Real Life / Handicapped Badass

Handicapped Badasses in Real Life.

Warfare

Tutankhamun was believed to have been a sickly and frail youth for some time. However, new research seems to indicate that he was a bona fide Warrior Prince — despite suffering from multiple congenital defects and developing bone necrosis in his left foot at some point.
At least according to legend, there's Genseric, fifth-century king of the Vandals. Apparently, a fall he took in his youth left him lame in one leg, leaving him unable to ride a horse. Undeterred, he simply focused the Vandals' military conquests on maritime affairs. End result: the Vandal Kingdom ruling Carthage.
The rediscovery of Richard III's skeleton revealed that he had severe scoliosis and uneven shoulders, so bad that he would have qualified to participate in the 2012 London Paralympics (now imagine how Sir Richard Gloucester-Plantagenet would have done in men's fencing, wrestling, and riding...), yet was known as one of England's foremost warriors and was the last English king to die in battle. According to the autopsy on him, he went down swinging with multiple head wounds.
May have been the case with Viking raider Ivar the Boneless. His nickname has been interpreted in multiple ways—some believe he was lame in the legs, others say he had no legs, and there's even a theory that he had brittle bone disease. If any of these was the case, they didn't stop him from earning a reputation as one of the most brutal chieftains of his era of the early Middle Ages, and he was renowned as both a leader and a berserker. Yes, despite having been carried around he still put the fear of the Norse into the enemy army on the battlefield.
Jan Žižka, Czech national hero and Hussite rebel, lost an eye early in his career. He later lost sight in his other eye and was forced to campaign blind. He's one of the few military leaders in history to have never lost a battle, and his battlewagons were the precursors to the modern concept of the tank.
Timur the Lame, better known to the west as Tamerlane, was an Uzbek Khan of Turkish and Mongol descent, and a bonafide megalomaniac ("As there is only one God in Heaven, so there should be only one ruler on Earth."). His armies overran the Chagatai Khanate and the Il-Khanate, making him the master of Central Asia, and in the process, earning himself a reputation as a real-life Evil Overlord (seventeen million people are calculated to have died in his wars). He managed to humble the Ottoman Empire by capturing its Sultan Bayezid and at the time of his death he was planning an invasion of China, and one of his great-grandsons would go on to found the Mughal dynasty in India. As his nickname would indicate, he was lame in the legs, a fact which didn't stop him from becoming the most feared man in Asia.
Enrico Dandolo, the blind Venetian Doge who sacked the Byzantine capital of Constantinople and burned it to the ground, is also one.
Julián Romero, one of the greatest Spanish soldiers of the 16th century, lost an eye, an arm, a leg and an eardrum during his tenure in the war of Flanders. Fortunately for him, his exploits got him promoted to field commander, where he didn't need to fight at the frontlines. His reputation of being ridiculously badass and hard to kill at once spread the belief that he was actually an immortal sorcerer.
Louis-Auguste, duke of Maine and bastard son of Louis XIV of France, had a leg about five inches shorter than the other. In spite of that, he was named general of the galleys, lieutenant general, great master of artillery, and knight of the Order of the Holy Spirit.
Jay J. Armes A-list private investigator, and possible escapee from a Rated M for Manly story by a gifted but overcaffeinated 12-year-old. Having lost his hands in a childhood accident with a railroad torpedo^note, young Julian Armas found himself having to relearn how to live life with simple hook-pincer prosthetics. Like any good comic book character escaped into reality, he of course grew up to do a stint in Hollywood, become an extremely successful top-notch private investigator, pilot helicopters, and develop numerous Swiss-Army Appendage attachments for his limbs. And yes, this includes more than one gun hand. He was launched into brief international fame in the 1970s when he landed his first high-profile case, tracking down Marlon Brando's son — who turned out to have been sent to Mexico with a band of hippies by his mother in a staged kidnapping and hidden in a cave, nearly resulting in the boy's death from pneumonia. In the years since, Armes has developed his one-man business into a large investigation firm, investigated international crimes, and generally been an omnidisciplinary badass. Armes was inducted into the Investigator's Hall Of Fame in 1998, was one of the National Association Of Investigative Specialists' Top Ten Investigators of the century for the 1900s, and may have provided inspiration for a somewhat well-known cartoon character by the name of Inspector Gadget.
At least four famous admirals count as this:
- The great Chinese navigator Zheng He was a eunuch — and yet he had more figurative balls than most people with literal balls could ever hope to have. Also counts as a Celibate Hero.
- Several centuries later in England, Horatio Nelson lost an arm and was blind in one eye — and outmaneuvered Napoléon Bonaparte twice, netting himself a Dying Moment of Awesome during the last time.
- Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku was short due to childhood malnutrition, and during the Battle of Tsushima he was permanently scarred and lost two fingers- one finger more and he'd have been medically disqualified from the navy. He earned a medal for staying at his post despite his injuries and eventually rose to command the entire Imperial Japanese Navy, where he managed to put the United States, Great Britain, and the Dutch on the back foot for six months- exactly as he told his superiors he could do while trying to get it through to them that they were setting themselves up for a Hopeless War. Unfortunately for Japan, Yamamoto was an Ignored Expert.
- Blas de Lezo. Lost an eye, an arm, and a leg in three different battles. During the War of Jenkins' Ear he led the Spanish garrison in Cartagena de Indias to a brutal Curb-Stomp Battle of the invading British. While being outnumbered ten-to-one. Considered a national hero in Colombia and Spain to this day.
Baldwin IV of Jerusalem managed to kick ass even though he was a leper.
Brevet Colonel Anthony Durnford, commanding officer of the British troops at Isandlwana, had lost the use of his left arm in an earlier skirmish, suffering permanent nerve damage to the underarm and hand. While his abilities as a commander have been questioned many times, his bravery and ability as an individual combatants has not been. When he realized the battle was lost, Durnford ordered his native soldiers to escape, while he and a mixed group of regulars and colonial volunteers held up one of the Zulu army's "horns", buying his surviving men time to flee.
Captain Okita Souji of The Shinsengumi was the most fearsome Master Swordsman serving under the Tokugawa Shogunate, even as he was coughing bloody chunks of his lungs out and dying from tuberculosis.
Aaron Burr had a heat stroke severe enough to knock him out for several days in 1778, sustaining permanent brain damage as a result; this didn't stop him from rejoining the revolutionary war effort as soon as he had recovered enough to stand, or from inventing political campaigns 22 years later. Or his various exploits in trying not to be assassinated between 1805 and 1812.
George Orwell constantly suffered from frequent chest infections which became TB. Didn't stop him from not only being one of the most powerful writers in the English language but from serving in the British Imperial Police and fighting in the Spanish Civil War, where he survived a shot in the neck.
Douglas Bader. A World War II airman who lost both his legs and went back into service as soon as he was physically capable. He was captured in 1941, and the Nazis had to take his prosthetics away to stop him from repeatedly trying to escape. Even that didn't stop him from trying.
Alexey Maresyev, another WW2 fighter pilot. Shot down beyond enemy lines in 1942, got both feet injured, spent 18 days walking and crawling through winter forest with hardly any food.^note Partisans found him and called a rescue airplane. His legs were amputated below the knees because of gangrene, but he learned to use prosthetics and came back to service in the summer of 1943, just in time for a major air battle at Kursk. Retired in 1946. The story was the basis of a novel, a film, and an opera.
Captain Carlos Dardano of TACA Flight 110 who landed his crippled 737 on a levee in New Orleans despite having lost an eye to crossfire in his native El Salvador several years previously.
Galvarino was a Mapuche warrior from Chile that had both his hands cut off by the Spanish during the Arauco War to make an example of him. This backfired, as his mutilation only incensed his fury and that of his fellow tribesmen, so he attached a pair of blades to his stumps and personally led his army to get revenge, killing 30 soldiers in the battle and cutting the enemy's second-in-command to ribbons. Of course, this being real life, his army was beaten by the Spanish using guns and Galvarino was re-captured, though this time the Spanish were impressed by his ferocity and offered leniency. He told them that if they let him live, he'd rip them apart with his teeth and they opted to throw him to the dogs.
Burial 223, found at the King Archeological Site in northwestern Georgia, is a skeleton ceremonially buried with the symbols of the highest-ranking Coosa military honor and valor; hematite, bifacial blades, points, a shell pin, etc. Later examination and DNA testing showed that not only was Burial 223 only 25 years old and biologically female but had a severe hip deformity. The Coosa culture placed heavy emphasis on gender distinction, especially in burials, and no other women at the site have been found to be buried with any such symbols. Yet 223 was able to achieve the greatest military honors of her people in spite of her age, gender, and especially her disability.
American Embassy clerk Virginia Hall had her hopes for a diplomatic career crushed when she lost her left leg below the knee in a hunting accident. But when World War II broke out, she found her true calling in espionage, working behind the German lines to deliver all kinds of devastating intelligence to the Allies. The Nazis ultimately called "the limping lady" the most dangerous Allied spy and put her on the most wanted list, but she escaped (hiking over the Pyrenees Mountains into Spain in the dead of winter)^note then returned to France and spent the rest of the war training resistance forces in guerrilla warfare. After the war ended, she was the only civilian woman to be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, presented personally by OSS head William Donovan ^note, as well as the Croix de Guerre and an MBE.
Condottiero and Duke of Urbino, Federico da Montefeltro, was blinded in one eye early in his career as a knight when he took a lance to the face in a jousting match. This did not stop him from becoming late Medieval Italy's foremost mercenary commander, building a reputation for being pretty much unbeatable in warfare and utterly incorruptible.

Politics

Franklin D. Roosevelt is considered by many to be one of the greatest American Presidents and an incredible leader who was able to maneuver the country and keep up their morale during the dark years of The Great Depression and World War II. He had a paralytic disease that crippled the use of his legs. He was diagnosed with Polio but as time has gone on, it seems to have more likely been Guillain-Barré Syndrome. Did that stop him? Of course not! To reassure the nation, he kept up appearances that he was either not sick or constantly recovering. He refused to use his wheelchair in public (enough that only two photos of him in it exist), gave all his speeches standing, used leg braces and had one of his sons with him at all times to lean on when he needed to walk, and had the first car modified with hand controls before automatic transmissions existed. FDR must have inherited a ton of his cousin's badassery.
Theodore Roosevelt himself was essentially sick for his entire life, not to mention becoming blind in one eye (through a boxing match) and getting shot in the chest. Those didn't stop him... at all.
- He suffered from asthma. Seeing this as a challenge, he proceeded to beat his asthma to death, ate the asthma's raw flesh, and ran 100 miles off the energy it gave him.
- One of his sons, Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr, landed with the troops at Normandy, on Utah Beach. While in his 50s and suffering from arthritis. He used his cane as a baton to direct his troops during the fighting. It may have been too much for him, for he died of a heart attack a month later.
Another presidential example: John F. Kennedy suffered from Addison's disease and chronic problems with his lower back. He also commanded patrol torpedo boats in the Pacific Theater, once towing a badly-injured crewman through the water to a nearby island after his PT-109 was rammed and sunk. By gripping a strap from the injured man's life jacket with his teeth. And after the sinking had exacerbated his own back problem. And then got back in the water and hauled the man along again, to get to a second island where rescue awaited.
Harriet Tubman, the most famous conductor of the Underground Railroad, suffered from narcolepsy as the result of a severe head injury sustained when she was young. She would have fits, or just fall asleep and be unable to be woken up. The narcoleptic fits would sometimes strike in the middle of an escape. And there was nothing that the rest of the party could do except move to a presumably-safe location and hope that Tubman would wake up soon. Clearly, she never let this stop her.
Pope John Paul II had horrible health late in life; he suffered from Parkinson's disease, terrible osteoarthrosis (that led to a broken femur and dislocated shoulder, requiring him to walk with a cane), poor hearing, and on top of it, survived the attack of a would-be assassin in 1981 that required a colostomy (which he insisted they reverse with a second surgery, as he didn't want to "live more dead than alive"). Despite it all, he was more active than most other popes in history. He was one of the most travelled world leaders in history, beatified more people and canonized more saints than all popes in the past five centuries combined, and at the time of his death, he had named most of the College of Cardinals, consecrated or co-consecrated a large number of the world's bishops, and ordained many priests. He is also credited by many for being instrumental to the fall of Communism, as he was a Polish priest. Poland's Communist government was atheist but it didn't stop the population from practicing Catholicism as they have done for centuries. With a Polish Pope preaching freedom the Poles became more vocal in their demands.
US Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL). Lost both of her legs in a brutal helicopter crash and very nearly died during the Iraq War, and despite this was back to flying with the Illinois National Guard within the year. Later became a Representative and eventually a Senator, and one of the most prominent and effective legislators in Congress.

Sports

The Paralympic Games are basically one big celebration of this trope.
- By that same token, so are the Special Olympics.
Anthony Robles, the college wrestling champ born with one leg. Get this, he was so good that some fans claimed his disability is an ADVANTAGE against his able-bodied opponents, which may make his story an example of Disability Superpower.
Garrett Holeve, aspiring mixed-martial-arts fighter with Down syndrome. He wants to beat the crap out of Chris Brown "because he beats women." It's not clear due to his disability that he'll ever get a UFC contract like he wants, but he's badass either way.
Jean Jacques Machado was born with amniotic band syndrome, which left him with only the thumb and the little finger on his left hand. Didn't prevent him from starting Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, winning major titles in championships in Brazil from 1982 through 1992, including major medals in the ADCC — with a silver medal in the "absolute" (i.e. openweight) category, and receiving a rare Coral Belt in 2011. He was one of the pioneers in BJJ on the United States, arriving in 1992 after his student Chuck Norris helped him to set his academy.
Jean Jacques Machado, meet Shaquem Griffin. He was born with the same condition, in his case causing him to be born with abnormally soft tissue in his left hand and fingers, which caused him such constant, unbearable pain that at the age of 4, he nearly tried to cut his own hand off with a kitchen knife; the next day, his mother, a nurse, called in some favors, and Shaquem went into surgery to have his hand amputated. His lack of a hand didn't keep him from high school sports. Or from a very successful college football career at UCF, even being named the defensive player of the year in the American Athletic Conference in 2016. Then at the 2018 NFL Draft Combine, he performed 20 repetitions of 225 pounds (102 kg) in the bench press with a prosthetic left hand, and recorded the fastest 40-yard dash time ever at the combine for a linebacker. Griffin was picked by the Seattle Seahawks, made the roster, and played with the team until moving to the Miami Dolphins after the 2020 season, though he only made the practice squad for 2021 and retired from play in 2022. He remains in the game as part of the NFL Legends Community, a league-sponsored initiative through which former players offer mentoring to past and present NFL players.
MLB pitcher Jim Abbott famously pitched a decade long career at the top level while having been born without a right hand. The highlight of his career was a no-hitter (an incredibly rare feat of pitching dominance that several of the greatest MLB pitchers never did once in their career) he threw for the New York Yankees against a Cleveland team that fielded multiple Hall of Fame-caliber hitters. He also once finished top-3 in American League Cy Young Award voting (the award given to the best pitcher in each league of MLB), and also registered two hits in 21 career at-bats despite both only having one hand to grip the bat 'and' being a pitcher, a position already notorious for players who are bad at getting hits.
By definition, any disabled professional wrestler. Examples include Zack Gowen (whose left leg was amputated when he was a child), Gregory Iron (cerebral palsy), Leva Bates (partially deaf), and Crazzy Steve (legally blind).
Michelle Akers was one of the centerpieces of the US women's national soccer team in the 1990s, with perhaps her greatest accolade coming when Pelé named her as one of only two women^note on his list of the top 125 living players. She did this despite numerous concussions, more than a dozen knee surgeries, a broken cheekbone... and, to top it all off, chronic fatigue syndrome.^note
High schooler Nico Calabria loves playing soccer and climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro when he was 13, not letting minor details like being born with one leg stop him.
Another sporting example: Arvydas Sabonis, a Hall of Fame basketball center who had a long and immensely successful career with a couple of European clubs, the Portland Trail Blazers, and the USSR and Lithuania national teams, qualified late in his career. When the Blazers were preparing to sign him in 1995, the team doctor told the general manager that Sabonis' leg X-rays would qualify him for a handicapped parking space. He wound up playing seven seasons in Portland... and when he returned to Lithuania for one last playing season, he was MVP of the EuroLeague.
Pete Conrad got himself a full-ride scholarship to Princeton, became a carrier pilot, instructor, and test pilot in the US Navy, and finally was certified as an astronaut, eventually becoming the third man to walk on the Moon...and all that while dyslexic.
Monster truck owner-driver Ranger Joe Cypher of Reno, Nevada is a former army ranger that went on to own and drive the Airborne Ranger monster truck. He is paraplegic that was paralyzed in an automotive accident in his younger days. He is said to have played wheelchair basketball at one point before becoming the owner and driver of Airborne Ranger. It is the world's first and so far, only hand-controlled monster truck. He has competed in Monster Jam where he had a special feature on him, during the Anaheim event in 2000. He was even invited to the inaugural Las Vegas world finals where he crashed in round 1 of racing and didn't make it to freestyle. Though, he mostly competes in smaller leagues, he is still a well-known inspiration and good role model to people with disabilities. And his contributions to the sport will always be honored.
Missouri resident and USA Today sportswriter Eddie Timanus is a handicapped smartass. He made history on Jeopardy! not only as the first blind contestant on the show but the first blind contestant to become a five-time undefeated champion. (At the time, five times was the limit.) There were a few changes made to accommodate Timanus: the first was that he received a card with the category names printed in Braille before each round, and a Braille keyboard to type out his name on the podium's computer and his response and wager for Final Jeopardy. There were also no video-based clues during his appearances. Later, he appeared in the Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions and then the Jeopardy! Battle of the Decades tournament, and was also a lifeline on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?. In one appearance on Jeopardy, host Alex Trebek asked him about how he was mentioned in Trivial Pursuit, and he half-jokingly replied, "Well, the problem is, nobody wants to play Trivial Pursuit with me anymore."
Canada has three such famous people in the 1980s who performed marathons that were thought impossible with their handicaps.
- Terry Fox attempted to run across the country on an artificial leg to raise funds for cancer research. Although he had to stop about midway due to his cancer spreading to his lungs, Fox became one of the great Canadian heroes.
- Another amputee, Steve Fonyo, decided to repeat the feat and eventually was hailed as a hero himself after he passed Fox's stopping point and made it all the way to the Pacific coast.
- Finally, there is Rick Hansen, a personal friend of Fox and a paraplegic athlete who went for an around-the-world marathon tour in his wheelchair and was an international hero by the time he returned to Canada. His story inspired the song "Man in Motion", which was used as the theme song of the film St. Elmo's Fire. Yes, the line "All I need is a pair of wheels" is talking about a wheelchair, not a car.
Bethany Hamilton lost her left arm in a shark attack at age 13 while surfing, went back to surfing with one arm, published a book about her experiences, which was then turned into a movie. Later, after marrying Adam Dirks, they both competed in the 25th season of The Amazing Race where she was shown to be just as capable as her fellow contestants with two arms. They finished 3rd in the race, not due to any physical limitation, but due to a very difficult Final Exam Finale Roadblock.
Another surfing example would be Derek Rabelo, who appeared in season 11 of Bondi Rescue. Completely blind but you wouldn't think so to see him riding the waves.
At the second race of the 1987 Formula One World Championship, at Imola, Nelson Piquet had a massive crash that left him suffering from headaches, blurred vision, and insomnia for the rest of the season. He refused to tell his team or the F1 medics how bad his symptoms were, rightly fearing that they'd forbid him to race. He won the championship that year by 12 points.
IndyCar driver Will Power revealed in his autobiography that he's color blind—which doesn't seem that big a disability until you remember he's a race car driver, where color plays a major role (lights, flags, etc.) Despite that, he's an accomplished driver with two championships and several wins (including the 2018 Indianapolis 500) under his belt.
- Speaking of IndyCar, there's also Charlie Kimball and Conor Daly, both drivers racing while diabetic. They and their respective teams take extra precautions to make sure the drivers don't go into insulin shock, but that they're racing at all is badass (especially considering a driver was kicked out of the Indy 500 in 1933 because he was diabetic). Charlie has one win to his name while Conor has won a couple minor championships (and competed in season 30 of The Amazing Race!).
Former ChampCar and Formula 1 driver Alessandro "Alex" Zanardi lost both of his legs in 2001 as the result of a terrifying accident at the EuroSpeedway Lausitz. Despite such a life-changing injury, he returned to compete in motorsports, winning multiple races in the World Touring Car Championship for BMW before switching to para-cycling, winning four gold medals at the Paralympics in 2012 and 2016. Then, just to prove he had not unlearned anything from his previous profession, he proceeded to return to motorsport, winning the final race of the 2016 Italian GT Championship.
Another motorsports badass would be Frédéric Sausset, a quadruple amputee^note who competed in a modified LMP 2 at the 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans.
In April 2017, just a few weeks shy of his 18th birthday, rookie racing driver Billy Monger suffered a horrific accident and had to have both legs amputated. Not only was he back racing just 2 1/2 months later, but in December 2017 the FIA actually changed their rules specifically to allow Monger to move up to Formula 3!^note In May 2019, Monger won his first race.
Polish Formula One driver Robert Kubica was considered a potential future Champion, and had a preliminary deal in place to sign for Ferrari in 2012... until he figured in a rally crash in February 2011, leaving his right arm noticeably atrophied and with little (if any) movement. Undeterred Kubica continued his forays in motorsport, winning the inaugural WRC-2 title in 2013; then joining the Williams F1 Team for the 2019 (which many people thought would be impossible,) and even managing to score a single point^Explanation, despite being outqualified all throughout by his younger teammate; then race in DTM in 2020, alongside a test driver role for the Alfa Romeo F1 team; then participating in endurance racing, alongside a couple more F1 races^Note in 2021, then becoming part of the team who won the World Endurance Championship under the LMP2 category in 2023. Considering how bad his accident was back then, his return run to motorsport as a whole definitely qualifies him for the trope.
There are weightlifters who can bench press plenty without the use of leg drive. To put things into perspective, maximum power is gained from pushing into the ground to borrow power from it, and these individuals can bench press respectable amounts without needing said leg drive.
Games Done Quick: One of the speedrunners, Halfcoordinated, has a disease that weakens part of his body. As a result, he has to play one-handed. It doesn't stop him from being a VERY good speedrunner.
Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson was diagnosed with Bell's palsy in 2017, leaving the left-hand side of his face visibly paralysed. Didn't stop him from being crowned World's Strongest Man in 2018. While defending his title the following year, he tore a muscle in his left foot early in his heat, leaving him in agony and doped up on painkillers. He kept going, won the heat, won the Deadlift Hold event in the final, and finished third overall, just one point behind 2nd-placed Mateusz Kieliszkowski. It takes a lot to stop The Mountain.
In the 2021 World's Strongest Man competition, veteran Terry Hollands suffered a Career-Ending Injury during the opening event, completely tearing his left bicep. Hollands, however, was determined to go out swinging, not just for his own sake, but to help out his friend and training partner Adam Bishop, who was in the same heat. So not only did Hollands keep going in that opening event, he finished a close second, then competed in the deadlift, where he managed six reps of a 770lb dumbbell with one working arm, finishing third. Then he called it a day.

Other

Some historians claim that Aesop suffered from two birth defects, and was a dwarf and a hunchback. Still, his name is pretty much synonymous with "fables", and despite his disabilities, he was never known to have complained.
Ludwig van Beethoven wrote his Eighth Symphony when his hearing ability was greatly reduced, and the Ninth Symphony after becoming completely deaf.
Bass-baritone Thomas Quasthoff was born with severe birth defects due to thalidomide exposure: he has phocomelia and stands under 4.5 feet tall; he's also a world-renowned classical singer.
Stephen Hawking suffered from a severe, horribly progressed case of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. He was almost completely paralyzed, and could only use his cheek muscles to control the movements of his wheelchair and voice synthesizer. Despite this, he was as upbeat and optimistic as it gets, and was also one of the brightest and most intelligent scientists on the planet. What's most impressive is how long he lived with his condition before he ultimately succumbed to it; when he was first diagnosed with ALS in 1963 the doctors predicted he would only live for two and a half more years. He lived with ALS for 55 years after his initial diagnosis and died at age 76 on March 14, 2018, meaning he managed to live out an average lifespan for a male living in a developed country against all odds. He became the archetype for a Genius Cripple and might be a better example than even any fictional character.
The manga author Shigeru Mizuki lost his dominant arm in World War II, but eventually learned to draw with his other hand. He not only lived to age 93 but popularized Youkai manga (which even profoundly influenced Osamu Tezuka) and wrote at least two stories that criticized Imperial Japan's war crimes.
Paul Johnson, a house music DJ and producer from Chicago, Illinois, notable for his 1999 hit "Get Get Down", is a double amputee who lost a leg in 2003, then his second one in 2010, yet still manages to DJ with some ability, despite this. He's not an activist for disability but manages to do well in spite of it.
Longtime Christian Rock artist Phil Keaggy has long been one of the most respected guitarists in modern times in either the Christian or mainstream world^note; something all the more impressive considering Keaggy lost half of his right middle finger in a water pump accident as a small boy.
Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin. A chemist diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis in her hands and feet at the age of 24, with her condition worsening over time. She used x-ray crystallography to figure out exact structures of various compounds, such as Vitamin B12 (netting her a Nobel prize in Chemistry, the third ever woman to achieve this), penicillin, and insulin, the last of which took 35 years - because the methods for tackling more complex molecules like insulin literally did not exist until she invented them. The techniques she created are still used to this day, and her work with insulin paved the way for mass production.
Best Halloween costume ever, won by this guy, a Paralympian who is an amputee.
Dave "The One-Armed Bandit" Levey of Season 6's Hell's Kitchen won the competition even after breaking his wrist in the 3rd episode. Watch him handle multiple stations on his own. Kevin from the same season also twisted his ankle and made second place.
- From the same show, Ariel from Season 15 after injuring her leg went on to win the season, and Anthony from Season 11 who would injure one of his legs during a challenge, making 7th.
MasterChef contestant Christine Ha was legally blind and won Season 3.
The second season of The Voice UK was won by Andrea Begley, who was almost totally blind. After her audition, she actually had to ask the judges whether any of them had turned round, and was quite delighted to learn that all four had done so.
Shayne Carter from Forged in Fire is color-blind, which is a major handicap in a profession in which judging the color of your metal during a quench can make or break (literally) a blade. Luckily, he's a good enough smith to heat-treat and quench accurately just based off of instinct, and he ended up winning his episode.
This guy helping to stop a robbery.
Among Cracked's 5 People Whose Major Disabilities Only Made Them Stronger are a legless mountain climber, one-handed martial arts champion, and a blind pilot.
A non-human example would be this adult male Asian Elephant, This individual has disproportionate dwarfism, resulting in having a normal sized head and body, but short stubby legs. If it were any other wild animal, this condition would be a death sentence. Despite that, not only is it managing to survive in the wild, it actually takes on other male elephants for mating rights and wins. It uses its unusual size to its advantage since it can just charge ahead into rivals, while the rivals have to awkwardly stoop to do the same. Since females are generally smaller than males, he also has no problems with mating.
Richard Turner, a card mechanic (the term he prefers to "magician", though that's pretty much what he is) and fifth-degree black belt in Wado-Kai karate, all after losing much of his eyesight to scarlet fever at age 9. He remains extremely physically active into his 60s and claims to have never missed a workout with his sensei. Here he is thoroughly swindling Penn and Teller.
Neil Young counts as this among musicians. He's been assaulted with sickness and pain throughout his life — childhood polio and post-polio syndrome, diabetes type 1, a serious back injury, epilepsy following a beating from a cop, possible radiation sickness, migraine headaches, scoliosis, osteoporosis, and a life-threatening brain aneurysm — which was repaired through neuroradiology, then he almost bled to death from the incision. Never stops him. He turned 78 in November 2023 and is still actively recording, performing, and speaking up to save the earth.
John Gotti was deaf in one ear (which played a role in his downfall as when meeting with his underlings they would play the radio and Gotti would demand they turn it down, making it easier for bugs to pick up conversation). He also walked with a limp after his foot was crushed by a cement mixer and needed a toe amputated.
Mike Begum, known as BrolyLegs, was a member of the Fighting Game Community who was born with a rare muscular development disorder that caused the muscles in his legs and hands to not develop normally. Since he could not use a controller with his hands, he instead used a controller with his mouth. On top of that, his condition made it impossible for him to use two of the six buttons needed to play his favorite game, Street Fighter. In spite of his unconventional method of playing, he was a well-known competitive Street Fighter player, especially as the character Chun-Li — all of whose moves can be performed with the buttons he could use. On one occasion, he won 2–0 against the comparatively able-bodied (and infinitely more of a Sore Loser) LowTierGod. BrolyLegs stayed active in the fighting game community until his passing at age 35 in 2024.
Miguel de Cervantes continued his military career — as a marine, even — for a few years after his left arm was crippled by a bullet. Later, when he took up a literary profession, he was understandably irritated by rivals who made jokes about his crippled arm, pointing out that he gained his disability fighting for his nation and his religion.
Christopher Reeve, best known for starring in Superman: The Movie and its sequels, broke his neck in a horse riding accident in 1995. He became an advocate for stem cell research and even continued acting.
Wild West legend Doc Holliday was diagnosed with tuberculosis at the age of 21 and continued to suffer from it through his adult life. No effective treatment existed at the time, and the doctor's prognosis was that he had mere months left to live. At the age of 30, he took part in the gunfight at O.K. Corral alongside the Earp family. He finally succumbed to the illness six years later.
Cinematographer Jordan Cronenweth was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1978 but found steady work until his death in 1996, working on classics like Blade Runner, for which he won a BAFTA.
Brodie Lockard developed Shanghai on the PLATO system while recuperating from a trampoline accident at Stanford University that left him paralyzed from the neck down, typing by holding a stick in his mouth to press the keys on the keyboard. Ported to home computers, the game popularized Mahjong solitaire.
In a dark example of this trope, a teenager without arms tries to rob a jewelry store in Brazil.

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Handicapped Badass / Real Life

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