as small as a world and as large as alone

3:27pm February 27, 2015

fullyarticulatedgoldskeleton:

madeofpatterns:

I think that framing disability categories in terms of privilege hierarchies is a mistake.

I know what it’s like to face certain kinds of cognitive and physical ableism from my own experiences.

I don’t know what it’s like to face constant physical access barriers. I don’t know what it’s like to not be able to get into buildings. I don’t know what it’s like to have to sacrifice independent mobility to participate in some communities.

I don’t know what it’s like to have a life threatening medical condition and no access to competent medical care.

Or any number of other things.

Everything I know about that is from listening. I think that we should listen to each other more.

Yes. It’s really hard to understand other people’s experiences if you’re always looking for where they fit on the ‘you need to shut up and listen’ hierarchy

I’ve seen lots of conversations where someone makes a blanket statement or “rule” about disability, and then when someone chimes in to say, “Actually, other disability experiences exist,” they react with the same outrage that they would if an abled person told them ableism doesn’t exist. They often DO start out with the assumption that the other person is abled or neurotypical, even when the content of the response says ‘I have this disability, and…’

That’s extremely counterproductive.

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