Compared to other content showcasing competition highlights before this year’s Games began, these videos have significantly more views, likes and shares.

According to the Associated Press, International Paralympic Committee (IPC) spokesman Craig Spence revealed in an interview earlier this year that British Paralympian Richard Fox manages the group’s TikTok account, and most of the criticism the group received came from individuals outside the community of people with disabilities.

“If you speak to Paralympians, they’ve got a great sense of humour. They’re not wrapped up in cotton wool and protected from society,” he said, adding that they decided to use an “edgy” approach. 

Read more: Paralympics 2024: Yip Pin Xiu wins gold in S2 100m and S2 50m backstroke event

“Frankly, these videos didn’t hurt me much,” wrote Michael Chan, the founder of Companion HK, a platform against mental health stigma, in a written response. A brain cancer during his early childhood caused deafness in his right ear and poor vision in his right eye.

“In the competition of the able-bodied, the media often uses their behaviour in the competition to make videos and memes for making jokes. If we thought the account is deliberately ridiculing people because the person in the video is a person with a disability, it might affect people to discuss this topic casually,” he added.

On the other hand, Chan, a Gen.T Leader of Tomorrow for 2022, understands the audience’s adverse or surprised reaction, acknowledging the need and expectation for boundaries when using an official account for humour. 

Ryan Gersava, the founder of Virtualahan, an online platform that provides virtual skills training to people with disabilities, reflects on the complexity of representing this community after watching these videos. “This approach of inclusion is blurring the lines between a person with a disability, aka the Olympics, and a person without a disability, aka Paralympics. It’s trying to blur the lines between the realities of these two people,” he says.

Gersava, a Gen.T Leader of Tomorrow 2021, points out that media outlets, advertisers and marketers often portray the disability community in an inspiring light, likely to avoid potential criticism. This reflects the relatively conservative mindset of the older generation, while younger generations, like Gen Z, are more open to a more creative and varied portrayal. “Why not allow us the space in the disability community to make fun of ourselves sometimes as well? Is that too bad for us to ask?” he says. 

The neurodiverse social entrepreneur suggests that brands engage people with disabilities in co-creating content. “For someone with a disability to be involved in co-creation, you can accurately represent their essence while promoting your brand. You don’t have to compromise between highlighting your brand’s quality and portraying the disability community effectively,” he says.

The IPC released a series of videos to promote this year’s Games on YouTube. One of them begins with an animation showing Paralympians playing sports in a dream-like Paris without stress and later depicts them returning to the reality of intense competition. It challenges the stereotype that the Games is “an idyllic event where the athletes are carefree and just happy to be there.”

Read more: Swimmer Jasmine Ng wins a bronze medal: Hong Kong athletes’ highlights at the 2024 Paris Olympics and Paralympics

The committee also partnered with TikTok to attract a larger global audience to watch the game by providing more short-form and live coverage of the Games this year. A record of 225 media platforms are also covering the event.

The viewership of the Paralympics lagged behind that of the Olympics in 2020. The US television network NBC reported that its primetime coverage of the Olympics averaged 15.5 million viewers per night, while 14 million people tuned into the Paralympics.

The Olympics TikTok and Instagram accounts also have over 10 million followers, vastly higher than the Paralympics accounts.

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