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mild rant rq:
I fucking HATE how bsd portrays disabilities and physical/mental illnesses. By that I mean they don't. It is ONLY brought up when it's relevant to the plot, and never any other time. All the characters are capable of functioning the same way as any able bodied individual.
Note: I may be missing a few things from mangas or light novels, but this is because I can't afford to purchase them. However, I think my point still stands here, as I've heard multiple people who have read the manga and light novels agree with me on this.
Akutagawa's chronic lung disease is hardly mentioned. The most he does that shows something might be wrong is when he starts coughing for like a minute. He's seen fighting, running, splitting a metal bar in half perfectly fine, without any hindrance due to having a lung condition. The only time this is mentioned is when it's important to the plot.
Jouno is blind. Now, I can understand that he has heightened senses due to blindness, but it gets to a point where it doesn't even seem like he's blind. The only thing that could indicate that he's unable to see is because his eyes are closed almost all the time. Sure, I understand that the hunting dogs are supposed to be an elite group of extremely strong individuals, but it gets to a point where he might as well just…Not be blind. He shows no struggle with blindness, he functions pretty much the same way everyone else does. It would have been interesting if maybe he could show strength in other ways, could show how he can function differently than an able bodied person, even if it's not in a way that could show him as weak or vulnerable, but no. There's nothing like that.
Fyodor's anemia pisses me off mostly because I'm anemic. He's never seen showing literally any symptoms of anemia, the only reason I know he's anemic is because Chuuya called him an “anemic bastard” in one scene. There is no indication that he's not able bodied. When I was told by someone “oh he's anemic” after I saw the first episode he was shown in, I thought “oh cool, it would be nice to see a character have the same issues as me” just for him to not do that. As much as I love Fyodor, I was thoroughly disappointed with that.
I'll admit, Atsushi's PTSD was actually portrayed pretty well. But this is likely just because he's the main character, so he gets more focus.
Ranpo is heavily autism coded, but he isn't shown to struggle due to it much except when him and Fukuzawa met. I don't really think I get much of a say, as I'm not autistic (I think) but my brother is, and he said he found Ranpo really relatable, and he mentioned that he didn't like how media either portrays an autistic character as either all positive and good, or completely negative, and nothing in between, so.
Outside of being suicidal, Dazai doesn't really show any physical signs of having depression. This could be him masking, however, as someone who has struggled with depression for as long as I remember, it's a lot more than just wanting to die. He does show that he's indifferent to good or bad, and also that he doesn't really have a reason to live, but I'm talking physically. Outside of his views on life, he doesn't seem to struggle with mental illness too much, it doesn't cause him to struggle with day to day life.
Anyways, yeah. I don't like how the portrayal, or lack of, disabled or physically/mentally ill characters actually being disabled or physically/mentally ill.
So I'm making a bunch of one oneshots of them ACTUALLY struggling.