The thing that abled people who advocate for the disabled community don’t get is that there are times when disabilities/accommodations clash. Horribly.
Like I spent years having to come up with a solution to get therapy dogs into a series of residence halls. Why years? Because we had to decide who got to stay and who got to leave: the people who needed therapy dogs or the people with severe allergies to animals. Who got the alternative housing?
Things like fidget toys might seem great for some disabled people but having them in the room could be distracting/overstimulating for others. The same goes with stimming. It can’t be helped but neither can the anxiety that another person in the room feels as they watch/hear it. Additionally, something like a weighted blanket might immediately calm one kid down and send the other one into a panic attack due to the claustrophobia it causes. (*Points to myself*)
Every Metro bus in New York City has a series of seats at the front that can be lifted up to accommodate people in wheelchairs but if I’m in one of those spots then someone with a cane/walker has to journey even further to sit down.
The flashing lights of a fire alarm are there to help deaf/hearing impaired but if they’re not properly timed, they can also cause a person to have a seizure.
The worst part about all of these is that there is rarely a concrete solution that makes everyone happy/safe. And I’m not here to offer any because I don’t know them. I’m just here to remind you all that as you’re taking your education/health classes, as you’re reading your textbooks, as you’re preparing to go be an advocate, just remember that there is rarely ever such a thing as a one-size-fits-all solution to advocacy and that something you do that can help one disabled person might actually hinder another.
Food for thought.
I have heard this referred to by some in the disability advocacy profession as “duelling disabilities” and it’s definitely something I wish people would be more mindful of when discussing accessibility.
In order for disabled people to receive any sort of financial assistant for their housing, food, bills, medical supplies, etc., they cannot ever have more than $2,000 of resources to their name. Ever.
It doesn’t matter what it’s for.
You’re saving up for a new wheelchair?
For college?
To put a downpayment on a house?
Hell man, you just happen to budget for once in your life so that you can have some extra money in case something bad happens?
Your benefits immediately get cut off if you’re a cent over $2,000.
And, even worse, you usually end up having to pay back every dollar the government gave you that month.
So say you get $400. If they find out you’re twenty dollars over the resource limit, you have to give them all $400 back and you undergo an investigation of your funds to see if you will continue getting money.
“What if I spend the money that day?”
Doesn’t matter. In fact, from what I can tell, people who do this are actually put under investigation for fraud.
And yes, this system literally kills people.
Remember when “Guardians of the Galaxy” came out? one of Rocket Racoon’s creators, Bill Mantlo, suffered an accident in 1992 and has irreparable brain damage.
before the movie came out, Marvel gave him an exclusive preview screening. SOme people were upset because they felt if Marvel was really wanted to thank mantlo, they should have donated money to Mantlo’s family.
Bill Mantlo’s brother had to come out and explain: If Marvel gave them monetary aid, Bill Mantlo would lose his financial assistance.
That’s so utterly depressing.
disgusting
I have friends on welfare who won’t pick up a penny in the street because they’d risk the welfare they struggled to get for 10 years.
oh look another fucked up thing in this world. let’s just add it to the list. number 63858b
My brother has been on California State SSI for autism for the last 10 years, and he absolutely has to (no joke, HAS TO) spend all 720 bucks of his SSI every month, because if he puts it in the bank he risks losing his SSI altogether.
Sometimes, at the end of the month, he has no idea what to do with his money because the whole month went by and he still has 400-ish bucks in his account, and he fucking panics because he doesn’t want to get anywhere near 2,000.
And here’s the funnest part of the story!
One day he did a huge commission on Second Life and wound up earning 1500 bucks off of it, and he told the guy to donate it 500 bucks at a time over 3 months. The guy didn’t want to, and just donated all 1500, which put my brother at 2,036 bucks.
The state IMMEDIATELY (I’m talking less than an hour) called him up to tell him over the phone that they were canceling his SSI, because they noticed he had gone over the 2,000 buck threshold. He had to tell them that someone had made a charitable donation to him and that this was not a common occurrence in any way shape or form, and upon not believing him, my mother had to call to talk to them as his legal caretaker and say basically the same thing until they called off the cancellation of his SSI money.
He also had to cancel his renter’s assistance because it put him to 1,062 a month, so if he went 30 days without spending any money they’d cancel his SSI altogether. Like, none of us in the family have any fucking clue why that regulation is in place and it’s the stupidest shit in human history.
Please, legal side of Tumblr, tell me what positive reasoning this law has?
It’s not just money, though. Things you own can count against your resource limit as well provided that they’re not exempt and provided that they’re worth money.
Also, the rules about what is and is not exempt from being counted against your resource limit are incredibly vague and deliberately open to interpretation. Even things that are normally exempted like clothing or furniture could be deemed non-exempt if a capricious bureaucrat decides that it’s actually worth too much money and thus counts as an ‘investment.’
As someone who receives SSI this causes me a huge amount of stress.
This is so unbelievably fucked up
don’t couples have to divorce sometimes because their combined income disqualifies them from assistance?
Conservatives: be more frugal and save money instead of asking to get paid more
Also conservatives: if you save money you’re a sneaky thief and a fraud
This week, the Office for National Statistics has added ready-made mashed potato to the UK’s official shopping basket, which it uses to measure inflation, and people are up in arms. Who buys a pre-chopped onion that costs three times as much as a whole one? How lazy do you have to be to choose a frozen omelette over a couple of eggs?
These kinds of convenience foods are an easy target. But for the 13.3 million people in Britain with disabilities – and those living with arthritis, chronic illness, recovering from injury or surgery, or undergoing cancer treatment – convenience foods aren’t just convenient: they are a lifeline.
This is an issue close to my heart. I’m a professional cook, but I also have a chronic pain condition, and there are occasions when I can’t even hold a knife. In times like those, I’m never going to opt for the impenetrable whole butternut squash over one that has already been diced for me.
Fuck man I’ve literally never even thought about this (which sounds so stupid when I type it out but that ‘s the insidiousness of abelism isn’t it? If we aren’t he ones affected we don’t think about it) but that’s ridiculous. Getting a brail menu made up can’t be that difficult. (And if it is, it shouldn’t be.) The big chain restaurants, certainly, have no excuse for not doing this. They can afford to put in that effort, can afford those extra printing costs without question. And they should be doing it, without question. But they won’t unless we say something.
So how about the next time you go into a restaurant, you ask them if they have a brail menu. Tell them you’re “checking for a friend” or whatever, I don’t care. Just ask them. Start making posts and tweets. Heck, tweet at the restaurants if they’ve got twitter accounts. If enough people ask, if enough pressure gets placed, they’ll see there’s a demand. They’ll see there’s a need, an obligation to provide a basic fucking menu that everyone can access. And maybe they’ll take steps to meet it. We can hope right?
Because the fact that this isn’t already standard practice is fucking appalling.
[ Image is a screenshot of a tweeted photo. It features a woman’s hands while reading a Braille menu. The tweet says, “My sister has been in this world 18 yrs and today is the first time she has been offered a menu at a restaurant. ]
Just for once I’d like to tell the gate agents and flight attendants that my folding wheelchair is going into the onboard closet and not have them tell me there’s “no room”. Bitch that’s a wheelchair closet, not a “your bags” closet. Move your damn bags where they belong.
Ok, so according to my friendly aviation expert, this is a Big Fucking Deal. In fact, if an airline argues with you about putting your wheelchair in the wheelchair closet or even suggests there may not be room, unless there is already anotherpassenger’swheelchair in that closet, they have violatedfederallaw.
CFR Title 14, Chapter II, Subchapter D, Part 382, Subpart E, Section 382.67, Subsection (e)
“As a carrier, you must never request or suggest that a passenger not stow his or her wheelchair in the cabin to accommodate other passengers (e.g., informing a passenger that stowing his or her wheelchair in the cabin will require other passengers to be removed from the flight), or for any other non-safety related reason (e.g., that it is easier for the carrier if the wheelchair is stowed in the cargo compartment).”
This is hugely important because it means that if this happens to you, you should report their asses to the DOT. Why? Because these statistics are published every year for every airline, and the airline gets a huge ass fine for every violation. If we want to see change, we need to make airlines literally pay every time they treat us this way.
Since I believe this is post mainly applies to Americans, here’s an addition for Canadian air travellers.
Code of Practice: Aircraft Accessibility for Persons with Disabilities (Air Code)
Scope: Aircraft with 30 or more passenger seats operated by Canadian carriers.
“The Air Code sets out that if the configuration of an aircraft with 100 or more passenger seats permits it, the aircraft should have on board storage space to accommodate a manually operated folding or collapsible wheelchair. If not, the passenger should have prompt access to their wheelchair upon arrival at destination and the carrier should make every reasonable effort to provide it at connecting stops where all passengers are permitted to deplane.”
Like OP says, if airline staff harangue you over your mobility device, or violate codes they should be following, report them.
Here’s the Canadian law for all my Canadian peeps! The original law is indeed US law and applies to all flights wholly within the US plus all flights originating or terminating within the US (so a flight from Toronto to Detroit would have to comply with the US laws). I believe it also applies to all flights on any US airline even if that flight is totally outside the US (e.g., a Delta Airlines flight from Tokyo to Singapore), but you’ll want to check that before you fly.
Please note that under US law, if an airline damages your wheelchair they have to repair it or else pay you the original purchase price. You’ll need to report the damage before you leave the airport. Don’t sign anything without reading it carefully – airlines have been known to try to get passengers to sign away their rights to this money.
wupacing 