Media Images Of Disability Cause The Disability Community

It s always been my belief that media images of disability cause the disability community some of its most serious and persistent problems... ~Prof Beth Haller, of media disdat Images of disabled people being depicted in a negative light go back at least as far as the Old Testament, where having a disability meant that you had done something to anger G-d. Disability was equated with sin (Shapiro). In the New Testament you got another choice-you could be cursed or possessed by evil (Shapiro, 1994 p. 30). This view perpetuated to the time of Shakespeare, where he gave his Richard III a hunchback (even though the real Richard III did not have such a disability) in order to make him seem more evil. Today, films such as Peter Pan and†¦show more content†¦These are all very bleak images of disability. Especially, I thought, since it was 2006. They painted a very meager, maybe worthless, existence. Although I had not heard of the term until just recently, it was very clear to me that night that to those in the room, to be someone with a disability meant to be a Tiny Tim. That is the term (named after the character in Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol) dis ability advocates coined to articulate society s view that people with disabilities (PWDs) are childlike, dependant, and in need of charity or pity (Shapiro, 1994 p. 14). Most people, I think, inherently feel sorry for PWDs. They feel like we must be suffering or that we are incapable of taking care of ourselves and making our own decisions (Johnson, 2003; Shapiro, 1994). Even if one of us is successful, like historian Paul Longmore who has a PhD and has written several books, but just happens to have gotten polio as a child and has to use a ventilator at night, we are still pitied. [Once, a stranger] approached him [Paul Longmore] on the street and said, ‘If I were you, I d kill myself (Shapiro, 1994 p 39). The image of the Tiny Tim gained popularity in the 1940 s and 50 s when charities focused on finding cures for disabilities such as polio. They realized that pity opens wallets, so they began poster child