Willing and able  

Anton Checkhov’s 1898 short story The Man in the Case told of a Russian teacher called Byelikov who was so preoccupied with his appearance that it eventually led to his lonely, untimely death. Although this story is over 100 years old, the idea of man being obsessed with how he looks is hardly alien to current modern culture.

It is ingrained into everyday life, cultivated in some corners and bitterly fought in others. But where is this battle most evident, most public?

In the media, one might argue.

Over the past few years the number of television programmes showing representations of people with disabilities has been on the increase, discouraging the preconceptions that disabled people are sick, dependant, childlike and asexual.

Alexander McQueen broke away from the norm in the 1990s when he and photographer Nick Knight used disabled models, both in magazine Dazed and Confused, and on the catwalk.

The subject of people living with disabilities has never been so widely presented in the mainstream media as it is today. Television shows like Britain’s Missing Top Model, Wheelchair Dancer, How to Look Good Naked…With a Difference, all perpetuate an understanding of disability, and positive reception of those who have long been marginalized on account of their physical appearances or conditions.

BBC Ouch! is a website that reflects on the lives and experiences of those living with disabilities. A contributor to the site, Simon Minty, says that he likes to think that “disability is catching up”. Perhaps he’s right.

Debenhams have recently launched a huge campaign using models with disabilities in fashion photo spreads that have nothing to do with disability, and everything to do with beauty.  Shannon Murray is one of the models who appears in the Debenhams campaign.  Like many young women, she’d like to pursue a career in television. When asked about the Debenhams campaign, Shannon says that it’s not just about money, and it’s not just about visibility. It’s a mixture of both:

“Obviously it’s a business. I’m aware that clients book me to represent their brand in the best way possible. They need to market and promote their product and my job as a model is to help make their product sell. I am also trying to challenge outdated stereotypes of disability and hopefully change perceptions.

There are still too many myths and incorrect preconceived ideas about what its like living with a disability as a young woman. I’d like to prove that disabled men and women can be style conscious, attractive and healthy, without being a Paralympic athlete. I’d also like to be able to give children with disabilities a better perspective of their own body image.  An increase in media representation would eventually filter down to society and normalise disability.

However, the increased representation of those living with disability is not necessarily a common goal across the board when it comes to the media industry.

Times columnist Rod Liddle once declared, “if we’re being honest, isn’t disability bad, wouldn’t we rather not have it at all?” He has a point. But the existence of disabilities is not to be likened to things we would “rather not have at all”, such as weekends of excessive rainfall, or an ugly car without an engine. What Liddle is not recognising is the human behind the disability. And perhaps what campaigns like that from Debenhams, and shows like Wheelchair Dancer, will achieve, is the placement of the disability behind the human, rather than the other way around.