amethysts insecurity about the whole thing is just too vague (and feels like something an able bodied person would write)… that one scene where she’s like “‘you can be anything you wanna be’ no I can’t!” is like the only moment Thats directly about disability and not just general insecurity.

Wilt is basically perfect. Sometimes he cartoonishly uses his nub like a hand but that’s rare and arguably just cartoon logic. (I can’t speak on the eye having rattle sfx tho). They could have easily made disability metaphor with imagery friends rules but instead they gave a character a real injury HORAY!! The only problem is they call him “broken” instead of disabled… my ONLY guess to why is because he’s an imaginary friend, not human? But like… that sucks. Maybe they’re scared of saying kids don’t want him because he’s disabled, but you could just NOT make that a reason he’s never adopted… if memories correct, they do make a whole new reason he’s not adopted anyway (Toeing the line of this subject I’ll admit, I just wanted to mention it)

Most disabled characters are flawed somehow and I wish more people would be willing to criticise those flaws… it feels like non disabled people tend to go “WOW DISABILITY MENTIONED” and leave the analysis at that.