Do you have disabled characters?

[sleepingmarlons2]

well I have one, her name is healer... she is dumb check it out here http://tapastic.com/episode/177496

[Jelw]

I haven't decided what her disability is yet, but it involves needing a wheelchair most of the time. She can walk a little, but not very much at all before she has to stop. I feel those who are not paralyzed but still need a wheelchair are some of the least represented people of the disabled community, with writers too often using the disabled person standing as a way to shock the audience about that 'terrible faker.'

Oh god I agree with this so much! While I myself am able-bodies, my best friend has a condition "POTS" meaning they have times where they are perfectly able to walk, but others where they cannot. My friend usually just always uses a wheelchair when going out because of the fear of being accused of being a "faker" and such and because people treat you better when they think you can't leave a wheelchair, apparently. :,(

[SpavVy]

I have a couple but I can't name off who because spoilers. >.<
But I have characters that have the following...

PTSD

Selective Mutism

A character that is completely blind

One character I have seems to show some signs of Reactive Attachment Disorder especially during her childhood years which I did completely by accident before I knew about the disorder xD but due to her past I seemed to have done a good job in making her current behavior pretty accurate although RAD is considered vary rare.

[ratique]

In Devil's Acres there will be a character that is very much disabled. I am not sure how to call her disability, but I think "vegetative state" describes it pretty closely. I don't like that word though, I prefer the German description for it: Wachkoma. Which means "Waking coma" translated.

I am really looking forward to working with that character, she is great!

[williamjbowles]

I don't know if this really counts as disabled, but Gunther from Outcast Kingdom is headless. Clearly, it's not a real world disability, but he can't talk, smell things, taste food-- or even eat. But he can see and hear, somehow. So... kind of?

[VaoMamago]

No, why should I? Tell me a reason

[Kamikaze]

We have a disabled character as one of our leading dudes in Kamikaze. His name is Toshi, and he's our main characters father. He can't see normally, and frankly he's fine with that. He's a writer, an amazing cook, and an awesome dad, but sometimes it's hard for other characters to expect much out of him, because all they see is his disability. The good news is, Toshi's a lot more capable than anyone gives him credit for. Ultimately, he's a dad, and his blindness has never impeded his ability to love his little girl. <3

[erwil]

I like this! I've got a mute character as well, and from previous experience in RP I'm slightly concerned if I can portray her properly.. She's an urchin so she doesn't have Echo's writing skills. I'm considering doing some studies in sign language to make it a little easier. But expressions and body language are probably going to have to fill her world in for the most part.

[carodoodles]

@erwil Mmhm good idea to study sign language. You could have your character do home sign if that character's world doesn't really have sign language or something. (Before 1500s, most deaf in the world used home sign or if there's few deafies in local, they use their own sign language)

Here are links to American Sign Language, ASL: aslpro and lifeprint . I’m not a HUGE fan of youtube videos because you don’t often know that person’s credibility. Lmk if your world is based on different part of the world because not all countries use same sign language. Good luck! And feel free to ask me any questions. I'm deaf but I am also selective mute (I have voice but I just don't like to use it)

Oh and check out Strays by Samantha Whitten- they have a mute character, Feral, who writes in different language that other character, Meela, doesn't know so they had to communicate through gestures, sometimes one word here and there in Meela's language. They wrote that mute character Feral very well! :3

[carodoodles]

More representation in comics for disabled people is really great. Did you know that we disabled people are the largest minority in the world. And often disabled people are ignored in stories, or we have disabled characters that are boring 2D with horrible stereotypes. A lot of disabled people are perceived very negatively, mostly because a lot of people know very little about disability. That leads to more oppression (or ableism, which is oppression against disabled people) toward us.

[Mineu]

I have a character in my comic who is disabled but I can't say who that is because of spoilers xD
But yeah, I think is pretty interesting to have disabled characters in a story but also it's a challenge (I'm usually afraid of not being able to represent them well ) so I think doing a lot of research is definitely a must.

[erwil]

Ooh that's excellent! Thank you ever so much! ^o^ And yeah, I get what you mean about the videos.. I'm not on the know enough about it to trust them either.
I like the idea of home sign of some kind, it'd make sense for the character in question for sure!

And gosh, I actually completely forgot Feral was one. I've been following the comic for ages and kind of took it as something normal since they've portrayed him so well!

[VaoMamago]

interesting thoughts, I cannot disagree with you. But want to admit though, that it's kinda hard for regular people to imagine how it feels like to be disabled person. I do not gonna put in my story such kind of man, because afraid of showing him in a wrong perspective. You actually said it in your reply about lame representation of them in comics. I believe authors should not put in story such characters without proper research. It's bad and for disabled person and for comic

[Elwetritsche]

Initially, I started my comic project out with a blind character among the mains, but since I reworked it over and over, he lost his meaning somehow. I now have a character with a similar condition to autism in the main cast.

[skatuya]

I have two disabled characters in my comic, Vicious Circle.
Veronica is blind on one eye and another character (who has yet to make an appearance) Helena has lost one of her legs when she was very young (In a pretty violent manner no less :/).
I just hope I can give a good representation with them.

[carodoodles]

I can understand. With the whole SUPER SUPER SOCIAL JUSTICE WARRIOR thing going on, especially with tumblr, it is easy for people to leap to conclusion and drag down people who are honestly good people who just aren't educated. I saw that happened to a great cartoonist and now they're too afraid to have characters who are outside of their comfort zone. Result? We lost representation of disabled and trans characters in their comics.

But good news- Actually giving disabled character a correct representation isn't that hard. It's like a man writing about a female character, a white person writing black character, a straight person writing about lgbtqia character, etc- there's so many of that. If an author keeps writing only about characters that they themselves are, then stories would be so boring.

Talking to people with your character's disability, do research isn't really hard. I did that for my character Dion who is blind. While I do have some degree of understanding/similar experience because I'm disabled, I still didn't know much because I am deaf not blind. So I went out and talked to blind people, checked out their blogs, read some articles. Best places to ask are their blogs that are dedicated to stuff about being blind because they'd be more than happy to talk about that thing. I do that with my tumblr- it's place where people can ask me questions about being deaf. It's rude to ask disabled people out of blue in somewhere like grocery store questions about being disabled. So I ask blind people online thru their blogs.

And yes I still do make mistakes here and there. We are humans. If some "super super social justice warrior" try to drag you down- just talk to that group of minority to ask for their opinion. If you realized you did make a mistake- apologize and move on. Bonus thing about talking to minority group is that they can back your word and verify that you are a good person who is still learning and unpacking your privilege (such as abled bodied privilege)

I do that for creators who create deaf character. Many of my deaf friends and I DO understand if someone makes a mistake. When that happens, I tell people "look this creator has made a mistake and apologized for it and has learned from it. I am deaf and I accept their apology." With that, people (esp super super social justice warrior) lose any good reason to keep attacking you.

Sorry for a long post! Hope that make sense?

[mariusthered]

I have just started posting here ( TalesFromSwipeCity) in drama. I do have disabled characters as it's something i have always thought was important in main stream comics. they don't show up till later but I have a woman ninja who has a robotic arm (due to her arm being chopped off by a gangster )and I also plan to have one of my characters put in a wheel chair (but I'm keeping that story under raps for now) I also have a girl with a cloned body but that's more of a super power.

[shazzbaa]

[oh man, your autobio comic is super cute btw! * u * ]

The main character of Runewriters, Tareth, happens to be deaf! She does read lips and speak as well, but it sure would be nice if the others would learn a little sign language.

There's a character who'll be introduced in a bit that can't speak, but that's for weird magic reasons so I'm not sure if he counts, haha.

As a hearing person, I'll second the recommendation for Lifeprint especially as having been an invaluable resource for me! The early lessons have a TON of really important info outside of just "this sign means this." @ u @

[Leyelle]

The male lead of my romance novel is wheelchair-bound (paralyzed from the knees down.)

Read Damsel in the Red Dress | Tapas Web Novels

[KevinReijnders]

(Oh wow, this thread is ancient)

One of my main characters, Zack, is missing an arm and uses a robotic prosthesis. Not sure to what degree that counts as disabled, in the sense that it rarely affects his daily life. Though it's a pain that the battery needs to be recharged often. He does suffer from some trauma regarding the accident that caused him to lose his arm.

I also want to mention, without going into too many spoilers, but a different character will go trhough a simular experience as him in a future chapter of the story, ending up severly limiting their abilities for a time.

Anyway, I'll let you be the judge if this counts as disabled or not.

Read Trespasser | Tapas Web Comics