hatred of disabled people doesn’t have to be blatant:
complaining about “people who walk slowly”
calling people with specific dietary restrictions needy/fakers/high-maintenance/etc.
insinuating someone isn’t responsible if they’re “living in their parents’ basement”/some variation thereof
insinuating that students with disabilities are actually “cashing in on special treatment”
praising what are basically snuff films about disabled characters
defending the casting of abled people for disabled roles
defending paying us lower wages
*swoons at the accuracy*
i used to complain about slow walkers because i was a selfish prick, now i walk with a cane and i’m on the receiving end of that shit
*raises hand* I used to complain about people who took the elevator to the second floor when I had to get to the 9th, now I’ve learned to consider it’s definitely a lot faster to run up to the 2nd floor, if someone is using the elevator to the second floor, it is probably because they need to.
And omg your slow walker story reminds me of how I used to zig zag at high speeds to get through crowds pre-disability, as well as reminds me how shitty it feels when I’m in my chair and trying to push myself towards the elevator and even though I’m closer, someone runs past me, into the elevator and closes it because I’m “too slow”. Yup, its happened a couple of times.
I will press the automatic door button for myself, and so many abled folk will rush in front of me because I’m slow that it’ll be closing as I go through. This happens at my university campus where there are literally four doors in a row, they could go through any of the three, but the fact that it is open (BY ME, FOR ME) makes that the quickest path, even though them darting through means I can’t get through any door lmao god damn
That’s another great situation to bring up! Prior to my experience with disability, I thought it seemed silly when I saw someone who appeared to be able bodied, push the automatic door button, now I know more about invisible disabilities, many people risk dislocation trying to pull those doors open, they NEED the automatic door or they need assistance. When my arm joints flare up, I can’t pull doors open either, at that point, I can barely pick up my phone or cut my own food
Also! People always talk about “manspreading,” but able-bodied people take up SO MUCH space. As far as I’ve experienced, this phenomenon isn’t limited to masculinity, it has so much to do with people subconsciously feeling that they have physical power over me. Able-bodied women may feel invaded and humiliated because people expect them to move out of the way; but as a disabled person, this has an impact on my everyday ability to get around. Able-bodied people move like fucking bulldozers.
When I see someone heading straight toward me, I can’t just step off the sidewalk to get out of the way. I’m trapped. If I’m in my wheelchair, sometimes people will literally grab my chair and move me without my consent. I have to constantly stop in the middle of the path and hope I don’t get run over. On multiple occasions I’ve been walking around with crutches and people have crashed into me, and they always keep walking without bothering to help me off the ground. When I try to get onto public transit, people never make space for me even if there’s a designated area for wheelchairs. Don’t even get me started on moving through crowdeds (hint: I can’t). Trying to join a conversation is difficult because people will stand in these little huddles and never think to scoot over, expecting me to peek into the group between their elbows.
It makes me feel like I’m completely invisible. People who limp or use mobility aids can’t move around the same way as everyone else not only because of our conditions but because we’re perceived as small, weak, and insignificant.
“not only because of our conditions but because we’re perceived as small, weak, and insignificant” ^^^^ yes. I am more disabled from doing thing by other people making actions inaccessible than I am by my own body impairing me from performing certain tasks.
My stubborn ass has had multiple injuries because I refuse to alter my path when able bodied come barreling through. They don’t give a single fuck.
My favourite is when I’m moving through a moderate crowd and people kick my walking stick from out under me. I’m just wobbling there like “Oh yeah, that’s cool. It’s not like I needed that to be upright anyway.” Or when they expect me to move over so far that my walking stick is off the kerb and is therefore useless. Seriously, sometimes I just want to be like…
… just so people realise that mobility aids are fucking important.
I have purposely stuck to using a folding aluminum cane, instead of getting something sturdier. Because I’m that much less likely to do some shovy asshole serious damage with it if I do snap one of these days. Know thyself 😒
Maybe my favorite so far was this one older woman maybe half my size who I swear brought both her hands up to push me right in the chest, so she could get on an already crowded bus before me. Almost fell over that time, it was so unexpected. There were also a bunch of people waiting who couldn’t have missed it, and nobody said a word.
Again, I may not be getting a number of needs met too well these days, but it usually seems like a decent tradeoff for not having to put up with a bunch of condescending bullshit and interference on a regular basis.
(Obviously not everybody even has that option to the same extent, and it’s not necessarily a great one even if you do. That kind of tradeoff shouldn’t be necessary for anyone’s autonomy.)
“I think we like to think [as a country] we’re making progress. But in reality, we still get turned away from buses. We still have nowhere to live.”
As one indication, the NHS didn’t even make an effort to look like they were trying with the Accessible Information Standard until over 20 years after the DDA went into effect.
“The school eventually informed her, she says, that it did not have to abide by her children’s IEPs [and] that her children’s teachers were not even trained in teaching students with disabilities.”
The physician who was hired to make the decision on my LTD benefit appeal denied me based on “facts” like this one. The twitter account he referred to as evidence that I’m lying about my illness is hardly active. Also, the majority of the posts are:
• Photos of pets • Photos from Timehop (aka from years ago) • Photos of things around my house
The few photos that “appear to be a young woman who is engaged in life activities” and “awake, smiling and alert” are FAKE. People always use social media to show the BEST moments from their lives, even if they aren’t the whole truth. I’ve had some great experiences in New York, so of course I am going to brag about them! What I don’t share on social media are the consequences of being happy for a day. I don’t share the three days I have to sleep to recover from one stand-up comedy set. I don’t share the intense pain my body is in after walking around in Central Park for a day.
They’re called invisible illnesses for a reason. People with chronic illnesses can look completely normal. They are hidden in plain sight.
This sickens me though, because like
“appear to be a young woman who is engaged in life activities” and “awake, smiling and alert”
The disability system (which is built to make it difficult and often impossible to get benefits), doctors, and yeah, a hell of a lot of people, believe that functional moments mean that disabled people have functional lives.
Maybe I only want my social media to reflect the good times I have. Maybe that’s the only form of control I have. Maybe I want to reinforce the positive. You know, the way people are always telling me to? To focus on the things I can do? Not to dwell on it. Not wallow in it or rub it in people’s faces.
But the instant I behave like the person our culture is always telling me to be, I stop being disabled.
“Be disabled, but act normal,” they say. Then they turn around and say “You act normal, you can’t be disabled.”
We are expected to fit the narrative. We are not allowed to “engage in life activities”. (What does that even MEAN? WHAT?) We are not supposed to be “awake, smiling, and alert.” I am forced to conclude that they expect disabled people to be bedridden and miserable at all times. As close to dead as possible.
This is so disgusting.
Forcing people to constantly appear “disabled enough” turns disability, our lives, into a performance for other people. It’s sick. We should be allowed to live our lives and be happy to the extent that we can do either of those things. We should be allowed to exist without harassment or gatekeeping. And the doctors that evaluate people for disability need to be ruthlessly vetted for bigotry of all kinds. (Of course they won’t be, the disability system WANTS doctors who will throw out cases at the drop of a hat.)
I cannot stress this enough: ALLIES, CALL OUT THIS BEHAVIOR WHEN YOU SEE IT.
THIS.
And the belief that you have to always look miserable/sick because of an invisible disability is pervasive.
When I was at Planned Parenthood – fucking Planned Parenthood – explaining to the doctor why I need an HBC implant, I mentioned that I have diagnosed chronic depression that seems linked to my period as that was when I’d have my absolute worst days, despite meds. The doctor blurted out in amazement, “But you’re so bright.”
Right.
Because God forbid I have an actual GOOD day, when I DON’T feel like shit. Thank you, person who’s only met me once, for thinking that I must be lying because I don’t meet your expectations for someone who’s chronically depressed. Swear to God it took effort to not just reach out and slap her.
You can totally complain to the office manager about that.
You know, if you wanted to.
I normally wouldn’t suggest this because I know firsthand how upsetting it is to have to lodge a complaint, even if it’s as simple as writing a letter, but given that disabled people are likely to be poor, and poor people rely heavily on clinics like Planned Parenthood, this kind of thing needs to be ruthlessly extinguished at those clinics. They MUST be held to a very high standard, because attitudes like this harm the people they are most likely to be dealing with.
@plannedparenthood, maybe some education is in order among your staff. This kind of thing, while probably not intended to come across as offensive, is offensive, and it is oppressive. You need to be better than that.
Some days when I don’t need extra help, I am forced to tote around a really heavy cane (which screws with my back and arms) in order to look –disabled enough– for parking (without getting disgusted looks), for disabled services at cons, etc. Sometimes I have to bring it with me to use the scooter at the grocery store, because otherwise I get whispered comments about fat people using the scooter because of their weight.
Never mind that I am fat because of my disability. Even if it mattered.
As someone that lives with more than one of the “invisible” illnesses, I sympathize and understand the double standard that exists. Sure, I smile in my FB photos and whatnot, but that’s in between the excruciating pain of ligaments and tendons that are constantly tearing (Elhers Danis Syndrome), depression that can be sometimes be overwhelming, and chronic migraines. I’ve heard “Well You look fine”. Great, that doesn’t mean I AM fine. Illnesses go beneath the surface. People need to change their mindset that in order to be sick, you need to show it
I would just like to thank everyone for your support in this difficult time. I’m preparing my final appeal and completely overwhelmed and feeling quite hopeless. This company has almost a year of back checks they are refusing to send me unless I prove that I am too sick to teach in a classroom again. I feel that I have already proven that, so what else can I do?
All of your kind words and cries of outrage about this horrible situation are really the only things holding me together right now. Wish me luck in preparing the appeal to end all appeals!
It’s sickening that these kind of things happen. Seems like we always have to prove that we’re sick or disabled and everyone else is always trying to prove that we’re not. I’m too tired to write much but I do wish you the best of luck!
“Be disabled, but act normal,” they say. Then they turn around and say “You act normal, you can’t be disabled.”
THIS JUST IN: IF YOU ARE DISABLED YOU CAN NEVER HAVE A GOOD MOMENT EVER, OR YOU DON’T COUNT AS DISABLED
If your boss or academic advisor says something like “I don’t want you to see me as an authority figure,” that’s a major red flag. It almost always means that they want to get away with breaking the rules about what powerful people are allowed to do. They’re probably not treating you as an equal. They’re probably trying to exercise more power over you than they should.
Sometimes authority figures say “I don’t want you to see me as an authority figure” because they want you to do free work for them. The logic here works like this:
They want you to do something.
It’s something that it would be wrong for an authority figure to order you to do.
If they were a peer asking for a favor, it would be ok to ask, and also ok for you to say no.
The authority figure wants you to obey them, but they don’t want to accept limits on what it’s acceptable to ask you to do.
For purposes of “what requests are ok to make”, they don’t want to be seen as an authority figure.
They also want you to do what they say. It’s not really a request, because you’re not really free to say no.
For example:
It’s usually ok to ask your friends if they would be willing to help you move in exchange for pizza. It’s never ok to ask your employees to do that.
It’s sometimes ok to ask a friend to lend you money for medical bills (depending on the relationship). It’s never ok to ask your student to lend you money for a personal emergency.
Sometimes authority figures pretend not to have power because they want to coerce someone into forms of intimacy that require consent. They know that consent isn’t really possible given the power imbalance, so they say “I don’t want you to see me as an authority figure” in hopes that you won’t notice the lines they’re crossing. Sometimes this takes the form of sexual harassment. Sometimes it’s other forms of intimacy. For instance:
Abusive emotional intimacy: Excepting you to share your feelings with them, or receive their feelings in a way that’s really only appropriate between friends or in consented-to therapy.
Coming to you for ongoing emotional support in dealing with their marital problems.
Trying to direct your trauma recovery or “help you overcome disability”.
Asking questions about your body beyond things they need to know for work/school related reasons.
Expecting you to share all your thoughts and feelings about your personal life.
Analyzing you and your life and expecting you to welcome their opinions and find them insightful.
Abusive spiritual intimacy: Presuming the right to an opinion on your spiritual life. (Eg: Trying to get you to convert to their religion, telling you that you need to pray, trying to make you into their disciple, telling you that you need to forgive in order to move on with your life.)
If someone says “I don’t want you to see me as an authority figure”, it probably means that they can’t be trusted to maintain good boundaries. (Unless they’re also saying something like “I’m not actually your boss, and you don’t have to do what I say”.) Sometimes they are intentionally trying to get away with breaking the rules. Sometimes it’s less intentional. Some people feel awkward about being powerful and don’t want to think about it. In either case, unacknowledged power is dangerous. In order to do right by people you have power over, you have to be willing to think about the power you’re have and how you’re using it.
Tl;dr If someone has power they don’t want to acknowledge, they probably can’t be trusted to use their power ethically.
I think this goes for people who work for disabled people too. A lot of caregivers seem to prefer to think of themselves as “friends“ of disabled clients. Mostly when someone says “I don’t think of myself as a caregiver, I think of myself as a friend” it’s followed by inappropriate attempts at intimacy (not necessarily sexual) and a complete lack of understanding of what the caregiver-client boundaries are.
Sometimes that includes offering to do the disabled client “special favors” that they later withhold when they get angry, or use as leverage to get something they want in return.
If caregivers think their job doesn’t include listening to disabled people, that’s not a good sign. It means they think the ordinary power balance should be “the disabled person gets no say.”
Neurodivergent people are one of the few groups who can be deprived of our most basic forms of autonomy and privacy just because of who we are. This includes confinement in institutional settings such as group homes, nursing homes and residential schools, as well as guardianship and court orders for the misleadingly-named “assisted outpatient treatment.” Most recently, the United States Food…
Urocyon's Jaunts 2.0 
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