Porygon Was Innocent: An epileptic perspective on the infamous Pokémon episode

> I have seen many fans, in the face of being told the reason for these changes, say that it doesn’t matter because they aren’t personally epileptic. This is, as you might understand, incredibly personally frustrating, and yes, very ableist. In saying this, these fans claim that disabled people do not have a right to feel safe when watching their favorite series, and that their wellbeing doesn’t matter in comparison to a few brighter shots of teenagers using their magic powers to punch each other.

As a person who's never had a seizure, and who doesn't want to find out the hard way that I'm vulnerable, nor have anyone vulnerable be harmed, I get angry at filmmakers who throw in rapid strobe light scenes.

(Secondarily, it even happens in non-action movies, so you can get the sudden strobe lighting when you're just watching a movie at night, in a dimmed living room, to wind down from the day before bed.)

It's often a nightclub scene, but most recently it was a fight scene with gratuitous strobe light.

The strobing is usually a surprise, as evidenced by the startled note to my initial curse word.

An engineer solution would be to make a software filter that operates on video playback in real time.

A lawyer solution would be to wait for someone's family to be devastated, then sue the perpetrator so hard that US companies start caring.

A social media mob solution would be to downvote punish movies that did this, then go through the credits, and downvote all the other properties in which those people are involved.

A human solution would be for people to be more considerate and responsible.

Entertainment is becoming more and more "in your face" harmful as technology evolves.

From night-clubs that move high-power lasers around blinding people, concerts with sound-walls that people have to use ear protectors to get close, events with closed-loop air-conditioning that poison (and contaminate, but the trend on that is unclear) people by not taking enough outside air, to whoever invented that safer fireworks can be used close to people. And yeah, the strobo and UV lights.

Governments aren't rushing to fix optional activities, so yeah, expect all of those to get worse.

Wait, how do closed-loop air conditioners poison anyone?

And who is using high powered lasers to blind people in clubs? And when hasn't getting too close to music required hearing protection? Even a flute is over 90 dB.

> Wait, how do closed-loop air conditioners poison anyone?

Not parent-poster, but I believe "closed loop" is referring to having no air exchange between inside and outside atmosphere of a room, as opposed to the refrigerant flow inside the air-conditioner itself.

So somebody trying to make their cooling or heating effective (or extra cheap) may inadvertently seal off too much ventilation, and then a crowd of humans becomes in danger of their own CO2.

Surely that would happen in any building with inadequate ventilation regardless of whether there's an air conditioner or not.