![]() The “psycho” killer (sometimes diagnosed with sociopathy but sometimes left as an undiagnosed “crazy”) is far more common in fiction than they have ever been in real life. There is also the prevalence of mentally ill antagonists in horror works. The belief that someone who looks different should be shunned is one that has been a crucial part of ableism for untold generations, and its continued presence in media simply allows that belief to continue on unabated. They rely on the deeply ableist notion that evil will make itself manifest in the body. ![]() Many horror monsters have their monstrosity displayed via facial differences or other forms of visible disabilities. Other works rely on far less pleasant ways to present disabled people as monsters. Of incidents of monstrous disabled people, these are perhaps the best options available, as it simply puts them on the same level as any nondisabled person, albeit in a way that relies on ableist notions in order to be shocking. They work on the audience’s presumed belief that disabled people are inherently virtuous or innocent, and thus it being a shock when it turns out that they’re capable of deep acts of evil. Some of these portrayals come from a reversal of the infantilization of disabled people. More troubling than the portrayal of disabled people as victims, though, is the portrayal of disabled people as monsters. Instead, it is important for disabled characters to have the same degree of agency and danger as their abled counterparts, to allow them to participate fully in the story. Giving them an undue degree of safety from threats that are harming the abled characters serves to infantilize disabled people, by giving them the same protections as children. This is not to say that disabled people cannot be victims at all in horror movies. A wheelchair user unable to escape from an axe user because the only egress is a flight of stairs is not killed because they’re a wheelchair user, but rather because there is a lack of accessible access to safety. Doing so positions the disability itself as being as deadly as the killer, which is simply not true or realistic. Indeed, there are many films where the central premise revolves around how the central character’s disability is the reason they are endangered in the first place. When a disabled person dies in a horror movie, their disability is presented as a weakness and as a flaw that allows for the killer to succeed more easily. When a Black man dies first in a horror movie, the reason is seldom (outwardly at least) because he is Black. In dealing with disability specifically, however, there is a tendency in works to have the character’s disability itself be the reason violence is inflicted on them. The use of disabled people as victims in horror is part of the broader trend of horror works victimizing marginalized people of all identities. This blog will dig a bit into the missteps that these works often make, as well as highlight some horror media that actually handles topics surrounding disability better than most. ![]() It has a history of poor portrayals of disabled people, as both monsters and victims. For disabled people, though, horror can be an uncomfortable genre. Classic horror films, spooky tv shows, and jump-scared filled video games take their place as the predominant media of the day. October is the time when the horror genre reigns supreme in the public consciousness.
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