Looking for some advice on how to portray these sorts of things without coming off as overbearing or like I'm seeking pity for my characters. I general, to any people here who do have disabilities of any kind I would love to know about any things I should know about portraying your specific needs or perhaps things I should avoid doing. This goes double if you see it often.

The character I'm trying to portray is someone with selective mutism, but has been thrust into a situation without any of their usual support group. I imagine they might manage to open up to a few people in small burst when alone.

Advice on playing a character that does not speak in general would also help me here, but I figured I might broaden this conversation for a better dialogue and to perhaps learn something as I go.

I don't think there's anything that should be considered "off limits" in terms of how you want to portray your character(s).

But in terms of "how you manage them in roleplaying or collaborative writing?"

My only true advice, is that giving your characters disabilities is a writing challenge that should only make it harder for you. (A personal flex to show how well you can portray said character.)

So, if your character doesn't speak. (Or speaks rarely in stressful situations - that let's be honest - good roleplays will likely put them in.) Then it's up to you (your character) to effectively communicate without using words. Whether its more focus given to facial expressions or body language. Or maybe using a gimmick that shows that the character is clever and pro-active in mitigating said disability. (Knowing how to sign, carrying a journal to write in, or maybe wearing something differently to show that they're too stressed to verbally communicate?)

Anything like that, will surely make your character far more likable and sympathetic.

Because the alternative answer is to make a character that's effectively an anchor to progress. A typical one I see all the time is the "shy" character archetype, which effectively means having literally no agency for themselves. So they almost never contribute or act first in the narrative. And that's not fun for anyone else.

So, try your best to not make a disabled character 'a Mary Sue' or 'a Damsel in Distress'. You should show the struggle they're going through. (Maybe their usual workaround doesn't always work.) But your character shouldn't act like a puzzle or trap that forces the other players to adapt to them.

An example of "mutism" you'd want to avoid that happened to me; is my character was trapped and had to somehow communicate with someone else who was mute. But when my character found parchment and ink to write questions down for them "to shake their head yes or no" to. My writing partner didn't seem to realize that was an option, and never really had effective way to handle it. Because "not speaking to them" was the entire point of their character. And I found an impossibly simple and obvious workaround...

Never thought to just make the character illiterate either. But yeah. If every single interaction with the character goes down like "Bob listens to the frantic questions of his peers. All sinking into a strange quicksand that only Bob knows how to escape. So Bob looks away and says nothing. His disability is very traumatic. Woe is he." People will be more annoyed at *you the writer* over Bob's accurate portrayal of a guy you might know.

@SleepingSilence

This is all good points! I had thought about them having a journal to write with, or more accurately, there is another character in the group that carries around a notebook to draw in frequently, so they would have access to something to write with. Gestures, body language, and the like work really well, and I think that can get me a long way. I shy away from sign language because of how hard it would be to accurately articulate them, and because in my admittedly bare bones research for selective mutism, many people with this disorder mentioned how sign language was helpful, but often times they couldn't muster that either. No other character in the roleplay would reasonably know sign language either, and a big part of this character is that they never had the resources to learn proper coping mechanisms like that. They've essentially been raw dogging this.

I totally get what you mean about falling into tropes. While I was writing this character, the hardest part I found was sort of falling into that idea of 'shocking excellence'. Like, oh, they can't speak and struggle to express themself, but you turn around and they've solved the puzzle. You'd never know it, but they're actually the best saxophone player you'd ever meet. At the same time, the sort of pity party, damsel in distress, is something I absolutely want to avoid. Ultimately, I tried to make them sort of just average at most things that don't require talking, while also giving them some skills they excel in (in this case being shooting guns and painting cubist art, both of which are pretty niche for this otherwise light hearted rp).

Character would need to be expressive in other ways that I feel like most writers fail to capitalize on (properly). I am trying to think of mute characters in media that are written well and the only one that comes to mind is Christine Royce from Fallout New Vegas. Other than that I am drawing blanks personally.

That said I think this might also fall a bit into the 'stupid people can't write smart characters' thing where it's really hard to express (faithfully) something that you're not yourself, which isn't to say 'you shouldn't do it' but it probably does mean you're going to give a fairly non-faithful rendition of what it's like. Stupid people don't know how it feels to be smart, and therefore they project what they believe a smart person is like onto the character.

The same is true in reverse; smart people don't really know how dumb people operate so you see most renditions, written or otherwise, devolve into hurr big caveman strong smash. That's not faithfully how dumb people are, to put it bluntly.

I would be wary of falling into that pit when you are writing a (selectively) mute character. Maybe if possible I'd find some sort of resources on (selective) mutism from the POV of the person who is (selectively) mute. I would guesstimate that the experience of a mute person probably isn't as 'simple' as others might want to dumb it down to - and a lot more goes into it that we probably aren't anticipating because we don't live life like that.

Christine was my first go to as well. I've seen a few mute characters in smaller and more indie things. Jason is often times portrayed as non verbal, and in No Evil, they have the mute character use sign language while someone translates/interpretes. I do agree that this is not something my limited writing skills are ready to tackle, but in a way that makes this all the more rewarding. It's a way to really push my limits and try to step outside of my comfort zone.

With selective mutism I've found a shocking amount of people online willing to share their story to a camera, since they aren't in public or have managed to work on it enough to be able to speak. Maybe I should look into more things from people who can't speak at all though, since that gives a better idea of the way they might have to engage with people when they are mute. In general, I suppose more research can never hurt and I've really only touched the surface here.

One of the things I love about RPs is the research that goes into making a game or character;

1. Go find blogs or vlogs and other qualitative materials about people with the said disability.

2. Don’t listen to Yoda. There is a try. You might fail, but you can’t grow without failure. Successful people don’t let failure stop them. If you want success in writing a disabled person, you have to practice even when it looks like scribbles.

3. If you offend someone, take responsibility and apologize. Learn from your mistake and keep up your studies for accuracy in the topic as you process, create, and play your character.

It's kind of unfortunate that everything has become so political, to the point where people are afraid to RP certain types of people. There's nothing wrong with reaching out, but opinions will range from "There are many different ways you can play this" to "There is only one way to play this, and that is if you have this IRL." It's fine to experiment and play around with an idea even if it's not completely true to life. Everyone has different experiences anyway. Some of my favorite characters do not act anything like real people, but the absurd, surreal like shenanigans they get into are always a joy to experience.

Regardless of what you RP, I believe the best practice when handling something like a disability is to not make it the core of the character. Obviously a story about a character overcoming their disability will focus on the disability itself, but they should have other quirks and interests that are independent of that. As an example, your selectively mute character could be interested in becoming a programmer, or maybe they want to become a stage performer. Maybe their employer activates their tics, or being in crowded spaces like a stage or being nested in hundreds of noisy cubicles. These interests hold up without being selectively mute, but the disability makes them more interesting to pursue. It should be possible to read posts about your character and not be constantly reminded of their disability. It's just part of the character, don't give it any more or less attention unless the situation calls for it. I don't see how that could offend most people.

Additionally, what you don't write is just as important as what you do. If you're going to fuss over the exact sensations people go through with their disabilities, I'd invite you to write their episodes from "outside" the character. I find it rewarding when another player can pick up on hints and correctly or incorrectly has their character react to mine.

I do not have selective mutism, but after skimming some articles it seems like it's tied to anxiety. So you can imagine it being a sort of panic attack that occurs in certain situations, like a selective social anxiety disorder.

Alternatively, and this only works in certain RPs, make your character's disability something fictional. Who can say what sort of quirks your disability has that is similar to but not quite like selective mutism?

With any luck, you won't encounter any crybullies and will have a fantastic time RPing.

Everyone else gave sound advice. Just be well researched and make sure your group is the sort that would be fine with a character like that, or if it would be problematic with other player's personalities.

Oooh, writing from like an 'outside ' perspective actually sounds really fun for this! It's actually getting me kind of excited to write it, just thinking about it, haha! I doubt I will offend anyone, this rp is in a Discord server with like 2 or 3 other people who all seemed very endeared to the character. I think because of the more 'slice of life' and realistic tone we are sort of going for, albeit with some shenanigans involved, I wanted to make this character feel a little real, and so the research and asking around was more for that.

Thank you all, the advice here has been really solid. More research is never going to hurt, so I will probably be doing that up until the roleplay actually starts. I appreciate everyone coming together to share their opinions! Some of the other places I asked gave some advice that really felt like a bad idea, haha.

@Birdboy

Your challenge wouls be you'd need to line up altentive forms of expression and communication beyond words. That's harder to convey in posts, doable but harder.

And its usually triggered by stress, pressure or such things, so you'd have to narrow down what the trigger / release is for the mutism ahead of time.

Also narrow down, the how, when and the mechanics of the character ahead of time, all the little things first. Alot of prior prep and planning..

Looking for some advice on how to portray these sorts of things without coming off as overbearing or like I'm seeking pity for my characters. I general, to any people here who do have disabilities of any kind I would love to know about any things I should know about portraying your specific needs or perhaps things I should avoid doing. This goes double if you see it often.

The character I'm trying to portray is someone with selective mutism, but has been thrust into a situation without any of their usual support group. I imagine they might manage to open up to a few people in small burst when alone.

Advice on playing a character that does not speak in general would also help me here, but I figured I might broaden this conversation for a better dialogue and to perhaps learn something as I go.

If you're not seeking pity for your characters, don't. Selective mutism would be an aspect of them but they would have many, many, many, many more sides and capabilities to them than this.

When you're writing someone with a disability, are you making it all that they are and the only interesting thing about them? I have a disability irl and it is absolutely by far the least interesting thing about me. That said, it's part of me, and it's not something to be "cured" - same would go for characters with disability unless you're writing from this angle as part of acceptance of the self/character journey.

I've written a character who was blind, a mute character, a character with chronic pain and amputation. While the disability played a part of the character and their perspectives of the world around them, they had so much more than that to offer the roleplay.

Agree with what others have said about using expression to your advantage in regards to the actual writing. Otherwise, it's fictional - it's your world and you can do what you want.

I work in publishing and attended a recent round table with various authors about this topic, most of what was brought up there has been already covered but theres one additional point I believe is worth raising.

When you start to break it down its very interesting how much of the language we use when characters express or act, even internally, assumes the presence of certain senses in any and all situations. To compellingly write someone who has been missing a sense for an extended period of time it often requires deconstructing even the way we would write something as simple as paying attention to someone in a conversation often relies on the use of words which are sight or hearing related.

If a character can easily recall having that sense it might make sense that their internal monologue still words things the same way but particularly deaf authors (at least those at the talk I attended) have said its very easy to tell when an author is deaf themselves, or has at least done some amount of research, based on how much unwitting sensory terms or metaphors show up in writing. It can certainly be an interesting and thought provoking exercise when done well and with good intention.

Oh wow that's a super interesting point and again, a small thing that I can imagine goes a really long way. I'm also glad that this helps me segway more into the other side of this conversation I was hoping to go into: disabilities.

So far we've stayed on point with mutism but I was hoping to get a more expensive conversation going about disabilities and similar situations in general.

I'm interested in writing some short stories just trying to play around with this though. Not saying "their ears perked up" or "listening" or "hearing" for someone who might be deaf. Similarly it goes the same for someone blind.