Why I Won't Write Cripples for Dummies

Happy birthday, stellaluna_ and faylinn_drake! ~glomp~

Like a batrachian elder god rising from the deep at the behest of a drunken frat-house ritual, flacks_my_man has resurrected her LJ to ask my why I don't devote my considerable energies to writing a Care and Feeding of Cripples and Other Imbeciles for Dummies book instead of railing against the world in my LJ.

It's a fair question, and it has two very simple answers.

The first is that no one would buy such a book. Cripples and their conundrums and peccadilloes are of scant interest to the abled world. Sure, a few fetishists and perverts might buy books about limper sex, but on the main, the public doesn't want to know anything about us beyond where to send the telethon check. If they were granted a peek behind the curtain of crippled lives, they might find themselves in the uncomfortable position of identifying with us, and that's too damn scary. If they cease to differentiate us, to classify us as the alien Other, then the next step would be to admit that but for the grace of God, they could be us, and that is some terrifying mojo.

As far as they're concerned, we're best viewed at a remove. They don't want to know how we think or feel or take a shit when it's cold and the muscular contracture makes squatting a bitch. They don't want to know who we are because to know that would demand a subsequent re-evaluation of our treatment by society as a group and as individuals.

To put it another way, they want the inspirational, feel-good glurge of Christy Brown and My Left Foot, but they adamantly refuse to acknowledge that all of the obstacles Christy faced on the road to his triumph were erected by their intolerance, indifference, and patronizing tendency equate our ravaged bodies with the Lesser.

And while we're on the subject, allow me to note the following: the older I become, the more I'm convinced that the so-called "inspiration" drawn from these stories isn't inspiration at all. It's not a revelatory epiphany about the strength of the human spirit. It's a miasma of self-congratulation. They watch the movies and read the books and think, "How wonderful we are for letting them live. What an enlightened society are we." Their admiration for Christy Brown's feats are on par with their wonderment at the acrobatics of Shamu, in my opinion.

For the record, Christy Brown should have his penis immortalized in bronze as a totem of absolute manhood. Anyone who could do what he did in backwater Ireland with nothing but his left foot is a fucking monster of a man. Period. If penis size were commensurate with guts, the S.S. Intrepid could berth in his foreskin.

But like I said, no one would buy a treatise on gimpdom. Limper life hasn't been a hot topic since Christopher Reeve cobbled a ramp to our bandwagon and took a rolling leap to the forefront as a cause celebre. Even if there were a market for such memoirs, I have nothing to recommend me. I've done nothing to set my opinions apart from the next cripple's. I haven't climbed Everest in my Quickie or cured cancer. I don't have famous parents or friends. I sit and write stories no one reads and watch the world through a fourteen-inch porthole. No one has elected me Queen of Cripple Hill and its de facto mouthpiece, and thank God, because I have the diplomacy of a rabid hyena with Asperger's. If I wrote a book, it would molder in the bargain bin alongside such classics as Knitting in Cellblock D: How Needlework Can Replace Surprise Buttsex as the Number One Prison Pastime.

Why should I waste the time and effort when I can get the same result on the Internet with half the ego bruising and without bankrupting a small publishing house?

And now, the second reason.

Why should I have to? I certainly don't see any books on the shelves with such charming titles as, Miss Manners' Guide to People of Color, Jews and You, or When Your Neighbors' Couch is Taupe: How Straights Can Cope With the Same-Sex Couples in Their Midst. If I did see such books, I would be appalled, and the uproar would be the stuff of legend. So why should it be different for disabled folks? Why do we need a special instruction manual? What's so hard about treating us as you'd want to be treated or at least keeping your ignorance and discomfort to yourself until you're in private?

On the other hand, if any foolhardy publishers out there want to write me a fat check for stating the obvious, be my guest. I'm as greedy for the easy money as the next person.