Sexism And Normality

There is a sense of normalcy instilled in our social culture, we have preconceived notions of what a normal human should be like—able-bodied and fully functional. When we meet someone who does not meet our criteria of normal, say a disabled person, we automatically think of and focus on all the ways in which they are different, and, in the process, separate them from ourselves. Because disabled people are categorized as people that do not fall into the norm, their wishes to assimilate in the normal society are met with hardships and often denial both from the communities that regulate their lives and from the so-called normal people around them. I personally believe that if we get rid of our notion of normalcy, accommodating people of disability …show more content…
The media has, for years, held the power to influence our society and, recently, minorities are demanding to be accurately represented in order to show that they are normal members of society like everyone else, and combat racism and sexism. In the same way, the media representation should focus more on people with disabilities and provide insights into their lives because the media representation could redefine normalcy.
The concept of what is or isn’t normal is a social construct that causes people with disabilities to seem lacking and in need of compensating for their physical or mental state. In his essay, “Constructing Normalcy”, Lennard J. Davis examines the construction of normalcy, “…the idea of a norm is less a condition of human nature than it is a feature of a certain kind of society” (3). What this means is that our determination of what is normal is not a part of our nature but it is a reflection of our society. Our society often constructs prejudiced viewpoints that associate people outside the norm with deviant acts. Like how in American society, where the normal is white able-bodied people, minorities like Asians get associated with stereotypes of being …show more content…
It is good in the sense that society is attempting to satisfy their needs, implementing community services, creating and aiding the profession of caretakers, and so forth. But while these aspects satisfy the basic needs of a disabled person, it also becomes more of a publicity stunt than a way to truly help them assimilate in society. In the essay, “Harry Potter and the Allure of Separatism,” Cal Montgomery writes from the perspective of a disabled person. Montgomery writes of an example where five men were put in a normal house in a neighborhood. Their needs seemed to be met and they appeared to live among a normal able-bodied society, but upon investigation, they found that the men were not friends with their neighbors and had no interaction with their community, “these men were completely isolated from the community while surrounded by community services.” In other words, a big show was made of assimilating these men with a local community, but they are still separated due to their nature of being different and disabled. Society only wants to appear to be more accommodating, and Montgomery emphasizes this by giving us insight into his childhood, “The adults around me weren’t interested in changing anything other than me—I was either unable or unwilling to meet their expectations…” In other words, Montgomery had the