An argument could even be made for The Grinch to fall into this cliché – his heart was literally two sizes too small.
#Tiny tim wife tv#
This trope can actually be traced to the Middle Ages in Western Europe, where the cultural belief was that disability was a physical manifestation of moral corruption, or as Joanmarie Kalter wrote in TV Guide all the way back in 1986, “Deformity of the body is a sure sign of deformity of the soul.” This correlation between evil and disability has no shortage of examples in Western media, from Shakespeare’s Richard III to Captain Hook. They’re probably disabled because they’re evil, but it’s equally likely that they’re evil because they’re people with disabilities.Įither way, the two go hand in hand. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly which came first, the disability or the villainy. On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have people with disabilities who are the Villain.
Other examples of this trope include John Merrick from The Elephant Man and Quasimodo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
He’s so good-hearted, how can we not learn from his preternatural wisdom and shield him from all hardship? Pats on the back all around. He pulls upon our heartstrings and perpetuates the patronizing idea that people with disabilities are dependents in need of charity, lower-class citizens who serve as both a lesson to us and a way for the able-bodied to increase their own feelings of superiority (I could delve into the world of Inspiration Porn and Pity Porn, but honestly that’s its own article). Tim doesn’t have any goals in life other than living, presumably in the care of his family for the rest of his days. The Cratchit family becomes their own trope, the “Noble Sacrificer” - the caregivers who sacrifice all personal needs and desires in order to provide and care for their disabled charge, again lacking in any other depth, arc, or development. He does not exist as a character in his own right, but only to make Bob Cratchit all the more pitiable and to make Scrooge feel guilty. His father recounts Tim saying that he “hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk and blind men see.” Tiny Tim has no character arc, no development, no future beyond bringing endless joy to his family and making other people appreciate that they aren’t him. You know when your mom tried to guilt you about the starving children in Africa to get you to eat the microwaved, un-seasoned veggies she served you? She’s using those Sweet Innocents to guilt you because at least you aren’t them, right?
#Tiny tim wife how to#
They’ll never survive in the big, scary world out there all by themselves, but who cares? They have such a good-natured temperament that we can’t help but want to take care of them, and they teach us so much about ourselves and how to appreciate life, that they’re worth keeping around. Holy Innocents or Sweet InnocentsĪ staple of the Victorian Era, the Sweet Innocent is the cripple with a heart of gold who needs to be cared for and looked after, also known as the “Charity Cripple.” The emphasis of this stereotype is that every Holy Innocent is a capitol-V Victim of their circumstance. And so, in the spirit of peace on Earth and goodwill, let’s go over a brief list of common stereotypes of disability in popular media. While we are living in a time of growing positive portrayals of people with disabilities in the media – or as I like the call it, the Age of Ali Stroker – it’s more important than ever to acknowledge the way disability has been depicted in the past and how it still affects our views on disability and people with disabilities today. Tiny Tim is a prime example of a “holy innocent,” one of the many stereotypes of people with disabilities we see again and again in popular culture. He’s sweet, he’s optimistic, he’s got a little crutch – he’s a cliché. Whether they be casts of humans, cartoons, or Muppets, they all have one thing in common: Tiny Tim, everyone’s favorite cripple.
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