The Movie “Blindness”

The latest buzz in the Disability Community and especially in the Blind Community is the release of the movie “Blindness.” The movie is based on the book of the same name by Nobel Prize winning author Jose Seramago. At first glance, the premise seems rather bland. For reasons unknown, a group of people in a city go blind and fearing that it will spread, the government quarantines them in an abandoned asylum. The rest of the movie is about how they cope. However, when you look past the bland exterior, it becomes apparent how much harm this movie could have on the public’s image of blind people.

There are a number of areas in which this movie portrays blind people as being incompetent and requiring sighted assistance; the most notable of which is hygiene. After the people are placed in the asylum, they often relieve themselves in their beds or on the floor, because they aren’t able to reach the bathroom. And when they have access to water for bathing they are portrayed as being unable to utilize it. The saving grace for one group of people is the wife of the town doctor who pretends to be blind in order to remain with her husband.  She cleans the blind people, with the doctor commenting at one point that without being able to see, he could not clean himself without the assistance of his wife.

This is a total farce. Even without a white cane, a blind person could trail the walls until they reached doors and then open them to investigate what was inside. Yes, you would wonder around a bit, but at least you could reach the bathroom independently. And let me assure you, the ability to wash yourself does not disappear if you lose your sight. I needed no training beyond that which other sighted children received in order to learn to clean myself properly. Though we are without sight, we have four other senses to rely on.

Aside from the blatantly wrong hygienic issue, some of the blind people in the film who were previously upstanding citizens degenerate in to criminals and rapists.  One blind man sets himself up as The King of Ward III and begins forcing the other prisoners to exchange valuables and sex for food. One character that had been blind from birth refuses to share his skills with the other inmates, but uses them to help the King. In essence, the producers of this film are saying that the loss of one’s vision makes one either become an invalid or degenerate in to a lawless savage.

Perhaps more damaging than these two aspects combined is the loss of dignity the blind individuals suffer. Once the prisoners are finally free, the doctor’s wife is scavenging in a supermarket for food while the doctor waits outside. He says: “I know my place.”  This quote implies that his place is dependent on his sighted wife.

A number of people have asked if what the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) is so angry about is more a matter of political correctness than anything else, and I suppose that if blindness were not already so stereotyped, it might be. It has even been said that we are overreacting because Seramago intended blindness, because it so often represents darkness, to be a metaphor for all the evil that resides in human nature. He intended to show how trying circumstances could bring out the evil in people. However, what would happen if a movie was produced wherein having blonde hair was a metaphor for stupidity. Every blonde in America would be incensed and protesting because the film stereotyped them as being stupid.  Blindness is a physical characteristic, no more significant than being blonde or left-handed; why should it being used as a metaphor for evil to go uncontested?  

The blind community has a rate of unemployment or underemployment of over 70 percent. Much of this stems from the bureaucracy that makes it nearly impossible for us to obtain the proper blindness skills and from the stereotype that blind people are unemployable and that their abilities are less than those of their sighted counterparts, which is patently untrue.

As Dr. Maurer, President of the NFB said: "The National Federation of the Blind condemns and deplores this film, which will do substantial harm to the blind of America and the world. Blind people in this film are portrayed as incompetent, filthy, vicious, and depraved. They are unable to do even the simplest things like dressing, bathing, and finding the bathroom. The truth is that blind people regularly do all of the same things that sighted people do. Blind people are a cross-section of society, and as such we represent the broad range of human capacities and characteristics. We are not helpless children or immoral, degenerate monsters; we are teachers, lawyers, mechanics, plumbers, computer programmers, and social workers. We go to church, volunteer our time for worthy causes, raise children, operate businesses, and engage in recreational activities, just like everyone else.

"Portraying the blind on movie screens across America as little better than animals will reinforce the unfounded fears, misconceptions, and stereotypes in the general public about blindness. It will exacerbate the unemployment rate among the blind, which is already higher than 70 percent because of public misconceptions about the capabilities of blind people. It will reinforce false public notions that blind children are uneducable, that blind adults are unemployable, and that all blind people are socially undesirable.

“Blindness has been played for laughs in the past on the movie screen, but this film does something worse: it makes the blind objects not of mere ridicule but of fear and loathing. For Miramax and its parent company, the Walt Disney Company, to portray the blind in this manner, even as alleged allegory or so-called social commentary is outrageous and reprehensible–and it is a lie.”

We, as the Blind Community must spread the word and break the stereotypes this movie presents. That is why the largest protest in NFB history is being planned, with nearly 75 protests in over 21 states being planned for the opening day of this film. And while we are spreading the word, I ask you to do so as well; to spread the word that blind people can be as active a member of society as their sighted peers.