Derpy Controversy

I don't feel conflicted.

Derpy's voice in The Last Roundup initially made me a bit uncomfortable, because it reminded me of media portrayals of developmentally disabled people, and I knew the fandom would react badly.  But the voice actor said she thought the character was male, and thus gave "him" male diction, a trick many VA's learn to broaden their market.  That explanation satisfied me, because while the association was there, it was unintentional.

I have Asperger Syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism.  I also have the "autistic accent," a strident tone to my voice that sounds geeky or goofy at times.  I also know someone whose manner of speaking is very similar to Derpy's; the first time I met her, I thought she was male.  Voices are visceral things, tied to all sorts of instincts.

I am a public speaker on autism issues.  I also work for a company that provides therapeutic services to children with autism.  I am a member of a support group by and for people on the autism spectrum.

The word "derp" is a neologism with a suspect etymology.  It has been applied variously to simple mistakes (synonymous with Homer Simpson's "D'oh!"), moments of clumsiness or forgetfulness, and states of perpetual obliviousness.  In this last application, it has been used by cruel and spiteful people to mock people with intellectual disabilities, autism, Down Syndrome, and other developmental disabilities.

However, Derpy might just be a bubble-headed blonde.  (And that opens up a whole 'nother can of worms regarding labeling and stereotypes.  I'll just let you think about that for a moment.)

There is another character whose portrayal is nearly identical to Derpy's, with two big exceptions.  His name is Snails, and he's a schoolcolt.  His accent falls somewhere between Canadian and moronic.  He's slow.  Being slow is so much a part of who he is, his "cutie mark" (rump tattoo signifying what makes a pony unique) is a snail.  His buddy Snips is a snippy little fellow, and together they reference a nursery rhyme:

Snips and snails
And puppy-dogs' tails,
That's what little boys are made of.

(I don't care how ableist I sounded in that last paragraph; I'm talkin' plain at th' moment, so if you can't take it, you best be skedaddlin'.)

He has an atypical accent, like Derpy.  His antics resulted in property damage, like Derpy.  He has moments of inattention and forgetfulness, like Derpy.  His name could be considered an insult, like Derpy.  His cutie mark can be considered an indictment of his intelligence, like Derpy.  But because he's male, and not yet an adult, nobody considers him a mockery of the developmentally disabled.

Hiding the existence of people with developmental disabilities is just as bad, just as norming and ableist and wrong, as making fun of them.  I believe Derpy should retain her voice, her name, and her quirks.

I can't count the number of times I've made mistakes due to slow motor skills, the number of times I've made a fool of myself by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, or the number of times I've been talked down at by peers and by people in authority because I didn't 'get' something immediately in the same way as a person with a full complement of human instincts would.  

A friend of mine taught me to ride a bike, at the age of twenty-two.  I'd learned how to coast and balance while standing on the right pedal.  He'd heard me talk about Asperger Syndrome and its effects on motor skills, but he'd shrugged it off as no big deal.  He finally realized how much it impacted my life when he saw my complete inability to generalize my newfound skill by coasting while standing on the LEFT pedal.

People like Derpy exist.  I am one of them.

#SaveDerpy.