#sensitivity reading

Alright. I promised this a month ago, but just did not get around, because university and work were all too stressful. But still, it is a topic that keeps to be on my mind, after the end of Arcane season 2. While season 2 was a mess in general, when it comes to pacing and characters and dialogues, to me – a disabled person – one of the biggest issues really is how the series treats disability. This was already a problem in season 1, but because of the bad pacing and the fact that a lot of characters clearly did not get as many scenes as it was intended at first, making this issue worse.

So, before someone asks, who am I to judge this: While my main job is in IT, I usually do at least one book or other project in sensitivity reading per month. I just rely on the IT job to know I have a constant income, if I do not manage to get a SR-job for once. But yes, it is part of my real-life job to critique writers on this kind of stuff.

So, let me talk about the disabilities in Arcane – and what is the issue there. I will go through different characters for this.

Spoilers for season 2, obviously.

Zaun and the Chem Lords

Let me start with something that mainly is in the background. We do see the Chem Lords once in season 1 and once in season 2 – though there for a prolonged scene. And a lot of them are disabled in some way and most of them are disfigured in some way. We also do see some of the “normal people” in Zaun, who are often disabled – using some sort of prothesis – and also often disfigured. And while, sure, the show portrays it as part of the tragedy that Zaun is so exploited that there are so many people who are very disabled, but at the same time the Chem Lords are not at all portrayed in a sympathetic light, and even those background characters of Zaun (like the woman, who lost her child to Jayce and Vi) are not exactly treated sympathetically.

Before anything else, we need to establish one important thing about disability in this show: Pretty much all disabilities in this movie are acquired disabilities. Which is fair. By far most people IRL who are disabled do acquire their disability during the course of their life. Through sickness, through accidents, and also through simply aging. However, there is some issue to the fact that we see very little in terms of variety to the disabilities.

Sure, you could argue, that technically Arcane has more disabilities, than pretty much any other western media project – and you would be right. But let’s face it here: The bar is on the ground – if not underground.

But the main issue is, that for the most part the Chem Lords and a lot of those minor disabled roles in the movie are not at all portrayed sympathetically. The Chem Lords are just minor cannon fodder background villains, while the background characters are also mainly villains. Sure, I have seen a lot of fans a bit more sympathy for their motivations. But in the show? Well, we mainly see how they attack main characters and almost kill them.

This could work, mind you – if we had a counter example of good disabled characters. But that is not quite the show that we got. For the most part.

Sevika

If season 2 had not been the mess that it was, Sevika probably would be the one counter example to all of this. While in season 1 she mainly is just “the goon” for Silco and we get very, very little in terms of motivation for her, season 2 (or rather what was probably originally multiple other seasons) clearly at some point had a character arc in mind for her. Even as it was, we did learn a bit more about her motivation and such.

While I had originally just taken Sevika mainly as someone who was working for Silco, because it was the most promising opportunity for her (given there are not a lot of chances in Zaun). Not because of some ideology.

But Season 2 proofed me wrong, there. We learn not much about Sevika here, but we learn that she actually was with Silco out of conviction that what Silco was ultimately doing was making Zaun better. She understood that Zaun needed a leader figure and she thought that Silco was possibly the best leader they could have had. Now that Silco is dead, she tries to prop up Jinx as the new leader, because she understands that this is needed.

Given the place that Sevika ends up in – as a councilor for Zaun – I am gonna assume there was some version of this (one with more seasons) where Sevika had gotten an arc, this would have been more of a focus. Her learning that instead of popping up someone else as a figurehead, she had to be the one to lead people. However, we clearly did not get that version of the story.

Still, I am possibly going to argue that the fact that she did not get this arc, is less connected to her being a clearly disabled character, and more to her being not a champion in the game so far. So generally speaking, I would still argue that despite it all, she is the one disabled character in this show, who I think is generally portrayed the most favorable.

Silco

I know, some people will now ask: “How the fuck is Silco disabled.” But for once, yes, he uses a cane at times, but also, he has a facial deformity, which is in fact counted under the disability umbrella. While technically speaking a facial deformity does not always stop people from being capable of working, the discrimination of people with facial deformities has to do a lot with the favoring of healthy bodies, and how this is connected to beauty norms.

And Silco… Well, how to put this best? From what is there in season 2, I am going to assume that there was a version of this, where there had been more time to tell the story, and we would have gotten a more sympathetic portrayal of Silco, where we went more into his motivation. Season 2 does hint at the fact that indeed, Zaun under Silco was a lot more stable than in any alternate scenario, and that Silco did in fact really try to make life better for the most possible people. But that is it: It very much hints at it, but never fully goes into it.

We know this is all bound to the lady who was the mother to Vi and Powder, but how we never get explained. And yeah, this is an issue. While I do not think that originally Silco really fell into the typical trope of “person has a facial deformity to signify their evil” (something that shows up in a lot of media – including Disney movies and a ton of James Bond movies), the fact that we never really go deep into his background and motivation, he somewhat falls into the trope here. And that really just because probably all the stuff that went into him as a character was just cut for time. And yeah, fuck. It is a big issue here. If the rest of the show was not as messy as it was, it would be less so – but given the state this show is in and the way the other disabled characters are portrayed… Oh boy, this is a problem.

Singed

I actually thought a lot about whether to put Singed in here. Because yes, he clearly is disabled and has deformities. But also, in the version of the show we got, he almost feel like a footnote of a character. However, I decided to at least go quickly into him, because again: You cannot put in most disabled characters as villains, and then make someone who is very, very responsible for a lot of the bad stuff that happens in this show and make him disabled as well. And yes, I get that Singed is disabled in the game, and that he is a somewhat bad character in the game as well. But that does not undo the harm this does within the narrative of the show. And you need to understand that. While yes, you can argue that his end goal (reviving his daughter) can be considered as somewhat sympathetic, it is not addressed enough to make him a complex and nuanced character. And again, he very much is responsible for many of the bad things that happen.

Jinx

Okay, let us talk about Jinx. She is the character, who I had the biggest problem in season 1 with – and season 2 did not really make it better. Because yes – until loosing her finger in season 2, generally her disability is her mental illness that clearly is chronic and unlikely to ever fully get away. And this is a big, big issue.

Because Jinx’s mental illness is from about the same line of mental illnesses that villains in the Batman comics have. Like sure, we can argue that there are some aspects in there of some sort of Borderline, PTSD, Dissociative Identity Disorder, and such. But for the most part her mental illness exists mainly to be edgy, and weird, and strange – much like Harley Quinn’s and the Joker’s disability. We know that those two characters were major influences on Jinx.

And look, I will admit, that Harley Quinn is a character I do generally enjoy. But that does not change that yeah, Harley like Jinx is a bad character in terms in representing actually mentally ill people. Because the focus of the character is to be weird, and cool, and somewhat entertaining. While yes, some of the symptoms that Jinx is showing are based on symptoms of real mental illnesses, as mentioned above, the way she is experiencing them is mainly there to be nice in a visual and entertaining kind of way. And that is… Well, it is an issue. Especially given that her mental illness mainly does also show in her violent tendencies.

Don’t get me wrong: I have known people with some of the diagnosis that one could probably read into what we see in her, and some of those people were in fact quite violent. At times only verbally, but in some cases they would also have a hair trigger before they would start and try to shove and punch people. So yes, this part is not technically speaking a thing that is unrealistic.

However, if someone was going to hand me a book, where the one character, who very clearly is written with a mental illness is depicted as a sort of maniac, who is part supervillain, and part manic pixie dream girl, that mainly exists and is the depicted the way she is to cater to a presumed straight male audience. That really is an issue.

Nothing that I can say about Jinx is exclusive to Jinx or Arcane in the grand scheme of things. A lot of these tropes are around for decades now. But that does not make them less harmful. On the contrary. They are actually worse because of it, as this kinda will play into the confirmation bias of people, who do not have to deal with mentally ill people very often. And I wish those tropes would die.

Sure, we can argue the fact that at the very least Jinx is portrayed in a somewhat more positive manner (just as Harley Quinn is these days), is at least a tiny step forward. But it is still not a good way of portraying this. Just not the worst way anymore.

And of course then there is the fact that for now she actually dies in the end of the show, just as pretty much most disabled characters in this show do. And that… is just not a good look.

Isha

Oh boy. Isha is something that came out of nowhere and really was one of the main reasons of me wanting to write this thing. Isha is mute. And here a little bit about muteness in real life: Most mute people are deaf-mute. So they are mute, because they were born without the ability to hear properly, and hence never learn how to pronounce properly, despite technically having a voice box. People who can hear and are mute – like Isha – probably are mute because of some mental illness. Some people go mute because of trauma, some neurodivergent people are non-verbal (so they don’t speak) or can be non-verbal under stress. (I fall under this, at times. I do have days on which I just cannot properly speak.)

With Isha we never learn why she does not speak. She just doesn’t. She shows up, attached herself to Jinx, and then is basically Jinx’s own Manic Pixie Dream Girl, just in the “little sister” way, rather than the “romantic” way. She mainly exists just to bring Jinx back into functioning enough that she can partake in the rest of the plot. And once she has archived that, well… She dies. Again, like almost all disabled characters in this show fucking do. She is merely a plot device.

And again, given some of the hints that are dropped, I do assume there was at some point more to her story. But we did not get that version of this story. The version we got? Well, she is the mute manic pixie dream girl, who gracefully offs herself once her plot function has been fulfilled. And this more than anything to me is so fucking egregious. If she was not disabled this was already bad enough, but given she is disabled? This is fucking horrible – especially again in the context of a show where most disabled characters die.

Basically what the show tells me – a disabled person – is that my main worth as a person is to die for ablebodied people. Thanks Arcane, needed to hear that. Great job. Hope y’all are proud for creating this show.

Viktor

Lastly there is Viktor. And mind you, there was a moment in this where I had some hope for his arc in terms of disability representation. Because while I will usually rage a lot about “healing disabilities” in fantasy and scifi media, his case was one where it was understandable. He was not trying to heal himself because he so desperately did not want to be disabled anymore, but because his never properly defined sickness, that was responsible for his disability, was degenerative, and he was going to die very early without a cure. And even with that in mind, once something bad happened because of it – when Sky died – he stopped it, because he realized it was too dangerous. While I had some minor notes of how this was handled in season 1, I thought it was fairly good.

And in the beginning of season 2 I actually kinda liked it too. It was not him who chose the healing, but Jayce. And once Viktor woke up from his coma after the magic healing, his first reaction was to be angry with Jayce about it. Partly because of the danger he understood, but partly also because Jayce violated Viktor’s bodily autonomy. I liked that. It was good.

However, it only went downhill from there. Because whatever anger Viktor had from that moment on, it was gone. Sure, you can argue with Viktor’s actions how much of it came from the core/the hextech/the arcane, and how much came from him. But never the less: He quickly is fine with being healed, and then becomes a sort of villain. And also goes ahead to heal other people of their illnesses and disabilities. Some of them consensually, which is somewhat fine though again for the aforementioned reasons of the eugenic implications of the “healing the disabled” trope has, but in some cases also non-consensually. And that is just… not good.

And then, in the bloody finale, he is kinda the final boss. He, the disabled person. Sure, Ambessa is the leader of the fascists, but Viktor is kinda the final boss.

Sure, I could say something about it being nice to have a clearly queer disabled character. But you know what? All of that pales against the fact that in the end of it all, Viktor has to be sacrificed for the happy end for the ablebodied people.

You know, in some other version of events I would have liked the fact that Jayce does acquire a disability in those last few episodes. While it is not quite clear whether this disability is gonna be chronic or not, it does not matter, because he, too, gets sacrificed. Guess he is no longer as valuable given that he is disabled now. Or at least that is the feeling that comes up.

Conclusion

Look, here is the thing: None of the characters in question are written in a way that is so egregious that if it was just this one example it would be a problem. And hey, some part of me is like: “Hey, at least there are multiple disabled characters,” given that this is still fairly rare in western media. (I am currently getting spoiled by Japanese shows. Ranking of Kings, Sign of Affection and so on are doing a much better job at portraying disability.) But given that most of these characters are villains or end up as villains on the long run, and most of them end up dead? Yeah, fuck Arcane. You do not get points for depicting disabilities in a way that clearly communicates that actually the lives of disabled people are less worthy than those of ablebodied people.

Look, whatever you have been told about Sensitivity Reading: Like editors in book publishing, Sensitivity Readers have little power. All we can do is say: “Hey, this is some really unfortunate implication here. Maybe you should change that.” But authors and publishers can absolutely ignore our feedback. Talking with other sensitivity readers there were a couple of examples where all the feedback was ignored.

I do not know whether Arcane had a Sensitivity Reader who gave feedback on the depiction of disabled people in this show. But I am going to assume if there was, they were very probably ignored. Because yeah, I am sorry. This is just overall not good.

Browsing open!

These are the creators separated by characters/pairings they have specified being interested in (though some will create for others!):

I'm a sensitivity and authenticity reader and content editor. Typically every year for the past roughly decade, I've had 3-8 assignments with traditional publishers.

American publishers this year, 2025? Nothing.

I know I'm just one person with one year of this. But 2024 was a high count year. So I do take it as a sign of the times. That I wasn't even contacted for manuscripts I had to pass on due to time crunch, or not being a good fit for the story personally, etc.

I don't think there are only cozy novels happening with no marginalized voices or special experiences that need to be asked about. I do think that the industry was never super excited to have to look for big huge red flags an author might need to take out or risk a scandal.

I'm so grateful to have worked on so many books, scripts, and comics. I hope we don't stop caring about authentic voices just bc the government here says marginalized groups don't matter any more.

I'm doing sensitivity readings, beta readings, fanfic commissions, lyric/poem writing, character playlists, and image description writing in exchange for donations to Maryam’s family and newborn (Urgent) , Fatima’s family and their newborn or to Ibrahim and his family.

(Update: Ibrahim and his family have made it out of Rafah and now need financial security in Egypt. Fatima’s family has yet to make it out of Rafah. Update 2: Fatima’s family needs support in moving to Canada the fees to relocate are too expensive.)

If you find another gofundme for someone in Palestine that you'd like to donate to I'll accept donations for that as well. I recommend looking at the operation olive branch document to find gofundmes to donate to.

The details for these commissions are below.

Sensitivity readings:

I can read for people looking to portray trans men, autistics, bi aces and biracial black people. Contact me to ask if you have something else you'd like me to read for as not everything is mentioned here.

€ 3 for 2,000 words.

Beta reading:

I can offer basic editing like spelling and grammar.

€ 2 for 2,000 words.

Song or poem writing:

You can give me a few words as a prompt and I'll write lyrics for a song that can be dedicated to whoever you'd like. If you want to record the song or use it for a story or game feel free to.

€ 5 per song which can be about 100-400 words. Same price for poems.

Character playlists:

€ 2.00 per playlist. It can be about anything I just thought people might be more interested in playlists for characters- but if you want one on like, the concept of springtime or something I've got you.

Image description:

€ 2 for 5 image descriptions. If you only need like 3 then any donation amount above €1 is great. This can be helpful if you're a blog that posts a lot of photos.

One of our favorite side projects at FTH is the Regiment of Fan Laborers, or ROFL: a group of beta readers, sensitivity readers, expertise pickers, translators and other fan laborers who are on hand to offer FTH creators assistance with their auction fanworks.

We love this project because (like the auction itself) it helps build connections and community between fans. It's also a great way for creators to find out how amazingly helpful fan labor support can be!

There are three ways you can get involved in ROFL:

Sign up for ROFL to offer fan labor support. Whether you want to join for the year or just until you've helped one person, we'd love to have you! You can sign up here. (If you said "yes" to joining ROFL during auction signups, no need to do it again! We've got you.)

If you're a FTH creator, you can ask for help from ROFLers. In about two weeks, you'll get an email from us with a link to the ROFL roster -- once it comes, take a few minutes and browse through the dozens of fan laborers offering to help. We can pretty much promise that you'll be amazed by what you find!

This year I'm offering three things in the @fandomtrumpshate auction: an original Queen's Thief fic, a Queen's Thief podfic, and fan labor that is open to ANY fandom.

Let's get into the details!

Auction 1: an original Queen's Thief fic

Max rating: T

Minimum bid: $10

Length: Under 5k words

Characters/pairings of interest: Gen/Irene, Sophos/Helen, Costis/Kamet, Gen/Irene/Costis, Gen/Irene/Helen/Sophos, Irene & Helen, Gen & Helen, Pheris (on his own or with family or OC friends/lovers)

Special interests: Aro/ace characters, Canonically trans or nonbinary chars, Gen (no ship) or platonic works, Poly ships, Trans or nonbinary interpretations of canon characters

Subjects/themes/tropes of interest: AUs, getting together, hurt/comfort, friendship, healthy communication, enthusiastic consent, and headcanons involving queerness, transness, or neurodivergence

Auction 2: a Queen's Thief podfic

Max rating: T

Minimum bid: $10

Length: 5k - 10k words

Characters/pairings of interest: I’m willing to record a fic focusing on any character(s) or pairing(s) as long as the fic doesn’t contain something in my Unwilling to Address section. I love Gen, Irene, Helen, Sophos, Costis, Kamet, and Pheris the most, though.

Special interests: Aro/ace characters, Canonically trans or nonbinary chars, Gen (no ship) or platonic works, Poly ships, Trans or nonbinary interpretations of canon characters

Subjects/themes/tropes of interest: I’m willing to pod anything as long as it doesn’t contain something in my Unwilling to Address section. That said, I love getting together, established relationships, hurt/comfort, friendship, and mutual pining, and I’m a big fan of AUs in this fandom.

Other notes: I will record up to three shorter fics that together add up to under 10k words (or just one fic that’s in the 5k to 10k range if you prefer--I’m just saying you may split the offer up into a maximum of three pieces).

Auction 3: fan labor in ANY fandom

Types of fan labor: Betaing, Culture picking, Sensitivity reading

Max rating: T

Minimum bid: $10

Length: Up to 20k words, although I am willing to work with a fic longer than 20k if you only send me the most relevant parts, so that what I’m reviewing stays under 20k. 

Beta services: primarily SPAG and sentence-level flow. I am a professional freelance copy editor and proofreader. 

Culture-picking: America-picking, focusing on the Upper Midwest. I have lived in the Upper Midwest for most of my life. I have primarily lived in urban areas, but I went to college in a small town in a very rural area, so I have that experience as well. 

Sensitivity reading: autism. I am autistic. Every autistic person has a different experience and a different combination of symptoms, so I can’t provide a universal perspective, but I can provide my own experience and ask other autistic people if needed.

Special interests: Aro/ace characters, Canonically trans or nonbinary chars, Gen (no ship) or platonic works, Poly ships, Trans or nonbinary interpretations of canon characters

Other notes: I’ve offered this before and I’ve gotten some unexpected requests from bidders, so here are two notes: 1) I want to work with YOUR fic, so please don’t bid on this and then try to transfer my fan labor to someone else, because that gets messy and isn’t what Fandom Trumps Hate is for, and 2) I want to read a draft of your fic--I’m happy to help with brainstorming if you want culture-picking or sensitivity reading, but I’d also like to read a draft once you have one. I hope that if you bid on this, you want my insights and feedback, because I like being communicative, answering questions, and sharing what I know!

I don't want to go into details publicly because this is well into the sequel of the current fic/s I'm writing, but the idea hit me this morning and given the topic in question I absolutely categorically do not want to fuck it up in the initial stages or later.