I would suggest reading an essay written by David Pfeiffer, who was a professor and friend of mine, in the book called "Teamsters and Turtles: U.S. Progressive Political Movements in the 21st Century" ed. John Berg <> Conclusion In the introduction to this volume John Berg wrote: "The movements discussed in this book are united, first of all, by the sense that they have a common enemy. The are less united about how that enemy should be defined --"capitalism" "the corporations," "imperialism," or "the power structure," for example --but they have more of less the same social forces in mind, whatever the term."
Berg is wrong in his assumption that the disability movement sees certain elements of society as a common enemy.
The disability movement is different from the other movements discussed in this book. The people in the disability movement see all of society as the enemy. To use Berg's examples, capitalist and workers, corporations and the public, the imperialists and the dispossessed, and persons in and out of the power structure all ten to loathe people with disabilities and want them out of the way. Because of the way people with disabilities are treated, the disability movement has no interest in joining some new broad movement.
Why is this pervasive dislike and oppression of people with disabilities no perceived by people in the other movements? Simply because it is so pervasive. The workers, the public, the dispossessed, and the powerless are not seen as being such because of a deficit in them, while people with disabilities are seen to have a deficit (named their so-called disability), which makes their unjust, prejudiced treatment seem to be natural. Building codes ensured the lack of ramps and curb cuts while requiring two exits and certain types of building materials in the name of a fire code. Educational policy required the offering of foreign languages while not recognizing Braille and American Sign Language as languages. Because people with disabilities are seen to be abnormal, their civil rights can be routinely violated.
The disability movement will continue to fight this oppression using the tools available to it. Unless changes happen in society, there will be no disability movement nor people with disabilities. Their "useless" lives will be terminated."
Rest in Peace David. Marta
On Apr 20, 2006, at 2:43 AM, Jim Farmelant wrote:
>
>
> On Thu, 20 Apr 2006 02:55:57 -0400 info at pulpculture.org writes:
>
>> While I agree with Carl, I think the problem is that no one's
>> listening to
>> what really undergirds Marta's ire: the fact the Left doesn't give a
>> rat's
>> ass about disability issues but will get up in arms about
>> immigration.
>>
>
> Well, if the truth be told, the Left's record on immigration issues
> is not a whole lot better than its record on disability records.
> The only reason the Left has been getting up in arms about
> immigration lately is because of the emergence of the recent
> emergence of the immigrants' movement, a movement which
> seems to have gotten underway, largely without the help of
> the Left.
>
> I suppose the take home lesson of this is to get your own
> constitutents organized and taking militant action, then the
> Left will begin to take you and your issues seriously.
>
>
>>
>> what more one could say on this is a simple acknowledgement of that
>> fact.
>> She's right.