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Societal attitudes towards people with disabilities
Societal attitudes towards people with disabilities
Public perception of disability
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Lindsay Palsgrove Pei-Chun Hsieh Disability Identity: Sec 02 November 8, 2015 Media Representation of Disability: The Ringer In today’s world, the main source of exposure for The movie The Ringer, starring Johnny Knoxville as Steve Barker, is posing as someone with a mental disability to participate in the Special Olympics. He is trying to get money from rigging the Special Olympics and using the money to help his friend Stavi receive surgery to attach his fingers back due to a landscaping accident. Steve is completely surpassed by the fellow athletes, which they are not only better athletes; they're just better people. Shortly after arriving, they're on to him, but instead of ratting him out, they help him beat Jimmy, the arrogant champion …show more content…
of the Olympics. They train Steve for the gold and, in the process, become really good friends with him. In the end, Steve doesn’t win but neither does Jimmy so Steve and his uncle get the money, but Steve’s morals kick in and he confesses that he was impersonating someone with a mental disability. The overall message of the movie was good to most people but there was some stereotyping and prejudice jokes and dialogue being made throughout the film.
A common character that faced prejudice was Jimmy, the arrogant champion. Steve and his uncle only decided to rig the Special Olympics because they were positive Steve could beat Jimmy because Jimmy has a mental disability. It was wrong to express that prejudice due to the misconception that people without disabilities can do everything better and faster than people with disabilities. Which it clearly showed that Jimmy was actually the better athlete, but his cockiness got the best of him not his disability. Another case of prejudice was when Lynn’s boyfriend was caught cheating by some of the athletes. When they tried to tell Lynn what happened, he just kept saying that they don’t really know what they are talking about, meaning due to their disabilities, they aren’t reliable sources and don’t know the full story. Unfortunately, The Ringer does disappoint in the aspect of ableism as displaying people with disabilities the source of all the jokes featured in the movie. So they rely on stereotypes of disabilities to be their jokes for the people without disabilities to find funny. Though Steve relies on exhibiting stereotypical behaviors in his failed imitation, but learns from his experience how wrong many stereotypes relating to people with disabilities
are. Despite the negative conceptions of The Ringer, this movie does provide a noble insight to disability identity to the public. This film includes about 150 disabled athletes and actors which is the largest amount of people with intellectual disabilities ever depicted in a popular movie. The Ringer does set an important step in changing destructive attitudes and negative stereotypes about individuals with intellectual disabilities, and helping the public to see them as equals. To challenge negative stereotypes and change the public’s negative attitudes toward individuals with intellectual disabilities. The Ringer set the stage with the uncle, who represents those stereotypes and attitudes in the beginning. At first, Steve does not speak up against his uncle’s obvious prejudice. But later in the film, Steve tells his uncle not to use words like “retard,” because after getting to know several Special Olympics athletes and are now his friends.
Prejudice is an issue that cannot be easily avoided in today's society. It has and always will have a huge impact on the discrimination that some people face based on religion, appearance, background, mental/physical disabilities and etc.
The Special Olympics date back all the way to the year 1968. Many see these Games as a time to honor someone who is able to “overcome” a task, but author William Peace sees this as an insulting portrayal of people with disabilities. Peace is a multidisciplinary school teacher and scholar that uses a wheel chair and writes about the science behind disabilities and handicaps. As a physically handicapped individual, Peace is able to observe a negative portrayal of disabled persons. In his article titled, “Slippery Slopes: Media, Disability, and Adaptive Sports,” William Peace offers his own personal insight, utilizes several statistics regarding handicaps, as well as numerous rhetorical appeals in order to communicate to the “common man”
Different types of prejudice are evident in this chapter. For instance, Scout refers to Walter as a “Cunningham”, and this automatically places him in the poor class (Lee 20). Miss Caroline displays prejudice towards Scout because she can read. Scout is singled out after she reads to the class, and Miss Caroline accuses her of her father teaching her how to read (Lee 17). It seems as though more serious types and instances of prejudice will develop as the story progresses.
The movie starts off by introducing a little boy named Matt. We find out that Matt is completely deaf. His grandfather doesn’t take the new lightly and is slightly in denial on the fact that his grandson is deaf. The baby’s mother talks about deaf schools and teaching the boy sign language. The grandfather doesn’t believe in those kind of institutions and believes his grandson would learn how to communicate through Oral education; teaching him how to read lips. The movie fast-forwards into the little boy’s life in elementary school. He’s put into a special-education class, when he’s clearly fine; his only problem is that’s he’s deaf. After watching this scene in the movie, it had me thinking. Not only was this little boy being singled out for one small difference than others, but he was seen as dumber than others because of it. Although this happened years ago, this reminds me of society today. Often time’s people treat others that don’t blend in, differently. People also believe they’re much better than others who have a form of disability, when in fact this is not true. Throughout his childhood he’s often bullied by other kids for being deaf. His grandfather starts to teach him how to talk by making him feel his vocal cords as he speaks. He also encourages him to join the wrestling team. It was difficult for him to adjust to the team because he would hav...
Eloise, a supervisor at the Federal Administration Agency (FAA), was faced with trying to ensure productivity when one of her workers became ill, and was not maintaining her level of work. Brenda, who had been a computer programmer for the Management Information Systems Support Division of the FAA for nine years, was diagnosed with breast cancer in January of 1991. She left work immediately to have an operation and to start treatments. Brenda was supposed to return to work after the medical procedure so Eloise reached out to her in February. Brenda stated that she did not feel up to it, that she would continue to use her sick leave and would return in March. Seeing that Brenda would not be back in the near future, Eloise asked the other workers in the office to “pitch in” and help pick up the slack in work due to her absence. To entice one employee to pitch in, she upgraded his work status from a GS7 to a GS9 (which is what Brenda’s status was) until Brenda returned. In March, Brenda could not return to work on her scheduled date and had her medical leave extended until she became better accustomed to the chemotherapy treatments.
One form of prejudice is rumors, it can cause harm to that individual who is being targeted and affect their future based on the rumor actually is and whether people would actually believe it or not. Rumors can easily hide the truth about that person’s personality because they are basically lies, opinions, and made up stories about that individual. Some people might start passing around judgments based on that rumor and that can a lot of trouble and conflict between the people. That person might not even be able to show their face to other people because they are so ashamed of themselves. This can also caused them to take a wrong step and end their live there. Rumors have destroyed many homes. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Boo Radley is an example of whom has been through prejudice for almost his entire life. As young children, Jem and Scout Finch are led to believe that Boo Radley is a horrifying man. People have set his image as a horrifying guy who likes to eat dead animals and is cruel. Unfortunately, their opinion of him has been influenced all the people that live in maycomb to believe he is a cruel man and he is nothing but scary. A examples of these...
Disability Rights Case Review Jonathan is a tenth grade student with multiple disabilities which include: profound mental disability, spastic quadriplegia, and seizure disorder. Jonathan’s mother approached the high school principal, Debbie Young, to request educational placement for Jonathan in the high school. Debbie Young, who also served as a Special Education teacher before she became a principal, denied the request.
The social model defines disability as a social construct that creates unwanted barriers for individuals, and a public concern, (Smart & Smart, 2006). Examples of these barriers include “inaccessible education systems, working environments, inadequate disability benefits, discriminatory health and social support services, inaccessible transport, houses and public buildings and amenities, and the devaluing of disabled people through negative images in the media, (Thomas, 2007, p. 13). Swain, et al (1993), states that “disability is not a condition of the individual. The experiences of disabled people are of social restrictions in the world around them, not being a person with a ‘disabling condition,’” (as cited by Lutz & Bowers, 2003).
The first article I read was about disability portrayal and the media today. He talks about a show where the actor with a disability plays a character with a disability. That is great because it makes more sense to have someone disabled play a disabled part. A disabled person can not play a auto bodied role, so where is the fairness in that? He also talks about how disney made a movie about someone with a mental disability. Although it was played by a auto body actor, the story was authentic because it was told by the actually twin sister. I actually did see that movie a couple years ago. I enjoyed the movie and the storyline was good. He also said disability roles are the easiest way to a oscar. One of those movies if Forrest Gump. It is kinda sad that having to play being disabled is a way to get an oscar. Most disabled roles have sad stories, so it seems like them make you feel bad in order to win an oscar.
As stated by C.Dave Hingsberg “For hundreds of years, western society regarded the mentally retarded as sad accidents of nature to be closeted behind walls of secrecy and silence. Thousands were forcibility sterilized in an attempt to erase the genetic stain of their misfortune. But scientists now know that barely 10%of mental retardation is passed on genetically” (Hingsberg, Dave C.2001). This section came directly from the video “Is Love Enough”. Throughout history, there was the belief that the disabled would produce offspring that would be burdensome to society. Policies were put into place that forced sterilization of 60,000 American citizens, some as young as ten years old (Reilly 1991).
It could be said that in modern industrial society, Disability is still widely regarded as tragic individual failing, in which its “victims” require care, sympathy and medical diagnosis. Whilst medical science has served to improve and enhance the quality of life for many it could be argued that it has also led to further segregation and separation of many individuals. This could be caused by its insistence on labelling one as “sick”, “abnormal” or “mental”. Consequently, what this act of labelling and diagnosing has done, is enforce the societal view that a disability is an abnormality that requires treatment and that any of its “victims” should do what is required to be able to function in society as an able bodied individual.
The word “disability” is an efficacious one, as far as words go. It manages to convey both a technical definition (“lack of adequate potency, vigor, or physical or mental capacity; incapacity”) as well as a general sense of the lack of glamour or romanticism found in the world of disabilities (Wai Au and Man David, 2006). Maybe it is because we as a society are preoccupied with both body image, expeditious fine-tunes, and disabilities are an affront to both (Wai Au and Man David, 2006). People with disabilities incline to survive in the world that is largely made for the “able-bodied” and it is perceive that they still want to live a life which is no more different from ordinary people (Rao, 2004). However, society has viewed this population
In middle school I was diagnosed with a disability with the way I expressed myself through writing. Ever since, I have gained multiple values and learned several lessons about self confidence. I was taught to push past my limits, in order to be successful in reaching my goals along with my dreams. Today I am a senior in high school who was once thought to struggle, but was able to succeed beyond expectations. To some, a disability may seem like a setback from achieving goals, but to me I used it as a challenge for myself. I accepted myself for who I was and looked at my disability as a unique trait of mine. I was able to provide a message to others that anything you set your mind to is possible with dedication and hard work. It might take
The newspaper dailies, have the ability to link persons with disability to the world. Still, no research has been found specifically on persons with disabilities and their portrayal in the newspaper daily in India. Many studies have focused on the more general topic of disabilities in the news (Mick 1996; Power 2006; Haller, Dorries, and Rahn 2006). Person with disabilities are also part of the society. The newspaper dailies depict the persons with disabilities, as reflection of the society’s perspective about them. Content analysis of media is a traditional mass communication research method used to assess a wide range of media content trends (Poothullil J.M.Martin 2008). This research paper advocates for increased newspaper analysis within the disability studies field. Using a short term media research study about Hindustan Times (HT) Newspaper daily and its news coverage of disability issue. This paper explores the shifting nature of recent disability coverage in Mumbai newspapers, for a period of 3 months in 2012. Content analysis based research found that the newspaper under study reported sensational and gender biased news related to disability issues.
People with disabilities are still people, they are people with hearts and they are actual physical beings; people with disabilities do their best to live every day to their fullest, yet that is still not enough for others. I feel like as a whole, humans are generally uncomfortable with people who have disabilities. Let’s think of it this way, people live their life every day in their normal lives and then they come across a person with a disability and suddenly their life is interrupted, like it is such a barrier in their flow of life to come across someone different from themselves.