Do you have any characters with disabilities? How do you portray them?

[sleepykuya]

I love seeing representation—characters with disabilities, whether that disability is physical or not! In my novel, I have characters that are partially blind or have chronic pain, and I hope that I’m doing them justice the way I’m writing them.

My question is, do you have any novels or comics that deal with characters having disabilities? Tell me about them! Drop them here, if you want. I’d like to check them out!

Read The Heart Dove | Tapas Web Novels

[justanothernerdling]

My character Calixa (princess of the summer fae) was born fully blind!

Read A Crownes Game | Tapas Web Novels

[NickRowler]

I have several in my series Frostpeak.

-Ken and Zeta have ADHD
-Claus has ASD with selective mutism
-Bertie has Albinism and ASD
-Mr. Blueberry has a missing arm, blind in one eye. He also has some mysterious skin disorder tho not really based on anything real.
-Burnetto is blind (cataracts) tho I admit not in the most realistic way. He has limited vision which is very cloudy.

Read Frostpeak West | Tapas Web Comics

[sleepykuya]

I’ll check it out! Thanks

[sleepykuya]

What a diverse cast! Thanks for sharing, I’ll check it out ^_^

[simonitropunk]

Read Lyza's Sandstorm | Tapas Web Comics

• Ethan... the older brother of Lyza. He is disabled and stutter while talking and although with his condition, he is still capable in doing things like the previous story arc protecting Sandy while his sister Lyza take care of other bad guys. While Lyza is the fighter and the muscles, Ethan is the intellect since he lacks the physical strength. He can build, restore, fix and even invent things which later would assist his sister in her fights.

[pinxfoxx]

In a comic I used to make "Witchy Life" the main character Morgan had dyslexia, which is a learning disability. But it was relevant only one time because the comic was based on mostly things that happened to my (slice of life, "comedy" comic) and dyslexia doesn't affect me that much in day to day life.

[moontokkym]

I have a lot but I don't really label many of them officially because if they're accurate people will recognise themselves in the characters without me needing to name it within the comic. I try to portray the reality of the neurodivergence or disability more than the label if that makes sense? A couple that come up quite strongly are:

• Khay has PTSD, causing flashbacks and other trauma responses, I try to use visual parallels to show what element of the scene is triggering to them and how it can sometimes be these fast intense flashes of fear out of both general feelings and little details.

• Aide is mostly deaf in one ear due to Waardenberg's Syndrome, I'm in a scifi setting so she has an advanced hearing aid device that she wears. It's bright pink so it's sometimes visible in her ear in some panels. It also has a secondary microphone that she'll leave in rooms to eavesdrop on conversations from afar.

• Sarin has many symptoms of autism, as she's the one who takes the most from my own attitudes and mannerisms. She hyperfixates and has difficulty understanding the emotions of others through their genstures and manners while being very introspective and working to put her own emotions into words. She also gets set on a plan and dislikes last minute changes. She's also severely dyslexic to the point she can barely read and relys on a drone to read for her.

• Haise has scoliosis that means that her shoulders don't sit level when she's standing up straight. Also it comes into play in her backstory.

Most of my characters with physical disabilities have prosthetics because my world is cyberpunk dystopia, so a lot of people just have robotic limbs for practical or purely cosmetic reasons so that's just really normalised in the world.

[KSlinger]

It's not a RL disability (or maybe it is?) but a character in West and many others throughout the story are Touched, which means they have a random power given to them by the West itself. One character can turn anything she touches into flowers. Another can 'open' anything. Even things shouldn't open, like animals. You get the jist. Anyway, a percentage of the Touched have no control over their power at all and can't touch, or be touched by, anyone without affecting them. Eliaz is one of these people. He lives his life with gloves on and with a service dog to keep him company. He does use his random power from time to time and isn't necessarily of the opinion that his life would be much better if he had no power at all, but yeah. Poor guy.

[allenT]

Yes some of my villager characters have disabilities. (a few not yet shown)

I might get some stinkeyes but I do not glorify disabilities. I treat it simply as handicap or something that has lost. But I do have a leaning that they need to be noticed for their conditions.

In my comic, I will never show someone being bullied because of their disabilities.
However, none get special treatments from village aside from their love ones. Either they are fine or not at the moment, they have to live their lives like others, struggling or not. And yes some characters may point it out or show pity (but nothing demeaning or detestful)

[sleepykuya]

Hell yeah, this sounds like such an interesting concept. I’m the same way—I didn’t really want to label my characters with anything but just have it implied and such. I’ll check it out ^_^

[sleepykuya]

Ohhhhhh wait this is so unique A cool way to portray disability, I can’t wait to check it out

[allisoncandraw]

My MC Bobbie is deaf and his best friend R.J. is hard of hearing. They're just a couple of goofy dudes.

I portray them as I would any other character, they just happen to be deaf/HOH. Of course this comes up in the comic in different ways, and they normally communicate in ASL.

Check it out here if you like slice of life! https://m.tapas.io/series/signs-point-to-bobbie/info

[GumshoeComix]

I have a story where every character is disabled in some way, its still very much in progress though ;w;

[UrMom]

I have a MC with ocular albinism, so he can't legally drive without some special eye hardware, his depth perception is atrocious, he's near sighted with text and he's super sensitive to light. He mentions it once, but it's never mentioned as a disability, I just show his issues visually and assume readers can pick it up.

I'm not sure if this is considered a disability (Recently found out chronic migraines are a disability, soooo "The More You Know~*".), but my other MC lives with PTSD and psychosis. This isn't brought up since they themselves don't know what's going on, never being properly diagnosed, so it's all shown through visual ques and how they talk sometimes. They also have back issues and arthritis.

(Btw don't look for my comic unless you're 17 or older, and you're fine with heavy themes.)

[irresponsiblepics]

As a person who works with young people with physical and mental challenges I agree with this approach. No stinkeye from me.

[MK_Wizard]

Technically, the titular character was born with several birth defects that caused him to become an amputee and he is technically blind and paralyzed as his organic eyes, spinal column, arms AND legs, and even some of his digestive tract are all gone. He copes with all of his disabilities in one simple way: he's a cyborg. Whatever is missing or doesn't work, gets replaced with cybernetic parts which he himself updates all the time to better.

Read Psychoborg | Tapas Web Comics

[maice]

I don't post my comic here on tapas so I won't link it. But my character Isaac is missing a foot. He's got a peg leg!

This hasn't been too bad for him mostly. He's a ranger, so he uses a bow and arrow. The sole reason for this is it's obviously going to be a much better fighting method for him with his disability, although this is never explicitly stated in the comic. I wonder if people would ever think about it enough to put that together though.

It has hindered him a couple times. Early on he tripped because of it, although to be fair, I trip all the time and I am not disabled at all, just stupid. More recently, he is having a hell of a time with some muddy terrain because of it.

That's all that's really planned for it, little tedious things like that. It's not a big thing for him, it's been like this since he was a child (and destroyed it beyond fixing when he jumped out of a tree trying to fly). He was raised by bird people. He thinks he is a bird. The peg leg is the least of his problems.

[DanielRKM]

It's weird calling it a disability because I feel deafness is more of difference in culture, but my main character Penny from Monkey Bunny (and supporting lead in Valor) is deaf. It impacts her socially in Monkey Bunny (as she's constantly talking through her interpreter/girlfriend Artemis) but that gets slothed off once we're several years in the future for Valor (and the main crew is bilingual in ASL and English).

It affects Penny socially as she tends to be more stoic and observant in larger groups (who don't speak her language) but once she's with Artemis/a fellow ASL fluent character, her charismatic self comes out much, much more.

Illustration-wise, I very rarely show full sentences in ASL, but I often choose one word/major theme and illustrate someone signing that in ASL for the panel. It can be a real challenge at times drawing long conversations (and keeping it fresh with camera angles/etc), but it's such a beautiful language that ASL has only ever been a benefit to the art (and I can't wait for the next 2 months of Valor as it is a VERY ASL-heavy scene).

Check out Unstoppable Monkey Bunny on Tapas

Read Unstoppable Monkey Bunny | Tapas Web Comics

Check out Valor: Family Tree on Tapas

Read Valor: Family Tree | Tapas Web Comics

Thanks for offering a space to talk about this aspects of our stories!

[DanielRKM]

Also, sorry if that felt a smidge like soapboxing, but I legit saw the thread, passed it by, and felt weird for not having more inclusive stories (featuring characters with disabilities) ... and then realized I did 🤣.