Characters with disabilities on TV

One of the main points about Disability Studies is to help society become more welcoming to all people, no matter what condition their body or mind is in. After all, most people don’t start off disabled; either an accident, an illness, some unforeseen event causes a person’s body to give out on him or her. People are born a man or a woman and cannot help their skin color, but whatever one’s background anyone can be affected by illness.

Since television is the broadest media outlet, it has a large impact on what people see as acceptable and what’s unacceptable. Some comments have been made recently that TV needs more people of color, and I certainly agree with this observation. Most shows present the viewing audience with the idea that everybody is white, attractive, and middle to upper middle class in lifestyle. Some strides have been made, in a show like Will and Grace, to have characters that are openly gay. As far as I’ve read and seen, no one with a large, public voice has commented on the lack of people with disabilities on TV. As a matter of fact, I can only think of one show, and I can’t remember the name of it because it was on in about the mid-eighties and had a short run, that had a main character that had a clear disability. This character worked in an office and was in a wheelchair. I recall one episode on of all shows the Love Boat that confronted the discomfort people sometimes feel when having to interact with people with a disability. In this episode, a woman was going to marry a man, who was then in his mid-twenties, who had had a skate boarding accident when he was fifteen which put him in a wheelchair. On the cruise, the bride to be’s parents meet the man for the first time. The father has concerns about her marrying a disabled person. But, of course, over the hour program, the father sees the error in his ways and there was a complete rapprochement by the end of that week’s episode. Of course one of the reason TV is so popular is because it aims to make the status quo feel as comfortable as possible.

It seems to me, however, that it’s time to have at least one series with a lot of public relations, big-time producers and directors behind it that has a main character with a disability. The show doesn’t need to be about disability, because for most people with disabilities the disability comes in second behind the everyday stresses of life, of paying the bills, friendships, dating, and making one’s way to a satisfying existence. The American with Disabilities Act, passed in 1990, was a start toward helping society become legally and ethically more fair toward all people. A further step needs to be taken. If people with disabilities are to truly be seen as just as complete and whole as other people, then the biggest medium in our culture, TV, needs to start including them into the fold.