Lamar Todd
Professor Shaw
WGSS 275
December 10, 2019
Blog #2:
Disability. You’re Helping Too Much.
On the CDC (center for disease control) website, there is a specified tab for “disabilities”. While broad, the tabs include titles like “inclusion” and “overcoming barriers”. It is obvious that the aim of this article is to allow able bodied people the tools to talk to someone with a disability and support individuals who are disabled who may be loved ones. Upon my experience being disabled and surrounded by able bodied people, I have come to realize that people are truly just helping to much. The significant focus on making people who are disabled feel more comfortable and accepted within an able bodied society emphasizes an individual’s differences and causes the person to feel even more uncomfortable than if they had simply just been left alone.
The WHO (World Health Organization) describes a barrier as “Factors in a person’s environment that, through their absence or presence, limit functioning and create disability”. So in context, a disability is something that is an extension or result of a barrier. The focus on these barriers by the CDC allowed them to create a list specified for this type of attempted inclusion They suggest these items: “Getting fair treatment from others (nondiscrimination); Making products, communications, and the physical environment more usable by as many people as possible (universal design); Modifying items, procedures, or systems to enable a person with a disability to use them to the maximum extent possible (reasonable accommodations); and Eliminating the belief that people with disabilities are unhealthy or less capable of doing things (stigma, stereotypes).” Individuals attempt to do these things or people in order to “help them”. Opening doors and making it a point to point out the person who is disabled only makes that person feel more uncomfortable and over time, anger arises from this. The frustration of being told that you are incapable of doing something yourself especially when they are showing off their able bodiedness by performing the task for you, is frustrating, demoralizing and serves as an insult to those who are disabled. It is an assumption that people want or need help just because of the way they look. This discrimination against a group of people is considered socially acceptable because of the intent behind individual’s actions. People feel that because they are trying to help, the other person on the receiving end of said help should be forced to accept. This is not the case.
An article written on “The Mighty” discusses 8 “helpful” things that individuals do that “don't really help people with disabilities”. These include: 1.) Helping people who do not want to be helped 2.) changing the way you talk 3.) Saying that someone does not look disabled when they are 4.) Feeling sorry 5.) Referring to a disabled individual as inspiring/brave 6.)Invalidating a disability or illness that is not readily visible 7.) Avoiding eye contact 8.) offering medical advice. These eight things as discussed in the article increase that disabled person’s feelings about being inferior in an able bodied society. I have experienced all eight of these things over the course of my injury, the most prevalent being individuals trying to help when I do not need or want it, people feeling sorry for me, which is displayed in their words with literally “oh I’m so sorry” or “poor guy” from people who are close to me and should understand my disability/ what it entails, and the avoidance of eye contact.
From the image above, we see a young girl in a wheelchair doing the task of shooting a basketball. This is not something you think of when you think of disability and the words “wheelchair” and “basketball” are not socially acceptable to use in a sentence together. This pairing of words sparks the interest of able bodied people. Another way that people are using disability to their own agenda without the empathetic aspect of understanding someone’s experience to the depths that their individualized actions may affect them, is by using disabled athletes and success stories for their own motivation. Those who excel and are also disabled serve as personal inspiration for able bodied people because. When an individual refuses help or visibly does not need help, able bodied individuals see this as a “bonus” to their own experience and use phrases like “if they can do it, I can too”. This is almost the equivalent, to the ear of someone who is disabled, to saying that this able bodied individual is the dominant to the disabled individual and if that disabled person can perform a task that an able bodied person can, then they are excelling and motivating to the people around them.
Overall, not only from articles, but also from my own experience of these things, being disabled, I have seen that people are turning the use of empathy in to a type of power dynamic.. Society deems it acceptable and the trend continues. You are Helping Too Much.
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