In Finding Nemo, Nemo’s attitude toward his disability is displayed after Nemo is captured and placed in an aquarium in a dentist’s office.
The audience sees how Marlin’s insecurity and assumptions about his disability scare him.
When Nemo gets stuck in an air vent in the tank, he immediately calls for help. Many fish gather, although Gil (the leader) protests for Nemo to do it himself.
Nemo is full of fear and doubt, saying he doesn’t swim well because “I have a little fin!”
Depending on the real-life scenario, this may or may not be an applicable excuse.
Seeing a disability as an excuse not to persist until you do it yourself
It is a very personal and internally ableist way for me to describe my own thought process.
I internalized asking for help as a weakness as a child and did not want to validate those assumptions about my capabilities.
Nemo is young and understandably relies on his dad for everything. It is natural for him to want help in a scary situation.
This is especially true when you’ve been there before and was immediately rescued by an overprotective parent who tells you that you won’t be able to do it on your own.
Gil believes differently about Nemo’s capabilities because he has a scared fin and is more confident in Nemo than he is in his own abilities because Gil has been there.
The mentoring relationship is not heavily focused on, but Nemo clearly looks up to Gil and learns confidence from him.
Representation matters because the relationship Nemo has with Gil can happen in real-life between two disabled people or just between a character and a child who identifies that character as “like me.”
Confidence in one’s abilities grows over time for nearly everyone, except those with disabilities who come from overprotective homes and are told what they cannot do by themselves.
This fosters internal ableism and, in my opinion, makes it more challenging to develop a positive sense of identity as a disabled person.