Disability continues to be underrepresented in cinema and television made in Spain. Of the more than a thousand characters that populated Spanish fiction last year, only 3.3% of them had some type of disability, far from the data available to the Spanish Committee of Representatives of People with Disabilities (Cermi ), which indicates that in our country there are about 4.3 million people with disabilities, which is equivalent to almost 10% of the total population.
This is one of the highlights of the report prepared each year by the Observatory of Diversity in Audiovisual Media (ODA), which was presented today at the Ministry of Equality, and which analyzes the representation of diversity in Spanish fiction through throughout 2021, focusing especially on diversity by affective-sexual orientation and gender identity.
Developed by 56 volunteers, something that the director of the report, Emilio Papamija, has emphasized, the report has taken into account 1,141 characters from 51 films and 46 seasons of 43 fiction series to extract its results. In the case of people with disabilities, the numbers have increased slightly between 2020 and 2021. This has gone from having the presence of 25 characters with some type of disability in 2020, to 38 in 2021.
For David Martínez Menayo, journalist and former head of Communication at Cermi, the study shows that “there is still much to be done” to make people with disabilities visible. A task that, in his opinion, is very important because for many people, especially in childhood, “the first gateway to social inclusion is fiction and a person who does not have contact with diversity and disability, hardly in the future it can be committed to inclusion.” The journalist says that in addition to making visible, “you have to do it well. It is not about just telling the problems that a person with a disability faces, but that they can be a character without their disability even being mentioned. Papamija agrees on this, assuring that many of the plots surrounding these characters “continue to focus on the field of health.” In addition, the director of the study also highlights that all these characters “are white”, except for Maya, a Latin woman who appears in ‘HIT’, the RTVE fiction.
Precisely, this is one of the criticisms in which the director of the report has made the most emphasis: the lack of intersectionality. In other words, that a gay character may have a disability or that a black character may be gay. “If not, we’re just talking to each other. Only in this way will we be able to combat stigmas such as fatphobia”, explained who was glad that series such as ‘Toy Boy’, ‘La Fortuna’, ‘Paraíso’ or ‘Señoras del (h)Ampa’ have taken the first steps in this direction.
‘Lost fagot’, an example
The production that marked a milestone last year is ‘Lost Fagot’, by Bob Pop, whose protagonist is a copy of its creator, an LGTBI character who has a disability. The writer, present this morning via videoconference, explained that he feels “privileged” to have brought his life to fiction through El Terrat and at the request of TNT and Warner Media. The appearance of him in the ‘late night’ at the hands of Buenafuente, without a doubt, has made things a little easier for him. «Yes, the format of the ‘late’ has a bit of that machirula look, but it is related to the public it is addressed to. I took advantage of a loophole to slip in and give my point of view, but that is also in line with the ‘lates’ that show different visions of life. My gaze interested me and that’s where I became strong », commented who used his life in ‘Lost Maricón’« as an excuse to talk about growth, identity, loss, sex and disability ».
Beyond the issue of disability, the main data from the report indicates that the presence of LGTBI characters has increased by 2.2% compared to 2020. Thus, last year of the 1,141 papers that were analyzed, 106 were LGTBI, which equivalent to 9.3% of the total. It should be noted, yes, that this type of characters are present, fundamentally, in the series, since of the total number 71 belong to television fictions. Even with everything, LGTBI characters are 35 of the 396 analyzed in feature films and the figure also increased with respect to the previous year by five percentage points to 8.8%. That yes, more than two thirds of these characters are concentrated in just three films (‘CUT!’, ‘Where two fit’ and ‘Polyamory for beginners’) «which confirms that the creation of LGBTI content is still very polarized”, Papamija indicated. In the series, this polarization does not improve much, since 48% of the characters meet in only six series of the 43 analyzed. Namely, ‘Elite’, ‘Everything else’, ‘The Boarding School: Las Cumbres’, ‘The People’, ‘HIT’ and ‘Tell me how it happened’. Precisely, the report highlights the irruption of ‘Everything else’ on HBO Max, the series created, written and starring Abril Zamora, which portrays the life of a trans woman outside of common stereotypes. In 2021, the three trans representations that were in the cinema are interpreted by trans people, something that does not happen in the case of the series, where only one of the seven characters, that of Dafne, who is played by Abril Zamora, is trans. On the contrary, they could only find a male trans character, Rober, in ‘Paco’s men’, who is played by a cisgender actor, Juan Grandinetti.
As for female representation, from the Observatory they lament a decrease in the presence of women in cinema, which has gone from 52.5% in 2020 to 44.8% in 2021. Regarding television series, ODA criticizes that “there has never been parity” but that the presence of women has decreased again, since in 2020 it was 44.8% and in 2021 they had to settle for 44.1%. They celebrate, however, that there are more proposals created by women and give as examples ‘Perfect life’, by Leticia Dolera, the already mentioned ‘Everything else’, or ‘Cardo’, by Ana Rujas and Claudia Costafreda. “Series that show that when there’s a woman behind the camera, there tends to be more diversity in front of it,” says Papamija. The three series, by the way, are only available on payment platforms, which indicates that free-to-air televisions are not yet committed to this content.
The social communicator and anti-racist activist Paula Guerra Cáceres pointed out that the progress in the representation of women in fiction has to do “with the rise of the global feminist movement” and also that the series “have a format that is He is more interested in addressing other issues such as feminism or racism”, something that in his opinion is more difficult in the cinema because “the format is shorter and entertainment is encouraged”. The journalist Borja Terán, moderator of the presentation, has also pointed out that the great diversity of the platforms encourages this type of fiction, while the large film distributors “are more afraid of taking risks.”
Lesbian women have indeed increased their presence in Spanish fiction, representing 25.7% of the total LGTBI characters and going from 17 to 26 characters in 2021. As for bisexual characters, for the first time they move in numbers similar to those of gay characters, with 38 roles, 14 in movies and 24 series. Of course, in them the female presence is greater, with 26 characters played by women. The hypersexualization of women and the stereotypes of prostitution are still very present in the creation of these characters.
With regard to racialized characters, their representation has increased and last year there were 86 characters, 7.5% of the total, with a significant increase in cinema, where a scant 5.8% rose to 9.6%, in line with a significant drop in series where 7.6% in 2020 becomes 6.4%. The bad new? “It’s still very difficult to find non-stereotypical representation.”
Lastly, the Observatory celebrates the fact that for the first time non-binary characters are shown in Spanish audiovisuals. Specifically four that are in the series ‘HIT’, ‘Vamos Juan’ and ‘El pueblo’ twice.
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