#Zeph and Representing Disabilities

1 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

scenic flame
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Disclaimer: I'm not disabled nor do I speak for disabled people, what I'm about to say is but my own opinion. Also, I just reached Mistwood, so please don't spoil me.

I know this is like my third post in a row about Fruma's writing but i finally get to sit down and really think about one thing that has been bothering me throughout the story: Zeph's speech quirk. I know that he will speak less later in the story, and I know that it's because the writing team think it'd be nice to have a character with a speech impediment, because I was told that.(#1490815820404625638 message)

But my problem isn't really just the presence of the stutter, it's also how it's not acknowledged in the story at all. It spoils the reading experience, but it somehow doesn't hinder communication for the characters. So get this:

This might be a take that will have me burnt on a stake but imo, if you want to have a character with a major disability, it has to have a story presence + there is a certain balance you have to hit. You are depicting a disability, something that makes your life harder and you have to learn to live with. You can't just make the character act like they don't have it, ts is not the wind; if none of the characters and especially said disabled character doesn't even acknowledge it/are affected by it then what is even the point? You're not representing, you're just asking for diversity brownie points.

On the other hand if the disability somehow spoils the audience's experience, then it does more harm than good for said disability. You can make the argument that "oh but that's how it is in real life" but brother this is fiction we are talking about, if you make people don't like a character because of their disability hindering the audience's experience then you're just doing a bad job.

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I understand that acknowledging the stutter means potentially increasing the scope of the story and maybe accidentally make everything center around Zeph + it's a hard thing to balance in general, I just want to talk about the fustration i have with Zeph. Other than that, he is a real homie.

karmic acorn
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dont know too much about speech impediments irl but surely every second consonant doesnt need stuttering

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and they could definitely pull it alot more subtle using font changes and controlling text speed

scarlet bone
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the only time one of his dialogues didnt have the stutter is when he is snoring

copper coyote
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I mean people do have that severe stutter

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But I think some acknowledgement from other npc that he has it would make it seem more real

opaque yarrow
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to be quite honest giving a character a disability that really affects people irl who have it "because it would be cool" and then not putting effort into portraying it as a disability is
like come on

copper coyote
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Make one of the canopy people mock him

karmic acorn
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its like rex randomly saying she has adhd

scarlet bone
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i do stutter irl as well

copper coyote
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Or hell even a sovereign

thorny moss
scenic flame
thorny moss
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In a certain boss fight

copper coyote
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Ur telling me majin wouldn’t say a single thing?

scarlet bone
copper coyote
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Smth to show that people do get discriminated

acoustic lily
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Zephs disability is no one liking him and he should have died why the fuck did the cool one get an arm cut off

scenic flame
thorny moss
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I took the stutter not being acknowledged by zephs allies as friends accepting the disability and being patient

thorny moss
scenic flame
copper coyote
crimson dirge
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one of the challenges with a story is the impossibility to portray every aspect of cases like this
any individual person cannot feasibly represent an entire group

thorny moss
copper coyote
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Yeah

acoustic lily
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why did zeph not die

scenic flame
acoustic lily
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oh

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ok zeph dies gruesomely

median night
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average zeph hater

acoustic lily
copper coyote
neat compass
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Idk maybe you have some reading issues yourself saltroll It wasnt really hard to read (For me at least)

median night
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I... don't think that's what they were talking about? (at least mainly)

scenic flame
scenic flame
scarlet bone
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they can do it between 3-4 dialogue boxes

molten oak
karmic acorn
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to be honest its quite telling of the writing that the stutter has no plot relevance except gikyo insulting him that it could be interchangeable with any other (perceived) negative character aspect

vague plaza
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honestly i don't think that every time you include a character with a disability in a story that it needs to be a major part of their character or even focused on a lot. representation isn't always about focusing on how a disability affects somebody, it can just be as simple as showing that people with that disability exist in the world

scenic flame
median night
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like a character seemingly not understand at first, then understanding, stuff like that

scenic flame
karmic acorn
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could be the player character ngl as you would expect to have a dialogue option to inquire

scenic flame
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also I kinda didn't expect Gikyo of all people to be the first to bring it up but I guess I haven't encountered him yet

median night
karmic acorn
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oh yea spoilers my bad

scenic flame
neat compass
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Makes sense why hed bring it up but not the leaves who are used to it

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Maybe somewhere in the questlines there could be a dialogue about this once or twice

scenic flame
karmic acorn
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dw you got workplace harassment by yuman that they insist is good writing

scenic flame
vague plaza
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that's the other thing is that it wouldn't make sense for his friends to bring it up organically so any mention of it kind of has to be from a stranger and kind of has to come off as a bit rude if not outright insulting

scenic flame
neat compass
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Whatd you say

scenic flame
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exactly lol

scenic flame
opaque yarrow
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Yhis was copied from another server but stilp

scenic flame
uncut dawn
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mentions about disability should be subtle imo, because being straightforward like "why are you stuttering?" would feel forced and unnatural, it'd be like hey audience, look, this guy has speech impediment! you must pay attention now to this important exposition!

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i think it'd be charming to explore such stuff through sidequests though

scenic flame
opaque yarrow
novel frigate
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I would not say stuttering is a major disability. Furthermore you would probably offend people with a stutter if you were to change the story or the way Zeph is perceived because of said stutter. The most polite way to treat someone that is like this is not acknowledging it in the slightest. Things like helping them finish their words or speaking out about it are rude

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So I would say this is the perfect way of representing his speech impediment and if it were done different it would be a lesser way of representation

karmic acorn
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i would like you to google the term token character

novel frigate
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Yeah no, Zeph is not that

plucky rose
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Regardless, when it comes to zephs character, I feel like something is off but I’m not quite sure what. It could be this, but not sure.

novel frigate
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Wdym?

plucky rose
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Idk, if I knew I would share

novel frigate
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I would say the stutter fits him well, it further pushes the narrative of him being a little shy and closed off, perhaps not too sure of himself

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Many people stutter less with confidence gain, which we can see on Zeph as we progress thru the story

plucky rose
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I do have other opinions on this, but I’m not gonna share them here

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Still, like overall

opaque yarrow
scenic flame
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was gonna say something but Moth said it better

plucky rose
opaque yarrow
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Thats another good way to put it yeah, life is never the ideal and in heated situations like what we see in fruma even friends can become agitated towards each other

karmic acorn
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a lot of the problems with the writing can be attributed to the fact they tried to write fire emblem but had undertale as a major reference

median night
karmic acorn
median night
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...... Yahya

scenic flame
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this is like the 4th? time I see someone compare Fruma writing to UT/DR

karmic acorn
scenic flame
median night
karmic acorn
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yeah theres meant to be an alternate "weird" route with tasim with the aledar thing

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i dont actually know if its been implemented yet

scenic flame
plucky rose
median night
vague plaza
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that's the only place I remember seeing it at least

scenic flame
plucky rose
median night
plucky rose
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Could be 100% wrong tho

opaque yarrow
karmic acorn
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i believe the arc will be as melodramatic as it was in the beta and be a massive disappointment so dont worry

median night
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what

scenic flame
opaque yarrow
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But again out of the scope and not related to Zeph lmfao

hazy nacelle
hazy nacelle
# plucky rose Regardless, when it comes to zephs character, I feel like something is off but I...

Zeph's character is probably the weakest of the Leaves IMO
His personal arc is basically just "I'm good with magic now", in comparison to the others who have at least some emotional struggle
Like he doesn't need to really grow more confident because it's shown that he already is confident enough to jump into situations to help strangers from minute one with us in Espren, as well as with the lady in Timesca
And he's probably the least effected of the characters post Echoes unless you go out and talk to him in side dialogue
It's especially bad because most of the other characters have basically the same growth in skill so in comparison he's kind of flat

opaque yarrow
sage oasis
opaque yarrow
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true..

void aspen
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so this isn't accurate

inland chasm
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I dunno if I'm qualified to throw my hat into the ring cuz I never really thought about Zeph's stutter... it was just kinda "I guess he just talks like that" and moved on

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I think it's kinda nice that the only one who pointed it out is gikyo, a clear asshole, because it shows the ideal of that just be how they be and we don't need to make a big deal out of it. It's like how nobody talks about how Syndra's gay because that's just how she is. It's not a big deal. You can understand what Zeph is saying, so no need to draw attention to it.

dark wave
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I think this is only a problem because zeph is also a very flat character so this sticks out more

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if his stutter was a symptom of his insecurities and we watched zeph change as a person throughout the questline as he undergoes personal struggles and loses people, that would make it feel much more organic and representative

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obviously your speech impediment is always going to be there - I have a very mild speech impediment but zeph is certaintly not an unrealistic portrayal, it just feels that way because he's an npc that finds the gay love of his life off screen and nothing else happens

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fruma is ultimately fiction and does not need to be completely realistic to what a speech impediment is like irl, and I think it would feel more genuine if he grew as a character that helped him overcome his stutter at least somewhat by the end of the questline

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like if he's super nervous and insecure about his stutter at the start to the point where it's genuinely hard to read what he's saying, but meeting yuman and watching syndra die in the revolution makes him realize that there are greater things to worry about in fruma

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so then he stutters noticeably less in the text box or says more confident-sounding things because now he's growing as a character and confronting his problems

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idk I'm not a writer, I think someone more eloquent than I am would be better able to explain what I'm trying to say

novel frigate
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You simply have a stutter, and that's it

median night
novel frigate
median night
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oh he does? I haven't noticed it

novel frigate
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fairly sure yes

median night
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well if it's less but still a little I don't see the problem then

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(well the problem related to what androphonia said)

novel frigate
novel frigate
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sure we could have some character arc where idk, Rex doesn't respect him because he stutters and he later proves to her he's useful (or any other character) but there isn't really any need for something like that

edgy eagle
# hazy nacelle Zeph's character is probably the weakest of the Leaves IMO His personal arc is b...

this is a fair point (even if i disagree with the specifics)

there's a couple of things in the fruma storyline i'm not ultimately super happy with, even though as a whole i think the questline turned out very well.

for my own sanity im electing to put those things aside for now. maybe in a later update (wastelands?) we could revisit the weaker points and touch them up all at once, that could be good

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zeph's stutter is a thing that has been hard to write consistently, and needs an overall dialogue pass to fix up

dark wave
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I said this - obviously your speech impediment will not go away magically if you become more confident irl, but then that leads to the problem that this post is trying to address

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it doesn't feel like zeph's stutter meaningfully adds anything to his character or the story

median night
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okay, and it magically going away isn't the solution

nova oxide
# hazy nacelle Zeph's character is probably the weakest of the Leaves IMO His personal arc is b...

Agreed.

Ugh I hate generally how it feels like they go from trash to endgame level threats in 3 days of training. There needs to be a quest focused on training with them and a mention of time passing, not just some show and tell where they’re like “look it’s been 3 days and I have been coming to this room by myself training hard and can use my magic I didn’t know I had perfectly!”. Use the acts of terror as a reason why the festival is delayed, then let them use that as their opportunity to grow.

I dislike how overly trusting Zeph is and how he just sticks to us. Give us more time with Mora bro, his powers are so cool and his character is underdeveloped. I just found Zeph annoying because every time I wanted to be paired with someone more interesting or that we haven’t seen much, we get stuck with him.

novel frigate
opaque yarrow
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comparing it to an extreme disability doesnt make the point any less valid lol

novel frigate
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it does, one is barely a hinderance to existence the other is a massive problem

scenic flame
novel frigate
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?

neat jacinth
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hey, person with pretty bad stutter here (as bad as zephs in my childhood, and now it comes and goes). I don't really feel negatively about his inclusion and the lack of plot relevance of his stutter. You could argue pretty easily that there's some synthesis between a character seeming flighty/insecure and having a stutter, since it definitely contributes in a trope-y sort of way. But, I like that it doesn't become less prevalent as he develops. It's just... something he has, and it's not something that is fixed or healed by him becoming stronger or meeting a partner. While his development overall isn't as dramatic as the rest of the casts, you can certainly see how his disposition changes throughout the story. I could be wrong, but I feel like there was a side dialogue in Auburn where he describes feeling insecure about not really having a thing he does, in comparison to Mora/Rex/Sui. By the end of the story, he's not strong because of, or in spite of, his stutter. He's strong, and he has a stutter.
Given how short the overall story is, I don't really expect to know every character inside-and-out, and zeph is definitely one of the leaves we get less insight into. He might feel a certain kind of way about his disability, he might not. I don't really need to know, since I know how I feel about my disability- and seeing that lived experience reflected in a character is nice. It doesn't need to be incredibly verbose and the fulcrum about which his character pivots. Just my two cents.

novel frigate
scenic flame