On the Disability Rights Movement

[greenie_breizh]

Through an NPR report that a friend recommended, I started reading chaoticidealism's journal, and I suggest you all do the same. In my own time I've focused more on the type of marginalization that non-whiteness, non-heterosexuality and femininity/femaleness bring onto people, but obviously marginalization isn't limited to these particular experiences. Disability studies is an entire big field that I've only been able to dip into briefly, but which I find fascinating because it speaks to me on the same level as the stuff that I'm more familiar with.

The experience of oppression at the hand of a dominant group has much potential for enabling people with different experiences to connect and empathize with each other (that doesn't mean equating the experience of being black with the experience of being gay, but rather it means recognizing the different forms that systemic oppression can take). I love to be reminded of that by reading thoughtful, non-essentialist reflections from someone else who's been thinking about this sort of stuff.

I particular enjoyed this post entitled "Joining the Disability Rights Movement", on the place of the neurodiversity community (which includes people with autism) within the larger disability rights movement.

As a sidenote, I love when people in the majority group get labeled, the way that Lisa is using the word 'neurotypical' to describe people who aren't part of the neurodiversity community. It feels weird, but it's an important experience to have when you're part of the dominant group and thus are most likely not used to being labeled constantly (including by people who barely know you). I think we have a lot to gain from being able to recognize the parts of us which enable us to access certain types of privilege.

EDIT: From a new post of chaoticidealism, not the one I was mentioning, but it sums up the argument wonderfully:

But sometimes, I see people who say, "I'm high-functioning. I'm not like those low-functioning people over there." And then they advocate for the rights of high-functioning people only, by whatever arbitrary standard they're using today to define "high-functioning", because at some level down deep, they're still trying to justify their existence. They feel like they've got to say, "I'm valuable because I can do X, Y, and Z", and distance themselves as much as possible from "disability". They don't realize that the solution is to challenge the disability stereotype that they're taking for granted. And they don't realize that it's valid to say, "I'm valuable," no strings attached, with disability or no disability completely irrelevant.

Comments

[heikki-cheren.livejournal.com]

Ahhh, "neurotypical"... I remember being impressed by the use of it in a book I read some time ago, "The way things look to me". A large part of the book is said from the pov of an Aspie girl.
Maybe I had already met this word before, but this is where I really noticed it.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Cool! It seems like it's a pretty common term in the neurodiversity community, which is neat. :)

[petit-rhino.livejournal.com]

I've come across "neurotypical" quite a lot in Autism/Aspie books and communities.

I like it too. It's time people got used to thinking of white/straight/able/male as something other than "neutral".

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

I didn't realize it was common, but I like it. I wish mainstream reports would acknowledge the power of community more (I feel like they made it sound like she came up with the term, rather than emphasized an involvement in the neurodiversity community.)

Exactly. I feel like having a label forces you to think about who you are, which we often don't do in relation to our positions of privilege.

[lounalune.livejournal.com]

Welcome to the club, and thanks for the link, I'll check it out. You might want to check the group blog Feminists with Disabilities. It has a daily list of recommended reading, which is great for going further. You might also like to know that the labels currently abled and TAB (temporarily able-bodied) apply to you, though I'm not too fond of the second one because, despite the fact that it's limited to the absence of physical disabilities, it's often used for currently abled people in general.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

I'm not totally unfamiliar with disability studies, so I know Feminists with Disabilities. :) I think I've recommended links of theirs before, on Glee, I really like that blog. Even if, like most blogs I've bookmarked, I don't read it as often as I want to. >.>

Thanks for mentioning those labels! I only knew of able-bodied, which might not longer be in use and is exclusive of physical ability anyway. Would you mind explaining to me why the labels emphasize ability as something temporary? Does it have to do with the fact that we will all, at some point or other, experience a disability (if only because of old age), or is there a reason I'm unfamiliar with?

[lounalune.livejournal.com]

A person is defined as disabled when their ability to do certain things differs to a certain extent from other people of their age group, so old age is not a disability, though of course elderly people face many of the same difficulties as some people with disabilities, from access problems to abuse and the problems related to institutionalization. Still, I think that the definition makes sense, because I think that temporarily abled elderly people don't experience the same kind of discrimination as disabled people, if only because they are not seen as strange, and less seen as burdens because it is thought that they did contribute to society, while it is thought that disabled people don"t, and never did (which is, of course, bullshit).

Even without old age, I would be careful with the concept of experiencing a disability "at some point or other", because one experiences a disability for a very long time, otherwise it's not a disability. The definition, at least in Germany, says that it has to be expected to last at least six months (at the time you're applying for benefits); all the people I know who self-identify as disabled will probably stay disabled for the rest of their lives. Fibro and some mental illnesses might get better or even be disappear, in the case of fibro, or be cured, in the case of some mental illnesses, but it's very unlikely (not in the case of all mental illnesses, but in the case of those of the people I know who self-identify as disabled). I know that some of us hate it when someone can "totally understand what it's like" because they broke a limb/had a bad flu/were very sad when x happened/etc. It's not. When a situation doesn't last long, the person will limit their activities in ways that a person with a disability cannot, and does not want to.

However, a person might very well become disabled through a disease or accident. Many currently abled people fear that "something like that" could happen to them, or that their children could be born "that way", and often project that fear in their behavior towards disabled people. Expressing the fact that the people could, indeed, become disabled, is for me a way of poking fun at that fear, and at their security when they happen not to be confronted with us. It kind of breaks down the barrier, also. Of course, other people might have other reasons for liking these expressions.

Another reason why I prefer "currently abled" to "temporarily able-bodied" is that a current situation may change, whereas a temporary situation will change.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the explanation - I think that's exactly why I was asking about the choice of word with "temporarily". It implies the situation will necessarily change, and the only way I could make sense of that was by relating it to old age, which is something different from disability (although there are overlaps, like you pointed out).

I definitely understand your frustration with people who experience disability "temporarily" through broken limbs, short illness, etc. It's an interesting balance between being able to empathize ('I am making effort to understand your perspective by listening to you and I occasionally relate it to similar experiences I've had') and appropriating someone's experience by always relating it to your own life ('I understand exactly what you have gone through because I went through x, y and z').

[chaoticidealism.livejournal.com]

Hey :) Thanks for linking to my blog.

I think it's very important for people in the various minority-rights movements to look at what people in other minority groups are experiencing and accomplishing. Personally, I often look back at the Civil Rights movement, during which black people finally got it across to the general public that they were equals; and the gay rights movement, which is only just getting to that point. Disability rights, especially mental illness and cognitive and developmental disabilities, is further behind even than that; but I can only assume that if we keep pushing hard enough, we'll eventually be where the gay rights movement is, and after that, where the civil-rights movement is now.

Yeah, I didn't make up "neurotypical". That's been in use in the autism community for quite a long while, and I use it because I needed a word for people with the usual brain configuration. There isn't one, other than "normal", and that comes with so many connotations that it's ridiculous. I also use "typical" sometimes, but that means anybody without disability in general, as opposed to just without neurological quirks.

I think it's definitely possible to be temporarily disabled. But because disability is defined by the society you live in, it probably doesn't "count" for the purposes of using the term "disabled" until you are no longer able to get by with only the resources society provides to a typical person--such as, if you broke your arm, your family would probably help you do things you needed two hands for; whereas if you had your arm amputated, that'd be called a disability because it's not considered something along the "normal" range of experience... Most mental illnesses, I think, do count as "disability", even the episodic ones, even the common ones, because society isn't set up to deal with mental illness at all.