Research undertaken by pan-disability charity Scope released exclusively yesterday to British broadcaster ITV has revealed a lamentable level of failure when it comes to seeing black individuals or those from minority ethnic backgrounds who also have a disability on our TV screens.
According to the research, 43% of the British public believe there should be more black, Asian or minority ethnic people with disabilities in important roles on TV or on streaming services. Disappointingly, just one in ten respondents reported seeing such an individual on television in the last 12 months with around 25% barely being able to recall ever seeing such a person on their TV screen.
A prominent example of someone who does fit the bill, on U.K. television at least, is former Paralympian, author and BBC and Channel 4 reporter Ade Adepitan (pictured above). However, individuals like Adepitan with such a visibly intersectional background possess a degree of prominence due to their rarity and can be viewed as the exception that proves the rule.
Another intersectional luminary in the U.K. is Shani Dhanda who was diagnosed with brittle bones disease as a young child in the late 1980s and went on to become the founder of the Asian Disability Network as well as helping to organize the first-ever Asian Woman Festival in the U.K.. Last month, the award-winning activist was voted the most influential disabled person in Britain in the Shaw Trustâs Disability Power 100 list.
Commenting on the reality of living with her intersectional identity, Dhanda told ITV News, âIt’s a really lonely and isolating experience, especially when you’re already fighting and up against so many other barriers and challenges when you live in a world that just isn’t designed for you.â
Further adding, âIt’s another form of erasure when you don’t see yourself in society. If you don’t see others like you, it’s very hard to envision what you can do and what you can be. I didn’t have that.”
Dhandaâs cogent analysis speaks to the crux of issues arising from this vacuum of BIPOC disabled talent on TV screens. Although, quite frankly, the same applies to on-screen professionals with disabilities from other backgrounds too. Those glass screens inside all of our living rooms are mirrors to society and if certain key segments are routinely absent from core broadcasting output â not only does this isolate and devalue those being excluded but also reaffirms exclusionary attitudes amongst the wider public.
When examining the corollary mechanics of affirmation and acceptance, it is also important to look at different types of disability depiction too, particularly in relation to fiction. Not only must characters with disabilities be authentically represented by actors with disabilities but such depictions must be grounded in the real world as much as possible and steer away from damaging extremes of people with disabilities being either tragic victims or otherworldly superheroes.
The disability community, and likely society at large, would be better served by showing disabled characters doing what everyone else does from getting up in the morning and brushing their teeth before work to going out on a date or squabbling with family members.
When it comes to evaluating the dearth of racial minority disabled talent in particular it isnât easy to pinpoint the precise mechanics as these are likely to be multiple and overlapping in nature. The more forgiving might point to a lack of confidence and awareness amongst those responsible for commissioning and producing primetime TV shows.
After all, if a pervasive lack of disability confidence across the media industry is widely acknowledged due to a fear of âgetting it wrongâ â adding race into an equation that already represents a tinderbox of complexities could be a bridge too far for some.
A more cynical analysis, that views the depiction of minority groups purely through the lens of tokenism, might simply question whether it is more impactful to dispense two tokens in one individual or whether a better calculation is to spread them more evenly.
Ultimately, if TV does aspire to be a mirror to society, then disability portrayal in isolation of its real-world context just wonât cut it. In reality, disability is something that can and does happen to anybody at any time. It is, whether actively considered this way or not, an intersectional identity by its very nature. Therefore, to reflect disability purely through the prism of white middle-class folk would be akin to taking out one big piece of glass from the broken mirror and making out as if it hasnât been broken at all.