Midnight Mass is a limited series with deep religious themes. One of the characters is a teen/young adult named Leeza. She became a wheelchair user as a child because she was accidentally shot in the spine and was paralyzed. At one point, the parents also go on and on about how poor they are because of the medical expesnes in front of Leeza. Her whole plot is the goal of being non-disabled, specifically being healed through religion. While wanting to be non-disabled is not an inherently bad thing for disabled people to want, it is harmful for media to perpetuate the idea that all of us need to be healed at any cost. This belief results in countless non-consensual procedures and tests done on disabled people under the assumptions that the person must want it and that fewer disabled people is better for society. Furthermore, a large number of disabled people are extremely uncomfortable with (if not traumatised by) religious people praying for their recovery or laying hands. The show makes no attempt to stop the stereotype and assumption that all disabled people welcome this.
Father Paul even went so far as making Leeza the first person he turned into a vampire because of his ableist assumption that she would prefer being the show’s symbol of true evil over being disabled. He assumed that literally nothing could be worse than being disabled, and they could have easily emphasised how exceptionally cruel this assumption was, but they didn’t. Not to mention—most churches don’t have ramps, particularly rural ones. This is actually a major issue for voting as inaccessible churches account for a very large portion of inaccessible polling sites. This is something else that they could have easily and equitably discussed in the show: a quick few lines about Leeza’s parents fighting to make the church install a ramp, but the church refused to do so until the parents paid for it themselves.
The main problem with this show is the fundamental assumption that all disabled people want cured, though many disabled advocates argue that that should never be the goal. It's important to remember that the grey area is valid. It's ok to want to be included in society, to access the places you want to go, to not deal with chronic symptoms, to want to be treated decently.
Comments