08/10/2024
Hi everyone, Shane here. This one hurts to write, but it needs to be done.
We currently have a silly video going viral, which should be cause for celebration. Instead, it’s forcing me to confront the painful fact that literally hundreds of thousands of people hate me and think I’m worthless because of my disability. I’ll explain…
The video is quite simple: there’s a trend going around of people posting funny clips of themselves failing miserably at sports, with an ironic caption that “announces” that they did not qualify for the Olympics this year. This kind of self-deprecating humor is right up our alley, so we joined the trend and posted a quick video of me “diving” into a pool, except my dive is obviously just Hannah gently lowering me into the water. My caption announces that I “sadly did not make the 2024 Olympic diving team.” Mildly silly at best, kind of dumb at worst, but it fits the trend perfectly.
As of right now, the video has almost 20 million views. In our work, that’s a major success. I should be ecstatic. I should be proud. I should be celebrating.
But do you know what makes it tough to feel those things? The comments pouring into the video. Let me share some of the brutally ignorant and aggressively hateful things people felt compelled to say on this lighthearted and fun video I created.
The very top comment says, “It’s always important to wash your vegetables,” referring to me as the vegetable. It has 97,000+ likes. That means almost one hundred thousand real humans on this earth agree with this humiliating insult!
The next one, with 79,000 likes: “I still struggle to see that they are in a relationship.”
10,000 likes: “One day she’s not going to pull him back up.”
And another: “Dating him is like doing charity work.”
“You should just drown him.”
There are thousands more just like these. Thousands.
I’m tired, guys. Tired of spending my entire life trying to get the world to accept me. Tired of dedicating my career to educating people about the true disabled experience, only to be reminded—DAILY, by hundreds of thousands of people—that I’m still widely regarded as a “vegetable” that would be better off dead in their opinions. Tired of being denigrated and dismissed. The sheer volume of these horrific comments is staggering, so please, I beg you, don’t tell me to simply ignore them. These are real, actual people, with families and jobs, with influence and votes, who are out there in the world every day harboring these absolutely disgusting ideas about disabled people. It’s sickening.
It’s moments like these when I just want to throw in the towel. Hannah and I have given the world thousands of hours of authentic and personal content about our lives. We’ve worked passionately and tirelessly to show people that a disabled life is just as valid, worthy, meaningful, and joyous as any other, and yet, hatred fills every comment section we create.
I won’t give up, though. It’s too important to me and the stakes are too high. Until disabled people are embraced by our world as equals, I’ll be here, sharing my disabled life that I so deeply enjoy and cherish, and hoping (maybe against reason) that it’s making a difference.
I do believe people can change their opinions. I believe people can grow.
If you believe that too, and if you believe there’s no place in this world for the kind of hatred we receive, it would mean everything to me if you’d share this post. Let’s fight hate with love. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for all the support you give us. You truly keep me going when I’m facing what feels like an overwhelming monster.
Love, Shane
