I read Lady Chatterley’s Lover by DH Lawrence when I was 14. The small, faux-gilded copy was bought as a Christmas present the year before by a family member all too trusting of my maturity and emotional gravitas. Despite being a novel about the sexual awakening of a pretty, white and presumably Protestant member of the British aristocracy at the hands of a gamekeeper during the gloomier than usual post-Great War Midlands, the barely pubescent me swooned at the mentions of young chicks and forget-me-nots that occasioned the aggressively poetic sexual descriptions. It is a tale of love and lust overcoming social class, female agency and healthy sexuality – your average banned book.
It is no wonder, then, that the fate of Lady Chatterley’s husband is soon forgotten. Paralysed as a result of a war injury, Lord Chatterley is presented as the sexually incapable spouse who indirectly drives his wife into an affair. This trope of the sexually challenged male and sexually frustrated female has become known as Chatterley Syndrome and is indicative of the misconceptions surrounding differently abled people and sex. These misconceptions are just as pertinent today as they were in the 1920s when Lawrence wrote his novel and as they were when William Shakespeare wrote Richard III. What’s different is that the disabled people of Ireland are joining the campaign for sexual rights for people with disabilities in more fascinating and inspiring ways than ever before.
The campaign to recognize the sexual needs and wants of disabled people fit into the larger disability movement, one that to this day is steadily gaining traction. The push for inclusion of disabled people began in earnest in the 1960s when Vietnam War veterans returned to the US seeking support and raising awareness. One of the most highly publicised protests in the disability movement was the Capitol Crawl of March 12th, 1990, which saw 60 physically disabled protesters abandon their wheelchairs and mobility devices and crawl up the 83 steps to the Capitol Building, advocating the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act. It was designed to show politicians the reality of life as a disabled person, and the climb symbolic of the climb for equal rights. The student vote was enormously central to passing the act, as well as enhancing awareness for disability rights, with University of California, Berkeley acting as the hub for discussion. The world was slowly gaining a vocabulary for talking about the issues of people with disabilities, as well as a visual culture, constructed by the very people it represented. The American disability movement became the standard by which efforts across the world to improve the lives of disabled people were measured and set a new bar for how such people should be protected and empowered.
The world was slowly gaining a vocabulary for talking about the issues of people with disabilities, as well as a visual culture, constructed by the very people it represented.
At virtually the same time, Ireland passed a bill that sought to both protect and empower people with disabilities throughout the country but has since become notable only for its inefficiency. The Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act of 1993, specifically Section 5, states that any person who engages or attempts to engage in sexual intercourse or buggery with a person who is mentally impaired and is not married to the person in question will be sentenced to either 10 years or three to five years in prison for the respective acts. It also states that a male who commits or attempts to commit an act of gross indecency on another male who is mentally impaired will be sentenced for two years. The definition of mentally impaired is here provided as “suffering from a disorder of the mind, whether through mental handicap or mental illness, which is of such a nature or degree as to render a person incapable of living an independent life or of guarding against serious exploitation”.
Though written with the intention of protecting vulnerable people from being sexually exploited, the law has been perceived as actually limiting people with disabilities by its narrow understanding of what such people are capable of assenting to or wanting. There is little provision made for consent as a defence where individuals involved agree to have sex. Perhaps more damaging, however, is the fear such a law can instil in people with disabilities. Prosecution for a criminal offence isn’t one of the usual worries of those entering into romantic relationships. It is an issue that has been addressed already in a political sense, with Senator Katherine Zappone having published the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) (Amendment) Bill 2014 which sought to “the same freedom to consent to sexual activity as people without disabilities”. However, in a discussion as deeply personal as the one advocating for sexual rights for people with disabilities, the political doesn’t always cut it.
Sanctuary, a play produced by the Galway-based Blue Teapot Theatre Company, is the latest example of political issues being discussed through artistic mediums. Blue Teapot describes itself as a “Theatre Company, Performing Arts School & Outreach programme for people with intellectual disabilities at the forefront of arts & disability in Ireland” and features actors with intellectual disabilities in works that try to accurately represent the experiences of one of the most underrepresented communities in Ireland. Sanctuary does just this, telling the tale of two young people with intellectual disabilities who want to be intimate with each other. The case is that if two people wished to do this in Ireland, they wouldn’t be able to do so without being listed as sexual offenders. That is until these laws are changed.
Speaking by phone during a few minutes stolen from rehearsal time, the play’s director, Petal Pilley, explains that the idea for the groundbreaking Irish play was her own. Having worked with the group’s actors for years, particularly with one of the play’s stars Kieran Coppinger, Pilley says that she commissioned the piece to be written for Blue Teapot. Certainly, it has proven a success since it opened in 2012 – “It’s got a huge response from audiences and sold out all across the country” – and was featured in the 2013 Dublin Fringe Festival. Last year, Sanctuary became one of the topics in the RTÉ documentary Somebody to Love, which followed the theatre group through rehearsal and production and spoke at length with the actors on their motivations for being involved in such a performance.
“The best people to represent those stories are the people themselves. It gives them a chance to be the ones telling the stories”
Pilley reasserts the need to bring contentious social issues to the fore through creativity, saying: “Sanctuary is very political and very personal.” When asked what is so special about using theatre as a medium for such a contentious topic, she explains that in doing so there is a sense of agency restored to the actors who are, effectively, portraying elements of their lives on stage or those of people they know. “The best people to represent those stories are the people themselves. It gives them a chance to be the ones telling the stories.” A large part of the programme is also based on making the people actors, Pilley says, and giving them a starring role in their tales. This is hugely significant as “people don’t often think it’s possible for them. People don’t really see their ability, just their disability”.
The focus on what people with disabilities cannot do is a narrative found at the core of the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 1993. Indeed, it endeavours to protect people from situations which they can’t understand or navigate, rather than providing a framework for experiencing things they can consent to. Rethinking what people with disabilities are capable of doing depends on how they are represented, something that Sanctuary addresses directly. There is something to be said for seeing the romantic interactions of two actors with disabilities performed on a stage – aside from showing the subtle differences of such an interaction, it quickly becomes clear how relatable it is. There’s still the over-eager-and-slightly-nervous fumbling, the comic embarrassment about contraception and the pervading sense of tenderness made all the more potent by the play’s honesty. Although Blue Teapot has a slight advantage in being staffed by people from the disabled community, accurate and fair representation of differently abled people and sex in the arts is improving with each considered offering.
Members of ADAPT taking part in the Capitol Crawl up the steps of the US Capitol Building, March 12th, 1990.
It’s something that young adult fiction writer John Green got right – either by accident or by design – in his novel The Fault in Our Stars, which depicts two teenagers with disabilities arising from cancer engaging in a sexual relationship to rival that of any movie character in levels of sweetness and sensitivity. The importance of such representation cannot be understated. In the one romantic scene of the novel, we see one character playfully undressing around her catheter and fretting about whether her bra matches her underwear. Meanwhile, the other overcomes his anxiety about his girlfriend seeing where his leg was amputated, aided by the sarcastic teasing of someone living with a disability, easily recognised by those who care for them. It’s a scene marked by teenage awkwardness that neither overrides nor focuses on the fact of the characters’ disabilities.
Pilley also notes how progressive representation in the arts and media has become. When asked what she feels about the kind of shows and books written about disabled people, she says: “In contemporary literature it’s become more honest and less patronising.” Indeed, this is the argument central to the campaign for sexual rights for disabled people: restoring their agency to ask for what they want and not be told they can’t understand the desires of their bodies.
Representation has found its way even to TV, with a 2014 episode of BBC’s Call the Midwife depicting a disabled man and woman having a sexual relationship, resulting in the girl falling pregnant. The relationship is considered unnatural by those in the show, an outdated opinion these days, but the depiction of a sexual relationship was arguably the most noted element. Moreover, the couple was presented as fully understanding what the repercussions of their actions would be, contrary to the expectations of the show’s audience. The media attention paid to this single episode, even prior to its airing, speaks of how controversial the discussion surrounding people with disabilities and sexual relationships remains.
The Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 1993 was, arguably, out dated even as it was passed, and it is even more so now that those in creative mediums have enhanced representation for people with disabilities. Furthermore, the very bill itself seems to be inefficient in terms of how it actively protects the people it aims to. In the two decades since its passing, there does not seem to have been anyone charged for breaking it, not because crimes have not been attempted but rather because the language used in the bill allows for loopholes to be found.
There does not seem to have been anyone charged for breaking it, not because crimes have not been attempted but rather because the language used in the bill allows for loopholes to be found
As has been pointed out, the bill only covers sexual intercourse, buggery and gross indecency but fails to address any form of general sexual assault. This failing was brought to the fore in a case in which it was alleged a man forced a woman with an intellectual disability into performing oral sex with him. Because it wasn’t in any of the acts in the bill, the man was only charged with rape. Similarly in the trial of Laura Kelly, who has Down Syndrome, who alleged that she was sexually assaulted at a 21st birthday party, Kelly was deemed incapable of testifying and so the case was thrown out of court.
One of the most high-profile instances of sexual assault on a person with an intellectual disability was only cleared in December 2015. It was alleged that a young girl with Down Syndrome was lured away from her mother to the home of Faisal Ellahi who then raped her at his home. Ellahi was charged with rape, sexual assault and the rape of a person with an intellectual disability, but the latter charge was not acknowledged as it fell under the umbrella of rape. What is the purpose of a law that fails to actively sentence criminals for acts committed, while also negatively limiting the livelihoods of disabled people?
Pilley’s point about Sanctuary being both personal and political is a statement that speaks for the campaign worldwide. It’s the reason artists paint self-portraits of the contortions of their bodies, why more and more fashion magazines are featuring disabled models presented as the beautiful and attractive individuals they are and why writers use short stories and novels explore their own ambiguous sexual desires while straddling larger, more ethical themes. Society has come a long way from representation for disabled people being either the stoic but barren “cripple” in Lady Chatterley’s Lover or the tyrannical Richard III, his body as twisted and deformed as his morals. The disabled body has become a place of expression, creativity and political discourse, the combination of which reminds society that they are people with sexual needs like everyone else. As Kieran Coppinger notes in the trailer for Somebody to Love: “We’re all like you, we’re all people.”
