5:06am May 25, 2014

And the most important DD community value I share.

Is the one that says people are people first.

The reason that the most well-known DD advocacy organization is known as People First is not just a language thing. I mean, most people in the organization do use people-first language. But that’s not the core of why it's people first.

It’s because DD people have been cut off from the definition of humanity in such an intense, pervasive way, that when figuring out an agenda for what was important in their organization, the very first thing someone said was that we are people first.

People first means that there’s something important about personhood and that we all have it regardless of what disability we have.

People first means that at our core we are human beings.

People first means that recognizing our common humanity is the only possible way to have respect for each other.

People first does not mean ignoring differences between people.

People first does not mean disability is unimportant, although there are some people who take it that way.

People first does not mean you pretend that differences between people don’t exist.

People first is an idea that comes from one of the most consistently dehumanized groups of people on the fucking planet. It’s an idea that comes out of a community where scientists and ethicists still debate whether we count as human beings, whether we should have fewer rights than rights granted to animals. And these are not fringe scientists and fringe ethicists and fringe debates that are widely denounced as ableist. These are absolutely dead-center mainstream values.

And if you don’t understand why a group of people who are consistently talked about that way, might want to emphasize that we are human beings, that we are all people, that our common humanity is our most important attribute… then you don’t understand how thoroughly dehumanized we are. You don’t understand what it means to be called retard or vegetable. I mean what it actually means – it actually means “you are not a human being, you are not even a living being, you are something beneath all of that”.

So the idea that we are people first is vital and revolutionary and important, and it’s about far more than language. Person-first language is popular in the DD community, though not universal. But the concept of we are people first is often misunderstood to be just a call to use person-first language. It’s much, much more than that.

And I don’t think it’s an accident that calling on our common humanity is something that I see people all over tumblr talking about as a bad thing. They assume that if we acknowledge our equality, it will erase the differences between people. They assume that calls to see us all as human beings come only from privileged people uncomfortable with difference. They refuse to see what it means when calls for common humanity come from members of groups that are currently and explicitly and completely and in huge major obvious ways that nobody powerful ever contests shut out of the definition of humanity.

There’s nothing like knowing that you literally are shut out of some definitions of personhood and that this could lead to your death, and then being told by some random cognitively-abled person on tumblr that you shouldn’t assert your common humanity because it’ll erase differences between people.

There is nothing about “We are all people first and foremost” that has to mean “Disability is irrelevant” or “Culture is irrelevant” or “Differences between people are irrelevant”. When people assume that common humanity erases difference, it makes me wonder what on earth their assumptions are about difference. Do they think that being human somehow makes everyone the same? Do they think that being different is the opposite of being a person? I don’t know, but I know that they make me completely furious.

Because developmentally disabled people, which includes a lot of people with cognitive disabilities (intellectual disabilities, autism, etc.) who are sometimes literally shut out of the definition of “persons”, are the ones who have chosen to emphasize that we are all people first and foremost. And this value is incredibly powerful and incredibly important. And anyone who tries to step on this value in the name of preserving difference, doesn’t understand it on a deep level at all. But more importantly, I will personally stand in the way of anybody who tries to tear down DD people for saying we are humans, we are people, and that is the most important thing that matters about us. Because it is the most important thing that matters about anyone. And those of us in the DD community who assert that we are people first and foremost, are doing it in the face of some of the worst dehumanization that exists in our society. Which takes a huge amount of strength, that I will not allow anyone to denounce as irrelevant or naive or not revolutionary enough. It’s way more revolutionary than sitting around bickering about whether saying you’re a human being means you aren’t different enough.