The film and television industry as well as other media channels are trying to portray individuals from all spheres in a more accurate way, however, it can be said that they still have a long way to go as far as genuine representation is concerned. And while some argue that autism is negatively or erroneously depicted by the media, others seem to be quite content with the strategy they follow.
Some of the negative impacts of inaccurately portraying autism are the following:
Not allowing the general population to see the range of characteristics that are on the spectrum
Removing certain groups of people from the media
Preserving stereotypes such as “the mute” or “the savant”
Leading parents/guardians of young children who have symptoms to disdain them due to their knowledge from the media.
Not correctly educating the general population about the spectrum
While no one TV show, movie, news report, or piece of art can portray every single characteristic of autism (because not one single person has every single characteristic of autism), they could do better at being more accurate according to statistics, and not as stereotypical.
Some positive impacts of accurately representing individuals from across the spectrum are the following:
Increasing acceptance and acknowledgement towards people from the spectrum
Educating others regarding various disabilities
Allowing many autistic people to relate to particular characters or shows
Showing what those with autism can do
According to a media advocacy organization, the number of regular characters on broadcast programming with a disability has increased by more than 1 percent in the past year. Even though it doesn’t seem like much, it is, indeed, an improvement.
Here are some ways we can improve media representation of autism:
Media creators can employ autistic people as writers, actors, technicians, etc, in order help in creating the roles of autistic characters.
Rather than having just one autistic character, which emphasises its difference from “the norm”, films, tv shows and series’ can include diverse communities of people to represent and incorporate all sorts of differences in the society.
Greater representation of non-speaking autistic people is needed, as autistic characters should be as complex as any other character, with autism one aspect of their multifaceted identities.
Additionally, autistic characters should have opportunities to succeed and to fail, to help and to be helped, and autistic people should play a central role in helping to create them.
By Avishikta Basu
Opmerkingen