A Tedious Delusion

May 1, 2007
Blog Against (dis)Ableism Day

This is the second year in which this event has occured to my knowledge and with my participation.  Last year I wrote on the accessibility of a world created for and by the able-bodied.  This is something that has not and will not change quickly and in the most near of futures.  Change and social progression take time, energy, effort, and the usual 'blood/sweat/tears' of a committed group of people.  It takes the ownership of privilege by those with it (able-bodied in thise case) and the refusal to participate in and benefit from such privilege and the system affording it.  It's something that can be brought up again and again with the same final statement: change may be coming, but we're living the reality right here, right now, and the possible future isn't making the here and now any easier to bear.

Accessibility however, is not restricted to commodities.  It's the definitive of power and privilege afforded and restricted based on ability and/or disability.  It's whether or not we get to be ignorant to what it means to be disabled, and it's whether or not we get to laugh at the jokes, talk about 'PC" as if it were a choice or an answer.  Accessibility isn't just about having a reasonable accomodation - it's about whether or not you understand what 'reasonable accomodation' means.

And yet I find myself often lately on the other side of the disability-friendly fence.  I'm multiply disabled and yet I work for a system that relies on policy.  Relying on policy means although you may be disabled, I'm not legally obliged to assist you and therefore I won't.  It means knowing full well the abuses some disabled people committ against a well-meaning system, and it mean boding the derogatory statements made in regard to those people.  I'm here to observe the abuses and poor nature in all people, and sadly disabled people are a part of that group.

Which makes me wonder what kind of community I'm a part of - what banner am I waving?  At the same time, whose to say the folks abusing the system are a representation of a community I'm a part of?  We rely so heavily on representation as marginalized people to present to a privileged group of people just how valid we are, and when our validity is questioned (as it is with my co-workers) those of us on the sidelines are implored upon to agree with and make up for that disparigy.  It's not specific to disability, but disability-rights is related heavily to it.

I'm not suggesting that we tap-dance at the foot of able-bodied systems, smile pretty and tip our hat, thank the man with the silver dollar for putting it in our cup.  But representation can't be ignored.  Not so much that we as disabled people need to do something with ourselves - but rather than those with privilege need to remember that representation does not equate reality.  We should no longer be responsible for defining our oppressors' ability to oppress us.  I've maintained time and time again that the oppressor must educate hirself, and that's just the case on a day like today.  We can talk about how it affects us as a group, but at the end of the day we do not have the power to make the real change - that's only going to come with it's given up by those holding all the power.

So on a day like today, kudos to those allies and members of the (dis)Abled community speaking out and making change.  Kudos to those crips working the system, being real, having emotions and having lives.  Kudos to those who refuse to be a living, breathing advertisement to Good Disabled Person (tm).  And hears to a future in which we aren't tokens, we aren't billboards, and we have access to a life worth living, not just a life capable of being lived.