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May. 1st, 2009 09:15 amI find it funny that The Rapture is episode 4.20.
That is all.
That is all.
May. 1st, 2009
Blog Against Disablism Day
May. 1st, 2009 11:00 amI've been planning to participate in Blogging Against Disablism Day for the last few weeks, but I'm struggling now. I'm tired from weeks of sleep-debt and distracted by voices down the hallway. I'm paranoid that my supervisor will comment (again) on my absence on Tuesday, that if I was too ill to come in she supposes that I couldn't help it. I'm trying to calculate the amount of pain medication and sheer will it'll take to get through this semester's finals.
More to the point, I don't think I'm disabled enough to blog about disablism.
I don't have this kind of insecurity about commenting as a lesbian about how homophobia affects me. It's not a sliding scale of inevitable comparison: "well, my partner takes more medication and has two diagnoses, so she's more disabled than I am and deserves her handicapped tag. My mom has MS and uses a wheelchair, I'm definitely less disabled than she is. What right do I have to ask for help? Why do I get to write about this?"
In the last two performance evaluations I've had, my supervisor has suggested that I seek therapy and that I act more my age. Is that disablism, or just an attempt to make everyone in the office socialize?
It's a hundred small things that I'm left examining after the fact. It's working at the Disability Support table in a college fair and watching parents yank their kids away from the booth like disability is a contact disease. It's a young couple muttering that yeah, I look really disabled when I haul myself awkwardly out of the car; disablism or fat prejudice? Both?
It's intersectionality and privilege and it's the lack of any reference guide. I'm more disabled than my colleagues, but able enough to pass on a good day. I get less harassment than my mother about my disability, but more harassment when I go to the doctor and request pain medication. It's a gray area, and the negotiation of it is exhausting when I'm already tired by getting out of bed.
I've learned to argue back against homophobia. Disability is a newer, uncertain territory. I don't have a reference point; I'm not sure how to advocate when the disabled person is me, not my mother or one of my students.
I don't experience disablism like anyone else, only like myself. From myself, at times, when I reject handicapped tags and canes and the identity of a disabled person. It's not until I come to terms with my own disablism that I can try to overcome it from outside.
More to the point, I don't think I'm disabled enough to blog about disablism.
I don't have this kind of insecurity about commenting as a lesbian about how homophobia affects me. It's not a sliding scale of inevitable comparison: "well, my partner takes more medication and has two diagnoses, so she's more disabled than I am and deserves her handicapped tag. My mom has MS and uses a wheelchair, I'm definitely less disabled than she is. What right do I have to ask for help? Why do I get to write about this?"
In the last two performance evaluations I've had, my supervisor has suggested that I seek therapy and that I act more my age. Is that disablism, or just an attempt to make everyone in the office socialize?
It's a hundred small things that I'm left examining after the fact. It's working at the Disability Support table in a college fair and watching parents yank their kids away from the booth like disability is a contact disease. It's a young couple muttering that yeah, I look really disabled when I haul myself awkwardly out of the car; disablism or fat prejudice? Both?
It's intersectionality and privilege and it's the lack of any reference guide. I'm more disabled than my colleagues, but able enough to pass on a good day. I get less harassment than my mother about my disability, but more harassment when I go to the doctor and request pain medication. It's a gray area, and the negotiation of it is exhausting when I'm already tired by getting out of bed.
I've learned to argue back against homophobia. Disability is a newer, uncertain territory. I don't have a reference point; I'm not sure how to advocate when the disabled person is me, not my mother or one of my students.
I don't experience disablism like anyone else, only like myself. From myself, at times, when I reject handicapped tags and canes and the identity of a disabled person. It's not until I come to terms with my own disablism that I can try to overcome it from outside.
Interesting quote:
May. 1st, 2009 11:34 am"I told the Professor once that I’m convinced that everyone carries around their own little hell inside them and that, with good friends, you can open up the gates a little bit and let them peer in there and them telling you that what they see in there isn’t so bad can be healing, but that we owe it to others not to throw the gates wide open and turn that on our loved ones."
- Tiny Cat Pants, this entry
- Tiny Cat Pants, this entry
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May. 1st, 2009 03:03 pmI has a Dreamwidth!
Disclaimer: I won't be crossposting content or posting fic in that account. I won't be moving, unless fannish tides turn. The fic and fandom stuff will stay here. The other journal is all personal stuff, all the time. So y'know, no pressure to go there, because I'm pretty uninteresting in general.
Disclaimer: I won't be crossposting content or posting fic in that account. I won't be moving, unless fannish tides turn. The fic and fandom stuff will stay here. The other journal is all personal stuff, all the time. So y'know, no pressure to go there, because I'm pretty uninteresting in general.
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May. 1st, 2009 03:47 pmIn other disability news, I love that Dreamwidth offers you a chance to describe your icons for the visually impaired. Two thumbs way up!