David Roche is a motivational speaker, performer and author of the new book Standing at the Back Door of Happiness: And How I Unlocked It.
Remember the movie Wonder Woman? I was genuinely enjoying the film until, near the end, the evil scientist appears. How did I know she was an evil scientist? She has a notable facial disfigurement! No dialogue, narrative or explanation was required. There is no greater hackneyed, unimaginative, shallow metaphor in cinema.
My lived experience is in direct contrast to Hollywood’s banalities. I am a performer with a facial disfigurement, born with a “vascular malformation” – a growth consisting of my own blood vessels – on the left side of my face and neck. Beginning in infancy, I’ve had numerous surgeries. Radiation therapy caused the lower part of my face to stop growing and left burn scars on my temple and eyelid.
Apparently, my face does not belong to me; it belongs in a catalogue of symbols. The face is commonly considered to be the locus of the human persona. When it is scarred, it is a reminder that the entire human experience is one of being flawed.
The very first time I gave a talk about facial difference, a lovely woman came up to me, clasped my hand and said, “David, you are so courageous. It was terrible for me in school and I am still very embarrassed and ashamed of my freckles.” I was quite angry at her conflation of freckles and “real” facial difference. But that was the beginning of understanding that my experience is universal.
I have listened to feedback after hundreds of performances and keynotes and have learned that everyone has the fear of being in some way defective, unlovable and unacceptable to society. That self-identified “defect” may be physical, a learning disability, a neurodiversity or may be simply imagined.
Fear is conveyed by Freddy Krueger and his slasher-film counterparts. Those who are marred are commonly cinematically seen as barely human, motivated only by revenge, driven insane by deformity and ready to lash out at society.
The Phantom of the Opera is forced to live, hidden and fearful, in the dark. His scars trump his talent in this limited artistic vision.
Simba’s adversary in The Lion King is named Scar. Grrr! Thus our children learn that any facial difference, however small, portends evil.
When the 2013 version of The Lone Ranger arrived in theatres, the film’s villain, Butch Cavendish, was described in marketing materials as “a ruthless outlaw whose terribly scarred face is a perfect reflection of the bottomless pit that passes for his soul.” Wow! Thanks for the explanation, Hollywood!
The sad truth is that we are so used to this type of artistic chicanery that it does not seem worth remarking upon – film critics have simply accepted it. I have not found any review of Wonder Woman that remarked on the evil disfigured scientist.
Yes, movies are a visual medium, but what message is delivered to a veteran with the side of his face blown off? What does a child with a cleft palate think about herself when the Joker points to his scarred mouth to justify monstrous behaviour?
Every time I walk out my front door, I deal with stares, comments and occasional cruelties. It is not my disfigurement that wears at my psyche. It is the fear and self-doubt of others, their very human concern about their own social acceptability, their worry about being unlovable and abandoned. That is what is projected onto me.
Yet, in truth, my face is a gift. My shadow side is on the outside, where I have been forced to deal with it. Paradoxically, I have found peace through – and with – what at first seemed to be my greatest and certainly most visible flaw. Working through fear and shame, I have come to discover that I am whole.
Seeing and accepting one’s “flawed” condition is a core spiritual challenge for all human beings, an essential step in developing emotional maturity. It is part of the work of being fully human, and it is hard work that must be done with a sense of love and compassion for the self and for others. We ignore it at our peril, for we can then remain fragmented and powerless, vulnerable to fear, addiction and the metaphor of victimization. That self-doubt and loathing, left untended, is where the predators (sexual, financial, political etc.) come to feed.
There is a more powerful, deep and real metaphor of the scarred face. It can signify growth and healing. The artistic metaphor of disfigurement can be one not of fear but of personal integration. We have an advantage over you “able-faced” in that we know to look inside to claim our beauty and worth.
Those who believe they can – or must – present a flawless image are in reality the disfigured ones. To deny one’s own insecurities and vulnerabilities by pushing them off onto the disabled is a personal failure. To pander to such fear by crude and lazy manipulation of images of disability is a failure of artistic vision. The metaphor of disfigurement is best defined by those who live it (Deadpool, no need for the mask!).
Come on, Hollywood. Don’t make me get my chainsaw.