>Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>>
>> >Eliminating impairment does nothing for our liberation.
>>
>> I agree. Only a social movement against the oppression of the
>> disabled, in the context of a socialist movement, can bring about the
>> kind of liberation we need to work for.
>>
>> By the same token, eliminating some impairments, via prevention or
>> treatment, in itself does nothing to make the oppression of the
>> disabled worse than it is. Impairment is one thing; disablement
>> another. It is not against the interest of Thalidomide victims &
>> other disabled to try to prevent the same or similar impairment from
>> being caused in the future. It is not against the interest of polio
>> survivors & other disabled to seek to eradicate polio.
>
>Some with such impairments would beg to differ with you. Dr. Gregor
>Wolbring of Calgary U who is a Thalidomide baby, for instance, does
>not consider himself a "victim." Further he sees nothing tragic about
>bringing more impaired persons into the world and is active in carving
>out a place for disabled persons to sit at the table with bioethicists
>and at world wide conferences on issues which have direct bearing on us.
In your LBO-talk post dated "Sun, 05 Aug 2001 21:28:43 -0700," you gave us a link: <http://www.thalidomide.ca/gwolbring/>. I visited www.thalidomide.ca as well, which turned out to be the homepage of the "Thalidomide Victims Association of Canada" -- hence my use of the word "victim." On the TVAC homepage, we see the following:
***** Thalidomide is a drug that was introduced on to the market on October 1, 1957 in West Germany. Thalidomide soon became a drug prescribed to pregnant women to combat symptoms associated with morning sickness. When taken during the first trimester of pregnancy, Thalidomide prevented the proper growth of the foetus resulting in horrific birth defects in thousands of children around the world. These children were born in the late 1950's and early 1960's and became known as "Thalidomide babies". See What Is Thalidomide for more information.
The Thalidomide Victims Association of Canada (TVAC) is an organization representing approximately 125 Canadians born disabled as a consequence of the drug Thalidomide. TVAC provides non-monetary programs and services, education, and advocacy for its members. Members of the Association call themselves "Thalidomiders".
The Promise:
"It is our job to ensure that these [Thalidomide] victims are cared for in the best possible manner, that their needs are met to the fullest extent we can devise and to ensure, as much as possible, that a similar tragedy will never occur again."
- The Honourable J.W Montieth, Minister of Health and Welfare January 29, 1963
<http://www.thalidomide.ca/> *****
So, there appears to be a range of perceptions & political positions with regard to whether to be impaired & disabled by corporate & government negligence, etc. is to become victimized.
BTW, to think of oneself as a victim of oppression is not necessarily to present oneself as a miserable weakling only fit to be pitied by "the more fortunate," though it is true that according to the (especially libertarian) Right, to speak of being victimized is the same as to forfeit one's claim to equality with others by becoming beggars.
I, in contrast to the Right, don't see anything wrong or pathetic in speaking of being a victim of corporate crime, police brutality, sexual harassment, etc., as long as we are not ideologically reduced to being *nothing but* victims of oppressions.
>What you seem to have absorbed is the wider disabling ideology that
>disabled people' s lives are not worth living. It assumes that a non
>disabled life is better than living a disabled life. That is the
>whole crux of our argument with Peter Singer.
I don't agree with Peter Singer, and you know that, if you remember LBO discussions of his work. To attempt to prevent an impairment of oneself and/or others is not at all the same as thinking that "disabled people's lives are not worth living." Take an example of an HIV-negative gay man lovingly practicing safe sex with an HIV-positive gay man, both partners trying to keep the currently HIV-negative one from being infected. Does that mean that they think that the lives of HIV-positive & people with AIDS (& those of the disabled in general) are not worth living? No.
>Yoshie:
>>That many people, soldiers as well as civilians, get killed, maimed,
>>diseased, psychologically traumatized, etc. in & after any war is a
>>good reason to work to bring about a socialist world in which war is
>>unnecessary, if not the only reason. It's one thing to have an
>>impairment because of aging, i.e., that which cannot be abolished;
>>it's entirely another thing to be impaired due to acts of oppressions
>>like imperialist war, racist brutality, gay bashing, rape, etc.!
>
>Marta
>I don't see it this way at all. Once one is impaired it is how one is
>allowed to live in the world that matters. Whining on and on and
>drinking oneself into a stupor everynight as Ron Kovic still does
>AFTER ALL THESE YEARS is not the way to go. Impairment being equated
>with victimhood does not do anyone much good.
So there is no tragedy whatsoever in the unnecessary pains & sufferings caused by an imperialist war -- the pains & sufferings that would not have come into the world if the war had been avoided -- because "[o]nce one is impaired it is how one is allowed to live in the world that matters"?
>What I have noticed from the left is an over bearing need to feel pity
>and put us out of our "misery" -- but not much effort to eliminate
>barriers or accept us as equals.
To see some impairments as painful to the impaired themselves -- an opinion that some (though not all) of the impaired themselves hold sometimes -- is not the same as to refuse to make "much effort to eliminate barriers or accept us [disabled] as equals," especially since impairment (physical) and disablement (social) are not the same thing.
>I have come to the conclusion that most people DO feel that the world
>would be better off without disabled persons but they cloak this
>behind the idea that we really want to get rid of ourselves. Please,
>don't do us any favors.
I think you are once again conflating physical impairments, disabling social relations, & the currently disabled. One may want to rid the world of known causes of some avoidable physical impairments (e.g., environmental pollutions), as well as disabling social relations (e.g., absence of workplace accommodations that empower the impaired to work), without at the same time harboring a genocidal wish to purge the world of the currently disabled people.
Yoshie