We’ve all seen the photos and videos. The disabled student on the front page of the newspaper, beaming after his classmates invited him onto the court to score the game-winning basket. The motivational memes with a marathon runner with prosthetic legs captioned ‘The only disability is a bad attitude.’ They go viral on social media and people share them without thinking twice. Because they feel good. Because they’re inspiring.
But inspiring to whom?
As a disabled woman, it’s not me.
Years ago, Australian comedian and disability activist Stella Young coined the term inspiration porn, which means objectifying disabled people for the emotional gratification of non-disabled people. To make them think: however bad my life is, it could be worse.
On the surface, these moments look like kindness. Something worth celebrating. But what they actually do is reduce a disabled person’s entire existence, story, and life, to a prop. It’s ableism at its finest, and it shows up in many different ways.
It objectifies us. It infantilizes us. It assumes our lives are so difficult that just getting through the day is worth celebrating. And it completely sidesteps the real conversation: the inaccessible buildings, the lack of accommodations, the systems that were never designed with us in mind. Smiling at a flight of stairs has never turned it into a ramp. And a viral video has never changed that, either.
It’s not inspiration. It’s a distraction.
When Stella was in her teens, someone wanted to nominate her for an achievement award. Her parents turned it down, saying she hadn’t actually achieved anything. She was just a kid, going to school, getting good grades, and watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Being disabled wasn’t an achievement. It was just her life.
And that’s exactly the point. As Stella put it: we are not here to inspire you. We are just living our lives.
I’ve been on the receiving end of inspiration porn many times. I have multiple chronic illnesses, have had more than 50 surgeries, and rely on a feeding tube to stay alive. So many times, someone has said some version of: “You’re so strong. You inspire me.”
I know those words come from a good place. I really do. But what they actually communicate is this: Your life is so difficult that simply existing is an achievement worth celebrating. It sets the bar for disabled people on the floor and then applauds us for stepping over it.
It flattens us, reducing a complex human being to a single narrative: the brave, resilient disabled person. It leaves no room for anything else. And when you’ve been flattened into an inspiration, it becomes very hard for the people around you to see you as a whole person. As a friend. As a colleague. As someone they might want to date.
Like Stella’s parents, I want to be recognized for something I worked for. If I’m going to inspire anyone, let it be for this: listening to my gut, building a company with no technical background, and creating something the world genuinely needs. That’s what Dateability is to me. The company I co-founded with my sister Alexa. The only dating app built for the disabled and chronically ill communities. Not proof that a disabled person can succeed despite their circumstances, but proof that we have just as much to offer as anyone else. Including in love.
Because inspiration porn doesn’t just live in viral photos and motivational memes. It shows up in dating, too. And when it does, it’s just as dehumanizing.
When non-disabled people encounter disabled people on dating apps, inspiration porn shapes how they see us before we’ve said a single word. We’re either an object of pity, someone who needs to be taken care of, or, on the other end, someone whose resilience and strength makes them uniquely inspiring to be around.
The truth is, disabled people don’t want to be your inspiration. We want to be your equal. We want to go on dates where our disability is context, not character. Where we get to be funny and complicated and occasionally annoying, just like everyone else.
Inspiration porn isn’t inevitable. It’s a habit and like all habits, it can be unlearned.
It starts with paying attention to what we share and why. Before you repost that viral video of a disabled person doing something that wouldn’t make headlines if a non-disabled person did it, ask yourself: who is this for? What does sharing this actually do for the person in it?
It continues with listening. The disability community has been saying for years what they need: not inspiration, but access. Not admiration, but equity. Not viral moments, but the ordinary dignity of being seen as a full human being.
And it shows up in the spaces we build. Dateability exists because we believe disabled people deserve a place to connect on their own terms: not as someone’s feel-good story, but as people looking for the same things everyone else is: companionship, laughter, and connection.
We are not here to inspire you. But we are here. All of us. And it’s time to change the narrative.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Olga Serjantu On Unsplash
