Trouble Is Everywhere

LET'S PLAY A FUN GAME

Fri, 01 Jun 2012 13:58:33 GMT

So this is a thing that happened.

Sign Language Ban Imposed on N.J. Girl

School officials have threatened a hearing-impaired girl with suspension if she uses sign language to talk to her friends on the school bus, the girl's parents say.

Danica Lesko and her parents say sign language is the only way to for the 12-year-old to communicate, especially while riding to school on a noisy bus.

But officials at Stonybrook School — which is not a school for the hearing-impaired — and district officials in Branchburg, N.J., apparently believe signing is a safety hazard. They have sent a letter to the Lesko family ordering Danica to stop using sign language on the school bus or risk a three-day suspension.

...

"The Board is committed to providing reasonable accommodations to all students with disabilities, and is satisfied that there has been no violation of that policy in this case," officials said in the statement. "The Board is also committed to assuring the safety of all students who travel on District buses, and will continue to take appropriate steps to accomplish that goal."

LET'S PLAY A FUN GAME.

How do you think Sign Language is a SAFETY HAZARD?

View Poll: I Am Anna's Sarcasm Voice

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The AODA needs you to support it

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 22:49:09 GMT

As most people who know me already know, Don is a full-time wheelchair user. In addition, he is a regular user of our medical system - he needs to have regular tests to ensure that his heart is still healthy, for example, and he needs to have various levels of things checked regularly in order to ensure that his thyroid replacement drug is working properly and his blood pressure isn't wonky. These are the sorts of tests he needs to keep him alive.

Since moving to Ontario, Don has been referred to two different medical clinics for evaluation of these. He was referred to both of these clinics by doctors who were aware he was a wheelchair user since they physically saw Don in his wheelchair when referring him, and also because they were referring him for things that need to be checked because of his Marfan's Syndrome, which is why he uses said wheelchair.

Don has been to two different medical clinics in Toronto, exactly zero of which have been wheelchair accessible.

A few months ago he needed to get into one clinic for a blood test and urine test. Most people can complete them both in the clinic. Don had to take things home and pee in a cup here because the washroom was completely unsuitable for people with mobility issues or people using wheelchairs, which meant Don had to make two trips - trips that take far more out of him than they would out of a non-disabled person.

The clinic today, which was ultrasound for his aorta, was not only clumsy in dealing with people who have unusual heart conditions (like, say, someone with Marfan's Syndrome), but their washroom was inaccessible to people with mobility-related issues or using wheelchairs, as well as having narrow hallways and doors that made navigating very difficult for someone in an electric chair.

The common response of people who are afraid of the Access for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) and similar legislation in the US is that if there's a need, things will be taken care of. Everyone "knows" that people want to be accessible they just lack the knowledge or ability or something that will make this happen. You just need to ask nicely and it will be provided.

Medical clinics serve people with disabilities on a regular basis and they can't even get it together on accessibility. That's why we need these sorts of laws, because frankly it's too long to wait.

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Thu, 26 Jan 2012 01:17:00 GMT

I'm sorry this image is so small. It's an image from the new Google video that explains their plans for how to change your privacy policies! it's not subtitled, despite Google's recent commitment to totally being accessible to people with disabilities. Thus I turned on YouTube's AutoCaption.

The video says:
With fewer words, simpler explanations, and less legal gloop to wade through.

The captions provide:
With fewer words simpler explanations and leslie copeland tweeter.

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The Montreal Metro System will be fully wheelchair accessible in 2058

Sun, 23 Oct 2011 07:45:30 GMT

I know a lot of people skip titles of posts. Please read the title of this one.

I had an argument with someone at school on Thursday and it's still sitting with me. I think this is because we'd had an earlier argument on a similar subject on Tuesday. As you can probably imagine, it was about disability, or more specifically, about how disabled people have existed and advocated for themselves since long before the mainstream folks started paying attention, and well before I ever started paying attention.

The argument on Thursday was about my colleague's disagreement with the abstract for a master's research paper on disability discrimination in the Montreal Metro System. I'm not from Montreal, so the place this system has in Montreal was a bit much for me to grasp. Apparently it's a big thing, a progress thing. A thing about how Montreal has been advancing into the future. When it was opened in 1966, it was opened to everyone.

Everyone, of course, except people who can't walk up and down stairs.

The presentation and follow-up short video talked explicitly about ableist constructions of public spaces. She called it out very bluntly: this is discriminatory. This has always been discriminatory.

The part that others tend not to get, the part my colleague at the university didn't get, is that the people at the time knew this.

This is one of the things about disability-based discrimination that drives me up the wall. The theory that many people express is that no one in the past could possibly have been expected to think about disability as a category because this whole disability rights thing didn't start until [the speaker learned of it, whatever time period that is] and obviously not a moment before. (See: many feminist responses to disability-based critiques online that ignore even something as simple as the presence of disability activists at the Beijing conference in 1995. I've been told again and again and again that disability only became a "thing" to consider in the past few years and it's mostly "oversensitive" types at that. Arg.)

So, let me lay some facts on you:

The late 1960s and early 1970s, when the Metro was being built to be inaccessible to many people with physical disabilities, was also the time when people with disabilities were getting out of unwanted institutional settings. It's called "The Great Exit," and I'm pretty sure you haven't learned of it. The Great Exit didn't happen spontaneously, and it wasn't an austerity measure. People with disabilities campaigned for it. They fought for it. Just like they fought for employment and education in the 1800s and early 1900s in Nova Scotia.

Once they left institutions, people with disabilities fought for employment rights and to live free from discrimination. To some extent, they won. The Quebec Human Rights Act included disability as a protected class, passed in 1975.

Except for transit users. Explicitly, transit was not included, you could not sue for a human rights violation for not being allowed on a bus if you were disabled.

In 1988, ADAPT (a US-based protest group) came to Montreal to highlight how inaccessible the transit system was. This PDF has some of their information [in English] about the protest. It was all over the news, and people were arrested for crashing through barricades with their wheelchairs.

And still, the Metro remained inaccessible. In fact, it wasn't until 2004 - Sixteen Years Later - that the law saying that you couldn't sue for inaccessible transit was struck down, and it wasn't until 2006 that a Metro station was made wheelchair accessible. And even then, it was a debate, and one that apparently was won because it "looked bad" that the Metro was still inaccessible. Not that it was bad, that it looked bad.

The Metro in Montreal is currently being retrofitted to be accessible. The current rate is less than one transit station becoming accessible per year. Again, The Montreal Metro System will be fully wheelchair accessible in 2058.

My colleague argued that it is wrong ("presentist," the worst thing to accuse an historian of being within the discipline) to chide people in the past for not thinking of people with disabilities when they made the Metro. "They didn't know better then. We know better now."

This is a lie. They knew. Disability-based historians and disability rights activists know how far back the fight for equal access goes. It didn't spring, fully formed from the head of Hephaestus, in 1995 in Beijing. It didn't suddenly arrive the day you first learned of it. It's always been here. In ignoring that, in assuming that his ignorance is in fact the truth, my colleague (and many others like him) are betraying their own attitudes about disability, about history, and about what matters.

Don will be 78 years old when he can physically get into every Metro station in Montreal. The lifespan of people with Don's disability is less than that.

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Ontario strikes again

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 14:38:19 GMT

We have started the process of attempting to get Don health care.

Logically, this should be simple: Canadian moves from one province to another, Canadian receives health care using Canadian's health care card from previous province until residency requirements are met for the new province's health care to kick in.

In practice, things are very different. Don's spent two days on the phone with various people about getting a doctor in the city. Ha ha, ha ha ha.

First call was to the HealthCareConnect people to find a GP that was taking patients. They will not help him because in order to use HealthCareConnect one needs to have a valid Ontario Health Care Card. Don cannot get a valid Ontario Health Care Card until October. We think. It might be longer.

HealthCareConnect refers Don to a website. The website is woefully out of date. He finally finds a GP that is taking patients and that doctor's office says "Well, awesome, but you have to register with HealthCareConnect before we can take you."

So, Don calls back HealthCareConnect and someone there feels sorry for him and kicks him up a level. That person reveals that she can give him phone numbers for some "community care centers" that are required to take him even if he doesn't have an Ontario health care card, but they're basically like walk-in clinics. There is no regular GP that you'll see (necessary for someone like Don who has a wide variety of health issues, is using a wheelchair full time, and needs careful prescription management) and they don't prescribe the medications he uses to manage pain.

Okay then. I call up our MPP's office. At first I am told that, no no, you can immediately just go into a Service Ontario office and get your health care sorted. The three month waiting period is only for newcomers to Canada. This is fascinating to me as it contradicts absolutely everything else I have ever read and would make Ontario unique amongst Canadian provinces. I ask him to confirm and he spends some time looking at websites and declares that things are "a bit unclear." He tells me that he'll call his contact at the Ministry of Health and get back to me.

So, here we are. Don has enough medication to cover him for a month. With some of his medication, if he can't get a new scrip, he will die. (Slowly, granted, so probably something could be sorted before he slipped into a coma, but who the fuck knows.) Now it's no longer a matter of "medication is expensive", it's a matter of "can we even get it?"

But gosh, if only cripples were more positive thinkers, everything would be easier.

Oh, and by the way: If Don were moving into a long-term care center, then he'd automatically get an Ontario health care card.

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Apparently people with disabilities belong in the uncanny valley, not on earth

Wed, 01 Jun 2011 20:16:07 GMT

Hey Everyone! Let's play a fun game! Let's play "How much hatred towards people with disabilities can one location support?" A fun and exciting game that leads to wondering how many people sitting in the same room as you wish you would die.

(Exclamation Marks are Sarcasm Indicators.)

This comes from that awesome place to hang out, TV Tropes! Specifically, people with disabilities are being discussed in the "Uncanny Valley" section of "Troper Tales".

(Here is TV Tropes' definition of the Uncanny Valley:

Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori stated in 1970 that the more human a robot acted or looked, the more endearing it would be to a human being. For example, most lovable Robot Buddies look humanoid, but keep quirky and artistically mechanical affectations.

However, at some point, the likeness would seem too strong, and it would just come across as a very strange human being. At this point, the acceptance drops suddenly, changing to a powerful negative reaction.

When shown as a graph (like the one to the right), the acceptance on the Y axis and increasing X approaching human normal, there is a slow rise, then a sudden drop, then a sudden peak as "human normal" is reached. Masahiro Mori referred to this as the "uncanny valley"

)

So, just to make that clear to start with: People with disabilities are being discussed in a section where other people are discussing cars that talk and computer animation. Because they aren't people, see. They're almost people, but not quite. And it's creepy.

This troper has a cousin with severe genetic defects. On the surface, she looks like an ordinary girl of her age. But spend even a minute in her presence, and the defects become apparent. Not only is she unable to stand upright without support and has seizures, but she is mentally retarded to the point that this troper isn't sure if she's truly sentient. She's like an animal in a human body - and yet she is kin.

This troper has a great-aunt who's mentally retarded to the point that she has the mind of a four-year-old... despite being in her late 50's. Every time his family goes to visit her, he can't help but be really, really creeped out.
Two Words: Tear Jerker.

That's why I can't substitute teach in EC, (what used to be called "Special Ed") classes. My empathetic side feels sorry for them, but every other instinct is calling for retreat. The exaggerated cheerfulness of the other teachers in there doesn't help. They pretty much have to do that to register on the kids.

You too? I missed my last possible year to go visit a school in LA filled with the kids who are just too mentally impaired to go to a normal high school. He couldn't help but pity them when they'd come to perform for Christmas, and looking at a friend's field trip form, rule #1 of the trip was "YOU ARE NOT TO PITY THEM". How can I not, the poor souls...

This troper has been stuck in Special Ed, and HATES the overly-cheerful crap. I'm disabled, not stupid!

Aye, this Troper gets very creeped out around mentally disabled people. Not to mention birth defects and other things. *shudders*

I once saw a special on TLC about a girl who doesn't age. She was technically 16 years at the time of shooting, but she had the body of a baby. Here is an article about her. I find it almost too bizarre to comprehend.

This troper goes to a high school with a Special Ed class in it and has to walk by the classroom on her way to lunch as the disabled kids are getting ready to eat too. This troper has to keep her head down at the floor to keep herself from running away. It's not that I'm truly afraid of them (I really do sympathize for disabled people) it's just it frightens me to know that they weren't supposed to be that way, they could have been normal, yet somehow they weren't born right. It frightens me even more if they're mentally retarded as I don't know what to do in situations like that without feeling uncomfortable and scared.

This troper's nephews were burned in a car fire when they were young; their burn scars ranging from just a few here and there to one who bears an uncanny (pun not intended) resemblance to Jacqueline Saburido (both were trapped in their seats when their respective fires happened). I don't feel it's effects since I've seen them at least once a month (and have gotten used to it), but I only noticed this trope applies to him when I overheard a small girl who couldn't be older than eight at a high school football game say "mommy, that kid looks weird" or something to that effect.

Jesus Christ there's a shitload of ableism in this thread.

There's some ableism, yes, but there's also recognition that it's not socially acceptable to treat mentally impaired individuals differently - and yet many people have an irrational part of their brain repeatedly smashing the panic button every time they are around these individuals. This whole trope is about the fact that there is, for many people, an intuitive response of DO NOT WANT to things that seem human-but-not-right, and the fact that it is the exact same response to an extremely lifelike robot or puppet as to a child with, say, down syndrome makes it very clear that this is not society creating a stigma, but a built-in human reaction. (Not to mention, it is depressing to meet all the kids who are functionally retarded and will never be able to live on their own just because Mommy couldn't stay off the crack and booze while she was pregnant.) I learned from substitute teaching that while I handle just fine the high-functioning "special ed." kids who just have learning disorders, I need to stay away from the "sheltered environment" assignments, because I can't effectively hide my body language from the other students in the classroom when a kid who hits my own Uncanny Valley effect approaches me, and I don't want to encourage treating those students as different.

This teenage troper HAD TO LIFEGUARD, for the mentally and physically retarded. While I admit I was not effected by the uncanny valley here, do you know how pathetic it was to watch some of them swim? Half of them were in wheelchairs, and had to scoot around in the wading pool on their butts. Two in particular were really sad cases, both of them in wheelchairs. One was a boy and he was probably around my age, his hands and toes were curled into his body and it didn't seem like he had much ability to control them, although he wasn't flailing or anything, they stuck him in a neck brace (it looked like a life vest, but it didn't go on his torso, he was LITERALLY floating around by his head and neck dragged around by an aid). The other case was similar, although instead of being all curled up, she was flailing around and at times wailing or seeming to be very angry at being in the pool, she did not float around by her neck, and despite her nervous flailing I noticed she had some control over what she did. She seemed to be trying really hard to get away from her aid... Worst of all? I still see some of these kids around the high school, as it was the school pool.

...

This troper Has always had issues with pictures of birth defects. Not so much disfigurements from an accident or something, just anything congenital or genetic. There's just something about humans being born looking inhuman that makes me feel like nature isn't to be trusted, and the world is a really squicky place on a primordial level. I saw a commercial for some Discovery Channel show about The Elephant Man when I was around eight, and... Well, needless to say, I didn't watch Discovery for a while after, and that commercial was literal Accidental Nightmare Fuel for me off and on for years after. Which probably means this is more like Nightmare Valley for me.

This just goes on and on and on. OMG! People with disabilities are inhuman! And if anyone points out how you're describing people in the way you describe dogs, then OMG! You are being mean.

I don't even know how to respond to this shit because what is the point? People actually argue that being repulsed by bodies like Don's, with his caved-in chest and his long spindly fingers and his sunk-in eyes is a normal human reaction to birth defects. They don't think it has anything to do with ableism, with the messages society sends about people with disabilities, about how rarely people actually interact with actual disabled people so they never get used to us, they think it's all perfectly acceptable because people with disabilities are not quite human.

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Accessibility & Voting

Mon, 02 May 2011 17:56:28 GMT

We voted! It was awesome! I love voting.

Our polling station was mostly good for accessibility issues. The door was heavy and didn't have a button, so points down for that, and the signs were difficult to see coming up to them because of the other signs in front.

But the space was wheelchair accessible, no one blinked or made faces or reacted to Don being there, they treated him like he was an adult rather than baby talking to him. (Note: baby talk in Canada is not the same thing as simple language. It's the high sing-song voice and slightly-above-babbling that parents use to their toddlers.) There was enough space for him to get his chair (which is a monster of a chair) behind the polling both for him to vote privately, and they told him openly and happily that if there were any problems they'd be happy to move things around for him. They were proactive and eager to be helpful. It was awesome.

My disappointments were the door, the sign, and that they didn't offer anyone an accessibility form to fill out. If you are looking for one, you can get an accessibility feedback form at the Elections Canada website.

But. All that aside, the voting has been accomplished, and now comes the waiting.

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Links!

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 07:52:25 GMT

Yesterday did not go according to plan, so I've decided not to discuss today's plan in the hopes that this means the imp of the perverse will not hear of it and ruin everything.

marshtide wrote about how archaeologists determine the sex of a skeleton.

zingerella wrote about etiquette rules for visiting Government House, which include reminders not to molest the hat rack.

sid asked about turns of phrase in English that have survived well past the things they refer to, such as "lock stock & barrel".

licht has written Waffle Dos & Don'ts, which a) amuses me far more than perhaps is necessary (Waffles may bring about world peace!) and b) makes me think of bubusquared because of her constant assurance that Belgian Waffles do not come from Belgium. (I assure you, if you don't have a Melle in your life, you are missing out.)

adsartha wrote about migraine triggers.

marina wrote about disability-related issues in Israel, discussing accessibility legislation and universities and the IDF.

shanaqui wrote about Health Anxiety/Hypochondria.

I've really liked pretty much every episode reaction I've read to The Impossible Astronaut. Here is boji's, which I liked a lot.

pipisafoat wrote about shopping for clothing when genderqueer.

I made a post a few days ago inviting people to basically ask me to talk about disability history FOREVER. But it is also open to other people to talk about disability history forever. Please feel free to leave prompts or write responses!

[I have Dreamwidth invites if people would like them.]

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Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:59:53 GMT

I am a little (veeeeerrrrry) drunk so I will make this short.

Oh Internets! Look how much the candidates in Antigonish value accessibility!

Antigonish: Disability-related barriers to Central Nova campaign headquarters

I have photographed campaign offices to see to what extent the entrances to the four Central Nova candidates' Antigonish campaign headquarters accommodate persons with disabilities, via wheelchair ramps, automated doors and elevators.

(Spoilers: None of them pass this accessibility test. The Liberals get part marks.)

Central Nova! Former riding of Green Party Leader Elizabeth May (she's moved to B.C.). Current riding of Peter McKay, Conservative Party candidate, Minister of Defense, IIRC. (Home of Emmy's mom. Emmy's mom is awesome.)

I am just sayin'.

<3 Anna

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Dear so-called progressives: I hate you

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 22:30:01 GMT

Hey so-called Progressives: Disability is not your fucking punch line and I hate you.

Wherein Wonkette dedicates a whole fucking post to mocking Trig Palin for being "r#tarded", because it's very progressive to mock children with disabilities! Seriously, it's a disgusting article. Read this description at adage instead.

(Oh, but see, they're mocking SARAH PALIN for "using her son as a political prop". Which is why they put up a post that implies that Trig is the product of incest between his father and sister, say that children with intellectual disabilities don't dream, and implied that he was born disabled because his mother drank while she was pregnant. Not, you know, just saying "This shit where Palin uses her son as a political prop is wrong." No no, they're mocking her by making him - and all children with disabilities by extension - the butt of the joke. Ha ha ha ha. ha ha. So creative. Gosh, those progressive sure are on the side of people with disabilities, right?)

And, of course:
Lady Gaga Calls Madonna Plagiarism charges r#tarded.

GOSH I'M SO GLAD THAT I HAVE PROGRESSIVES ON MY SIDE. It's been mere hours since I was last told that ableism wasn't a real thing because people with disabilities are treated with "kid gloves".

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FONSFAQ: Disability History

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 21:11:12 GMT

A bunch of awesome people I know are doing Three Weeks for Dreamwidth where they are accepting prompts and will write answers to questions about their topics. This started with dingsi. There is a master list!

(FONSFAQ: Frequently (Or Not So Frequently) Asked Question)

I thought I would love to be asked (and answer) questions about disability history! Because I love it like ice cream.

(In fact, you'd be doing me a huge favour by asking these questions. Don & I are playing around with an idea about a disability history related podcast this summer, and having some idea what people might be interested in knowing would be helpful.)

Things I do not know the answers to easily, I will happily research.

Please leave prompts! Preferred style would be PROMPT in the subject heading of the comment, but don't fret the details. Also, please feel free to signal boost this, as I would love an excuse to talk about my interests with everyone in the world. All the time. (Also, feel free to leave multiple prompts.)

check out Dingsi's prompt page for more ideas.

ETA: I forgot to tell people that they are welcome to claim and write about any of these! Please don't take my comments as claiming them for just me. It's a huge field, and I would love to see other people's responses. :D

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Canadian Election: Who's Talking About Disability? (Spoilers: It's not the Liberals)

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 20:50:55 GMT

Well, in general I'd say no one, but apparently I am wrong! This is both strange and a bit frightening, even though of course the difference between talking about disability and doing something that impacts on the lives of Actual Disabled People are two entirely different things.

The Council of Canadians with Disabilities (the CCD) have sent out a press release informing everyone that the Liberals have actually put disability-issues on their platform. I tried to find this information out on the Liberal website, but I struggled. See, their website is a mess of inaccessibility, which I know they've been informed of because I informed them of it. WebAim detects 46 accessibility-related errors just on their front page, and none of their videos provide actual captioning. Lucky we have YouTube auto-captions to the rescue, right?

Description: It's a screen capture from a YouTube video. Michael Ignatieff, an older white politician, is captioned as saying "And we met start ninety one for you".

Larger versions of the image are available.

I would tell you what he's actually saying but I have an ear infection so I have no idea. And neither would the indeterminate number of Canadians who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing.

You can watch the video yourself, though.

When I did finally poke around on the website, all I found about the Liberal election platform on disability wasfamily care and a national pharmacare plan.

(I will address the national pharmacare plan briefly: I think it's relatively pathetic. I know I should be all happy because pharmacare! but all I can think is "Okay, yes, catastrophic illness, go you! But what about chronic long-term ones?" It's possibly this will be covered, as they mention diabetes and arthritis, but they specifically use the language of catastrophic illness.)

The Family Care plans that have been bandied about by the Liberals and Harper have been really firmly aimed at a particular demographic: two-income homes where either a child or an elderly parent is in need of long-term care from a family member (~~because the hospitals refuse to accept them because they're too sick to treat~~). I know this because of what they're offering. Harper offered a $300 tax credit to people who stay home to take care of a family member. The Liberals are offering either six months of EI benefits or, to people who do not work in jobs that contribute to EI, a "Family Care Tax Benefit", which is a monthly tax-free payment.

Gentle reader, let us consider that "Family Care Tax Benefit" for a moment. This is the thing I'm supposed to be most impressed with, the thing that is most likely to help my family.

First, some background: I am the caregiver to my wonderful husband, Don, who was born with Marfan Syndrome. In July of last year his health took a series of hits, and by January of this year he was in bed basically 24 hours a day except for twice a day trips to the bathroom. He is taking enough pain relieving drugs that he cannot operate a stove safely, he cannot risk a shower even with the shower chair, he has difficulties keeping track of how many of his meds he's taken, and just earlier this week flew into a panic because he couldn't find one of his medications because he had completely forgotten that I had handed him the new prescription the day before. Many of his current problems are being blamed on his gastro-intestinal issues that cropped up in July, and the current theory is that once those are actually treated, his pain levels will drop, he'll be able to go back on his lower-dose medications, and he'll go back to being able to get out of the house three or four times a week, run errands, take care of the garbage and recycling and laundry, and all of those things that he does when he's not crippled by the health care system. His GI appointment is on Thursday.

I've taken off three months this year in order to care for him.

The hospital tells me that this has nothing to do with his health at all, while simultaneously telling me that they're sending him home instead of admitting him because he's got someone at home who can help him with tasks like eating and going to the bathroom.

Okay, so, here is our household, where there is only one adult who is able to work, rather than two, because the other adult in the household is permanently disabled, and the working adult has had to take time off to care for the other.

How much money do you think we would need in order to run our household and ensure Don received regular meals he can eat (which right now is limited to dry cereal, apple sauce, pudding, and frozen waffles), the power and phone stayed turn on, and we could afford the medications that he needs to live? Oh, and rent. Absolutely nothing else: not internet, not fancy meals, not even food enough for me, just food enough for Don. Just, add that up in your head.

The Liberals think it's, at the maximum, $112.50 per month.

Oh, but Anna! You should have savings! Things you can draw on. And yes, gentle reader, we do. We are currently living off money that we have been gifted by extended family members. We can do this because our families have both regularly been sending money to support us. If we didn't, I'm sure I would have to go back to working two jobs in order to have enough money to keep Don comfortable and ensure he was never out of meds, because that's what we had to do before. And when you're working two crappy-paying jobs, you can't find the time to get out of either one of them into something that pays better. And how much of my income would end up going to someone else to take care of Don (or at least check in on him) because I'd never be home?

"Poverty Eradication Plans" often do not include people with disabilities because the costs associated with living with disabilities are quite high. People with disabilities are disproportionately living in poverty: while 10% of Canadians overall live in poverty, 15% of Canadians with disabilities do. They end up doing things like splitting their life-saving medications to make the prescriptions last longer. They don't take their meds and get sicker. They don't get access to things like canes or walkers or wheelchairs because those things cost money and the amount of paperwork required to get in on charities that will pay for them is very high. It is difficult to get work when you're disabled. It is difficult to access community supports when you're disabled. It is difficult to get housing when you're disabled.

$112.50 per month, and that's still more than the Conservatives are offering.

According to the Council of Canadians with Disabilities, this is what the Liberal platform includes:

An "action plan" for implementing, monitoring and reporting on the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which Canada ratified in 2010.

Restoring funding to the Court Challenges program, which has been used by Canadians with Disabilities to force Via Rail to follow the law and have wheelchair accessible train cars.

The Liberals have "promised to address the housing needs of persons with disabilities" in their Affordable Housing plans

I promised I would vote for the first party I felt was actually going to address the needs of Canadians with disabilities. I've been encouraged to vote for the Liberals because of these highlighted issues.

Perhaps this post makes it clear why my vote is still up for grabs.

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Disability & Pity: A Documentary

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 16:35:38 GMT

Via a friend in a locked post: Five Things You Can Learn From Ventilator Assisted Children, or the latest round of "G-d created people with disabilities so that Good Christians could learn about piety".

(And seriously, the message is often not religious right anymore, but so much of the pity and "I learned so much from these sightless children!" is still present. One day, we'll be beyond Victorian stereotypes of disability and on that day, my friends, on that day... I will probably be dead already.)

What can you, gentle reader (because, of course, none of you are Ventilator Assisted, because people with disabilities exist only as empty vessels, not as people who surf the web), learn from Ventilator Assisted Children?

View Poll: Very Special Lessons!

This dude is a film maker. I wonder if it would blow his mind to learn how many films about their own experiences people with disabilities have made?

I would, if I may, recommend against engaging with the author, because he seems to have made several of these pity-pr0n movies and will no doubt wish to inform you about how incredibly brave he is or threaten to take his toys and go home or, even better, have people tell you how they won't care about disability anymore if you're not nice to him, so, you know. Leave that be. There are other uses of our time! Good uses! Like going out to tea with a book, which is what I am going to do right now.

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Happy Monday Morning!

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 13:50:41 GMT

Happy Monday Morning. My day today is filled with Things To Get Accomplished, but my Sunday eve has been filled with sleeping! This is very exciting.

Awesome Road Trip Plan!!! Let's all get together at the end of May and go to historic downtown Fredericton! We could check out the archives, and do whatever else it is to do in Fredericton, and then go to the Labour History Workshop! It'll be so much fun! There's simultaneous translation from both French & English! They will feed us! It'll be awesome! C'mon, the Fandom Con Goers can't have all the fun with their FogCon and their WisCon and their WhateverCon! Historians of the world Unite! We could call it LabourHistoryCon!

...

No?

:(

Filed under "Yes, there's a modern-day eugenics movement" (because I'm still irritated about that whole conversation, so expect this to become a Thing):

Shannon Barber at Junk: Cracked

“Mizz Barr-Berr, take these and come back when you are ready.”

I was ready, I was twenty-one goddamn years old, people had been looking at my cervix since I was thirteen, and I had mammograms before. I had gone all alone to get HIV tests and full STD panels. I was so ready to-

Then I realized that supposedly I was a crack addict, prostitute and deadbeat Mom who had aborted countless hordes of fetuses. The pamphlets were for Narcotics Anonymous and there was one on sterilization. I left and sat at a bus stop trying to process what had just gone on.

A Bee Of A Certain Age: If Only Those Poor People Would Stop Breeding (via @challywrites on that twitter thing I miss hanging out on)

And I am revolted by the wealthly, well-educated, well-resourced people who wrote the Welfare Working Group’s final report suggesting that all would be well in this country if only the poor people stopped breeding.

It turns out that the key to decreasing the size of the world’s population is not forcing people to use contraceptives, or to have just one child, but to educate and empower women. Ensure that women are educated, ensure that they have the resources and capability to build lives for themselves, and can sustain themselves and their children, and in time, the population will drop. The process is so well known that we have a name for it: "demographic transition."

Filed under "Disability 101: Service Animal Etiquette"

Andrea at Manor of Mixed Blessings: Service Dog Etiquette for Dog Lovers

Unfortunately there’s no way for me to let people down gently because the only safe answer is “No, there is never an appropriate time to ask to pet a working dog.” There’s a lot of reasons for this, and I’ll detail them below from my own experience using Beowulf (in dog-accessible places since his Public Access Skills aren’t up to snuff for things like restaurants and grocery stores and other REALLY HIGH-DISTRACTION areas) and Sid’s training outing.

I got the best spam contact on LJ today from someone on Facebook offering me the opportunity to try and sell Canadians on expat insurance or something, I don't even know. I'm so happy that Livejournal has made it possible for such people to contact me! /sarcasm

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We should rid the world of defectives or: Oh hey, someone just came out and said it!

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 17:26:08 GMT

Lawmaker Advocates Eugenics in New Hampshire

A 91-year-old state representative told a constituent that he believes in eugenics and that the world would be better off without "defective people."

Barrington Republican Martin Harty told Sharon Omand, a Strafford resident who manages a community mental health program, that "the world is too populated" and there are "too many defective people," according to an e-mail account of the conversation by Omand. Asked what he meant, she said Harty clarified, "You know the mentally ill, the r#tarded, people with physical disabilities and drug addictions - the defective people society would be better off without."

The thing is, honestly? I don't know why this is news, except someone "important" said it outloud.

A lot of people like to pretend that the eugenics movement is in the past, and I'm certain that this man's age will be held up in order to demonstrate that. But that's ... incredibly simplistic and ignores the way that certain types of people are prevented or discouraged from having children in North America.

I talked a bit about it in a Feministe Thread that went off the rails, if you are curious. Kaz is in there representin', as is abby jean, and La Luba. I should content warn for Hugo man-splaining, Clarisse asking people to do work for her so she can make a better presentation, a few disenvoweled comments, and people insisting that critiquing the modern pro-choice movement, and the "heroes" of the past for being explicitly eugenicist, sound too much like anti-choicers. Honestly, it might be worth skipping the whole conversation, but a few people said really smart things. You can tell who they are because they keep getting ignored.

Oh, hey, was that bitter me speaking? It's probably because I'm evil.

(I have not yet sorted all the other people who wanted on the acafilter. I'll sort that today.)

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History and Repeating It: Funding Through Taxation and why David Cameron is a lousy Victorian

Sat, 26 Feb 2011 22:35:30 GMT

There's a thing going around right now where certain government have decided to move to a charity-based model on public services such as libraries, schools, hospitals, and services for vulnerable populations such as disabled people.

Funny this should come up right now when I've been examining the impact of funding-related decisions such as this on educational facilities for students with disabilities in the late 19th Century. You know, when a lot of Victorians got together and went "This whole funding of public services such as libraries, schools, hospitals, and services for vulnerable populations such as disabled people needs to stop being charity based and come out of taxes."

Funding based on charity appeals is not just bad for Institutions, and it is not just bad for the people served by these Institutions. It also has long-term problems for society.

So, let's talk about my area of expertise: residential-based schooling for children with disabilities.

When the Asylum for the Blind needed to struggle constantly for money, a large part of their activities were based on, in essence, begging for money to support the school. They were constantly having to turn down applicants because they didn't have the funding to take on any more students. They couldn't effectively budget because charitable fundraising is always a crap-shoot that could end up with far too little money to feed the children in their care. They were very limited in what new programs they could introduce, had limited success in retaining teaching staff, and were unable to send their staff to other Institutions to learn how to teach blind students.

However, after a two year long campaign that involved going to every county in the province, the Board of Directors and the Principal for the Asylum managed to convince the Nova Scotia and New Brunswick parliaments to set their funding of the Asylum to the number of students from their respective provinces that were there, rather than a varying amount between $500 to $1000.

That, gentle reader, is when the funding for the school from all charitable donations and all government grants doubled. Because the amount of money it required per student in order to properly function as an educational institution, to feed their students properly, to ensure the building was well heated in a Nova Scotian winter, to introduce new educational reforms, to bring in books the students could read, and to pay their staff suddenly came into their pocketbooks, they could function as an educational institution rather than go around begging as a charity, presenting their students as pathetic.

The response by the Asylum was also quite incredible. The number of students jumped very quickly (suddenly girls were getting educated more often than before because free education usually means girls get education), and the number of options those students had for learning trades they could use to support themselves increased. The Principal was able to start some amazing programs, such as the Home Teaching Network that helped adults who became blind learn to read and navigate the world rather than sink into depression and desperation from their change in status. The Free Lending Library that sent braille books across the Maritimes was started, and there was a successful campaign to make the mailing of braille books free. The Principal also started an awareness campaign on helping prevent blindness in children by targeting nurses who cared for newborns in the signs & symptoms of infant blindness. Various highly successful programs were set up so that blind people could get loans to start small businesses to support themselves after graduation. Suddenly blind people were contributing members of society, getting an effective education in the same vein as their sighted counter parts, and relied less and less on the direct kindness of strangers and family members.

When various governments are saying "Let's take away government funding and turn these service organizations into charities again", they're saying "Let's have these service organisations go back to having to beg, to having to present the people they help as pathetic and helpless." They're saying "We don't think the people these services help are as deserving as rich people who won't need them." They're saying "access to education, to libraries and the services they provide, to assistance for vulnerable peoples such as people with disabilities should only go to those who can afford it, and everyone else can just sit around waiting for the scraps that the rich choose to throw out. Beg, little peons. Beg. And maybe we'll let you into this citizenship thing (except not)."

David Cameron and his ilk are suggesting we go back to a system the Victorians decided wasn't working. Maybe if we knew some of that history, knew why the Victorians decided that using tax money to support education and libraries and the like was a good idea, people would know why this is the worst. idea. ever.

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So, that happened.

Sat, 01 Jan 2011 00:11:29 GMT

Goodbye From FWD.

In one of those things that I find terribly funny (but other people may not), my final post on FWD is about Glee. It's a transcript of the WBAI program "The Largest Minority", in which various people discuss Glee and it's depictions of disability, and includes more details on that thing I mentioned where Ryan Murphy was invited to a major industry event about disability and accessibility hosted by the Screen Actors Guild and didn't show up: Glee and Disability in Pop Culture.

What I find funny about this is the reason FWD stopped posting anything about Glee was because I asked everyone not to. I still get a few emails a month from people telling me to kill myself over my posts on the topic at Bitch and on FWD, and at the time I was having panic attacks at even the idea of looking at another discussion of the show.

I updated my Bundle of RSS feeds for disability-focused blogs. Check out my awesome gReader bundle!. It does include parent-focused blogs and educator focused blogs. It doesn't include anyone from DW or LJ, sadly. I may update it in a few days to include those, I'm not sure. Feel free to use it in any way (or no way!) that you wish, and ping me to add someone if you think I should. I in no way think it's at all even a tiny tiny fraction of the disability-focused blogs out there.

I'm taking the next month or so (ish) off from the internet. If there's anything personal experience has taught me, it's that this is difficult for me, since about 90% of my friends are online, and a lot of them communicate primarily through blogs & LJ/DW. But, I will have email, so don't hesitate for one moment to email me should you wish. Be aware, though, that I'll be only checking my email once a day, because I need to focus on everything I need to get done in January if Don & I are going to blow the pop-stand of Halifax.

I hope you all have or had a wonderful Gregorian New Year's Eve, and many joyous returns of the day.

♥

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I wish I still had that "Harshing your Glee Squee" icon

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 22:14:06 GMT

Did you know that the folks behind Glee were explicitly invited to a best practices panel on disability at a major industry conference in Hollywood this past summer and turned them down?

Because, I guess, actually working with people with disabilities in the industry to talk about representation and stuff is too much work for someone getting awards for diversity while publicly mocking disability rights advocates and activists who have talked about the problems with Glee and representations of disability.

I will have more details about this later.

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No To Homeless Cripples

Wed, 15 Dec 2010 20:58:00 GMT

National Day of Protest Against Welfare & Housing Benefit Cuts - Trafalgar Sq (vid 1)
Originally uploaded by Lisy Babe

Video is of around 30 or so people with a variety of evident & non-evident disabilities protesting in the rain at Trafalgar Square. Visible signs include "STOP!", what appear to be signs of where people are from(?) "Hackney", ~~"Nanigey"~~ "Haringey" "Brent"

Chats are "No to Homeless Cripples!" and "Save our Benefits, Save our Homes!"

See also: Protesters lobby outside Leeds Civic Hall over mental health services cuts

See also: The lack of #solidarity. Oh, wait, that's bitter me. Mustn't be bitter, then no one will stand up for the cripples because they're all so bitter. But as much as I appreciate the outrage over Jody McIntyre's treatment (and I do!), how come the broken of Britain were out supporting students, and yet students stayed home when it came time to stand up for us? {ETA: Not that students and people with disabilities are in any way mutually exclusive terms, nor are students not risking becoming homeless in light of these steep increase in fees and the cuts to support programs and similar things. Thank you for the poke, spiralsheep)

Must have been the rain.

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Jody McIntyre Continues To Thrill Me

Wed, 15 Dec 2010 17:14:01 GMT

Jody McIntyre's got a blog post up at the Independent: Who's Apathetic Now?

I really admire Jody a lot - I think I mentioned before that I admire that he kept bringing the issues back to what he thought was important - less that he as a wheelchair user had been attacked by police, and more on how many other people were and how it wasn't even remarked upon. (Being that I get most of my UK news via blog posts, twitter, and outraged emails from friends, I had no idea that Alfie Meadows' near death experience that included the police demanding that the almost-dead bleeding in the brain kid be sent to another hospital, even though he might have died, was not reported in the mainstream media.)

Anyway, what I really like about McIntyre here is that he's seizing the opportunities given to him and using them effectively. He knows people want to hear his views right now so he's expressing them clearly and effectively in as many different venues as possible.

I don't think I could do the same. I've been contacted by reporters more often than you might think after standing up about disability rights and often try to firmly but politely refuse their interview requests because I'm going to come across as a screaming harpy who wants to kill everyone. (Note: I don't want to kill everyone. Just some people.) I get all red faced and blotchy when I'm angry as well, and thoughtfulness kinda slips out the back door while I'm busy gesturing wildly and talking about "rioting while crippled" and use terms like "work disincentive" without really explaining what they mean.

Anyway. Jody McIntyre is doing an awesome job of combating some of the stereotypes disabled people in the UK run up against all the time. He is both visibly physically disabled and an active activist. I think the reason he's getting so much attention is that this blows people's minds, even though so many disabled people/people with disabilities I know are like him in temperament and fierce determination to be heard.

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Tue, 14 Dec 2010 22:18:52 GMT

Via the F-Word UK, the Daily Mail decided to mock Jody McIntyre for rioting while crippled.

No, really. Here's The Guardian's discussion of the 500 complaints the column has garnered so far.

One tweeter described Littlejohn as "shameful [for] mocking the disabled". Another, referring to the Mail's coverage of Frankie Boyle's joke on Channel 4 about Katie Price's son, said: "When Frankie Boyle makes jokes about disabled people, the Mail complains. When Littlejohn does it, the Mail prints it."

(Not that the Daily Mail is somehow unique in this. I've pointed before to left-wing blogs and sites mocking people with disabilities for being out while disabled when protesting against stuff the left generally approves of, but when a disabled person is protesting on behalf of the left - especially when they're injured or attacked by police - it suddenly becomes worth supporting the rights of disabled people to protest. We notice these things, you know.)

Anyway, sorry. You'll have to scroll down a ways to get to the Daily Mail's mockery of Jody, but it includes a rather iconic drawing of Joey and his brother as characters from a show called Little Britain. I'm only dimly aware of it as that's not my sense of humour so I just didn't watch, and thus can't come up with something comparable in other countries.

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Bingo.

Sun, 12 Dec 2010 02:20:06 GMT

Every once in a while (I know, it's hard to believe), I forget that there are people who really hate people with disabilities.

I was on twitter earlier and @rampracer twitted this link: Disability Activist Pans Brick Walk

In an open letter, disability activist Eileen Feldman, director of the Community Access Project of Somerville, criticized the new brick crosswalks used in reconstruction projects on Somerville Avenue and in Magoun Square.

“These discontinuous surfaces have the effect of impeding safe and comfortable travel for wheelchair drivers because the whole-body jostling hurts bones, muscles, joints, and nerves,’’ she said. They also, she charged, require expensive maintenance.

“These are the pavers the state uses,’’ said mayoral spokesman Michael Meehan. “As far as we are aware there is no ADA violation.’’ The city’s Disability Commission has had no problem with the bricks, he said, and the contrasting crosswalks are more visible to cars than painted lines.

I was pretty curious about this open letter. It actually took a while to hunt down, although this particular news item was fairly easy to find. Apparently linking or quoting the letter extensively would be a bit difficult, right?

I think I finally found it: Letter: Somerville should place moratorium on brick paving

Three partner disability advocacy organizations published an open letter to the mayor in the Somerville Journal in June 2009 explaining why we were requesting him to refrain from using bricks and brick paver materials throughout Somerville Avenue’s rights-of-ways. The issues were ignored, the materials and supplies were purchased, and the pavers were laid beginning 10 months later.

...

Such discontinuous surfaces have the effect of impeding safe and comfortable travel for wheelchair drivers because the whole-body jostling hurts bones, muscles, joints and nerves. People with balance problems will also need to cross Somerville Avenue’s paver crosswalks with extra care, extra time and extra stress.

(The letter also details out the expense of maintaining these coble-stones.

Now, me, I like coble-stones, they're pretty. I've also seen Don try to cross over cobble-stone and it's obviously painful in the extreme. Eileen Feldman, the author of the letter, is blind and wrote about how coble-stones make it difficult for her to navigate because they are often uneven and in poor repair. I'm pretty content to give up my pretty for that, and I think there are other ways that areas can be made for visible for drivers than relying on coble stones.

So of course this is the only comment on Ellen's letter:

Honestly, I think all people who complain about sidewalks, handicapped or otherwise, should be picked up by truck and dropped off in the middle of South Dakota's badlands. I'm sincerely tired of these moonbats taking over Somerville and the surrounding towns, complaining about this thing or that thing not bending over backwards to help the minority of people who get the benefit of every little thing while the regular people, the middle class workers, get left in the dust with their hands holding their empty pockets.

Is it mean, what I'm saying? Sure, it might be, but that doesn't make it less true. Sidewalks aren't a god damned civil right because every city doesn't have sidewalks on every street. Be serious.

Is it ever good enough? Honestly? You're in a wheelchair or you're elderly and can't get around on the sidewalks of Somerville, I've got some news for you: you probably shouldn't be outside in the first place. There's nothing challenging about the sidewalks, except for people who are lazy or people who just want something to bitch about. How many more handouts do you want before you decide to do something for yourself?

I really am starting to hate the way the world is becoming delusional. We're NOT ALL EQUAL, some people are healthier, and smarter, and better suited to live or work or play in certain areas. I love football, but how long is it until you complain that we need more handicapped players in the NFL?

If it meant that much, you should have had a (no pun intended) sit-in on the crosswalks and prevented them from building it. But you fools think that words actually have an impact in the world. Wrong again. Get the hell out of my city and start your own b.s. utopia.

It's sadistic that you sick moonbats will stick cities with large bills to re-repair the sidewalks because you're a bunch of dicks.

I DON'T WANT ANY PART OF A WORLD WHERE PEOPLE JUST PRETEND EVERYONE IS EQUAL AND NO ONE IS BETTER. I CAN BARELY WALK YET I DO ALRIGHT. GO START A WHEELCHAIR AND OLD PEOPLE CITY. MAJORITY RULES, MORON

I don't know about you, but I would totally move to a wheelchair & old people city.

I keep thinking I should start a "disabled people aren't tax payers" tag or something, because the continual idea that PWD don't pay any taxes and are just a drag on society is kinda tiring, and very very common. (Hint: we buy things. Many of us have jobs. Some of us buy houses and stuff. We own businesses. It's almost like we're real people!)

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Tue, 30 Nov 2010 17:45:16 GMT

Y'all, netmouse is my hero of the day.

Inspired by the poem you posted and further reading about her, I created a wikipedia article about Laura Hershey. It has survived examination by other wikipedia editors and passes the tests for notability and having references but is by no means complete.

I encourage you to edit it and let others know about it so it can be filled in by those more familiar with her work than I. I'm also willing, as always, to add material given to me by people who'd rather not edit the wiki themselves.

Please pass this along. I know there are many many people in the disability community who could edit and enhance this article now that the outline is there.

Recording our history, recording our heroes, making them "notable" in Wikipedia, is such a big part of visibility, of our history. One thing I've raged about more than once is that people keep acting like disability history, disability activism, disability studies sprung out of nowhere to surprise them. Wiki is a way of combating this idea because it's something we can quickly point at, that has references.

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Oh I see: Blame Students for Ableist Decisions!

Tue, 23 Nov 2010 06:46:15 GMT

*headdesk*

I fell asleep at 9:30 and then woke up at about 2 a.m. and so I went on twitter so I could check the news and what the shit is this?

University Decision To Withdraw Student With Down Syndrome Sparks Outcry

When officials at an Oregon university decided that a 20-year-old with Down syndrome could no longer audit a ceramics class, the woman’s peers responded in force.

Eliza Schaaf was auditing a ceramics course at Southern Oregon University until she received a letter from the school Nov. 8 indicating that her need for extensive one-on-one assistance “resulted in a disruption of curriculum delivery and interfered with the teaching and learning environment for the instructor and other students.” University officials informed Schaaf that as a result she would be withdrawn from the course.

That didn’t sit well with Schaaf’s classmates who said that she was not a disruption and that her inclusion added to their college experience. All 19 of the other students in Schaaf’s class signed a petition asking that she be allowed to remain in the course. What’s more, the university’s student senate voted to oppose the school’s decision.

So, let me see if I get this straight:

The university administration says Eliza is a disruption to her classmates.

Her classmates respond with "lol no". Every single person in the class signs a petition saying she's not disruptive. The student union votes to back her inclusion in the class. There have been student protests saying she's not disruptive. But hey! Let's kick her out of school 3/4s of the way into the term because .... Why exactly?

We have a word for that, you know.

I'm looking more into this case, but it looks pretty shitty to me.

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I am thinking of Tracy Latimer again, again, again

Wed, 17 Nov 2010 00:08:36 GMT

Online because I am foolishly updating my list of murdered people with disabilities. Someone please tell me why it is that when a parent murders a disabled child, the defense always brings up "situational crime, not likely to be repeated"? Do they say this about the murder of non-disabled children? Is this the defense now? What about for coworkers? "Well, the defendant is unlikely to ever get a job again, so this is a situation that will never again come up, so let's give them a lighter sentence."

I don't know why people murder their disabled children, I really don't. So I don't know: is it because they're children? As was famously uttered by William Marshall to King Stephen, people do often still posses the hammer and anvil with which to make more children. Is it because they're not likely to be alone with a disabled person again? Average person in North America is going to spend 7 years of their life with a disability, so I find it unlikely that no one who murdered their disabled child will ever never see a disabled person again in their lives: parents, spouses, other children, friends, neighbours, coworkers.

Or is it simply that it's still seen as a mercy to kill a child with a disability, regardless of that child's quality of life? Is that the direction we want to go?

I know prosecutors have a responsibility - one I do respect! - to get their client the best they can out of convictions. But why do they have to go "Well, it was a situational crime, one unlikely to be repeated." Unless they make exactly the same argument for parents who murder their able-bodied children, they need to really think about what the fuck they are saying.

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