Nothing But Good News

I talk a lot about accessibility problems in daily life, but not typically about the unmitigated hell that is air travel. I have been insulted, touched without my permission, accused of faking, asked intrusive medical questions, gotten homophobic lectures from attendants I couldn’t get away from, been instructed to walk multiple times — and two of my personal wheelchairs have been broken.

All that said, the worst service I have received in my life has been from American Airlines. They consistently screw me over. They “forget” to preboard me. They “forget” to bring me a wheelchair. Heck, once I requested a bathroom break and I came out to find my wheelchair assistant gone. I had to sit there in the Cincinnati airport alone, frantically TWEETING AT THE AIRPORT, until a gate attendant took pity on me and took me down to baggage herself.

But if you really want to know how bad flying with them is, let me describe my experience flying with them a week and a half ago for a work trip. (In other words, I was not allowed to choose my airline.)

I arrived at the Philadelphia airport. I asked for assistance several times and was told to sit down in a waiting area and someone would be by shortly. I sat there for 45 minutes, at which point the person who told me that came by and it became immediately apparent that they’d forgotten about me. 20 minutes later, I finally got my wheelchair. In the end, I almost missed my plane.

The attendant, when he came, did not introduce himself or really talk to me at all. When we got to security, he refused to touch my belongings (attendants need to put our belongings on the conveyor because, y’know, we can’t get up there) and demanded I get up and do it myself, something I’ve literally never encountered before. In the end, he wheeled me over to the belt and made me strain to put my things on it because he was acting like my belongings were diseased.

When he rolled me up to the scanners, he did not ask me about my ability to walk, just demanded I get up. I requested a non-metal cane (because my own had been put on the belt) and he got very huffy about it, but another TSA agent heard me and gave it to me. After I finally got through the scanner, he did not bring the wheelchair over to me so I could sit in it, and I was forced to walk across the room to him. Yeah, it hurt.

I was handed off to like… six different attendants throughout the course of my trip to the terminal. At one point, I was forced to walk to get onto a shuttle bus. The wheelchair was not loaded on with me. When we arrived, there was no wheelchair waiting. I was told to wait on the bus — but then the driver started pulling away with me trapped on the bus. The driver was behind glass so I had to literally bang on the windows of the bus so someone would notice and stop the bus. Instead of bringing the wheelchair to me, I was expected to climb off the bus, walk inside, and get a new one. Wow, accessibility.

I finally had to demand a bathroom break because no one asked me if I needed to eat/drink/pee and I’d had to hold it for two hours at this point. I was told to walk to the bathroom. After I refused, more huffing, but someone got a wheelchair to walk me over.

FINALLY, TIME TO BOARD! Psych, I got outside, was told it was a tarmac boarding (something that had not been told to me ahead of time) and that if I’d wanted assistance, I should have preordered an aisle chair, something that’s typically only necessary to request if you’ll need a wheelchair onboard. I have never had to request one and, again, didn’t know it was a tarmac boarding, so I didn’t request it. I was repeatedly asked if I could walk “at all” and if I was sure I couldn’t just walk up. At this point, I was so frustrated that I literally started to cry. In public. They finally took me up.

Note: this was the ramp I’d been expected to walk up. As I was hobbling through the section too thin for the wheelchair, the woman grabbed my cane to “guide” me. I almost fell down.

When I got to Cincinnati, my tweets had apparently been heard. The manager of Prospect, the company AA uses for wheelchair assistance, was waiting for me. He was very nice! He gave me his card! The attendant told me to ask for him by name! I was not happy, but somewhat pacified.

I get to CVG three days later to go home. There is no wheelchair desk at check-in. I see another woman in a wheelchair, so I ask where she got it. Her daughter “found it”, and the woman had already missed her flight because she hadn’t been able to find assistance in time. I talked to two other women who just started walking despite the pain they were in.

I finally figure out where to request a wheelchair. A dedicated desk? No. A passing employee? No. I was supposed to stand in the check-in line. I got upset, so someone at another airline suggested I just cut the line. That was what I had to do, and I felt like a dick.

This line, in fact:

Waited, waited. Finally got a wheelchair. It was not the man I’d been told to request. Whatever. He was nicer than the man at PHL, but I still had to go through a genital pat-down at TSA. (As in, “please spread your legs wider for me”.) Yeah, that happens almost every time when you’re disabled. Fun times. Once I showed signs of being upset and they made me do it twice, without any kind of support to hold me up. Note: I am a sexual abuse survivor.

Finally get to the gate and the attendant leaves. I am in full view of the agent desk. It starts getting close to boarding and no attendant in sight, despite me specifically telling them I’d need help boarding. I got another passenger to go up to them and ask them for help. I was told an attendant would be coming soon. It came time to board, and I was left across the room. I literally started shouting across the room for help. The gate agent looked me in the eye and told me that she wasn’t ignoring me, that I’d be preboarded. SPOILERS: I wasn’t preboarded.

This meant that when I finally got down to the entrance of the plane, I had two options. I could go wait in the line that forms in the aisle while people are putting their baggage up. This is very painful for me, so instead I waited at the door for the people in front of me to sit down. A large line formed behind me because they still kept calling groups to board and again, I felt like a dick. I got to cry in public again.

Boarding in CVG, I didn’t have to do a tarmac boarding, but I still had to disembark that way in PHL. This time, the flight attendants called ahead to make sure I’d have an aisle chair. Those are super fun, by the way, you’re strapped in like Hannibal Lecter and wheeled backwards. :’)

I demanded a bathroom break once we got off. Note: I say “demanded” because no one ever freaking asked because god forbid they treat you like a human. You’re usually expected to just sit there at the gate for a while until a new attendant can take you to baggage, but I’ve taken to asking if they can leave me over by the bathroom instead because I’ve almost wet myself. (I often cannot get to the toilet on the plane.) So anyway, I was taken to a companion restroom. The door didn’t close all the way. Yeah, it was completely broken. This wasn’t a stall. It was a COMPANION RESTROOM WITH A DOOR. If the door doesn’t close, the entire terminal can see in. Instead of taking me to another stall, the attendant just “stood guard” outside the door. So that was super-fun and not nerve-wracking at all.

The attendant then proceeded to get lost in the airport and didn’t believe me when I told her the right way to go. It’s not like I’ve ever flown out of my own home city before or anything, wow.

Now, this was worse than usual. I often have problems with all airlines (Delta was the one that kept smashing up wheelchairs, shoutout) but American is just By Far the worst. I usually fly Southwest because I’ve had far fewer problems with them at PHL (and I don’t have to pay extra for a seat that’s accessible for my needs) but sometimes AA is the only airline that’ll take you where you need to go.

I make this post for two reasons. Number one, I have to fly American again in about a week (again, I did not choose this) and I’m almost sick with worry. I was so stressed out and pained after the last trip that I came home, took very strong painkillers, and collapsed for like a day.

The other reason is that AA finally got back to me about my complaints from last week. They accused me of not asking for assistance ahead of time (I did; I even talked face-to-face with a manager to order accommodations) and snottily told me that I could have asked the gate agent for assistance. So number one, they only answered one of the MANY issues I had. Number two, they implied it was all my fault — despite me doing everything I was supposed to do. Number three, despite the many broken accessible areas, despite the poor treatment by employees, they still hold firm to this “you need to order things ahead of time or you’re screwed” line.

So I ask you. What if you don’t know those policies? What if you’re a child or a first-time flyer? What if you have a short-term injury and aren’t used to this? What if, like that woman in the wheelchair who missed her flight, you’re elderly and ESL and deeply confused?

The pain I am put through, the embarrassment and dehumanization and physical strain, is awful when I fly. To be blamed for it is worse. But the worst knowledge of all is that I am privileged. I am white. I am young enough to know how to complain on social media. I know my rights. I know to leave several hours in case I am mistreated. Like that old woman, like the women I saw walking to their gates, there are so many people who are not in that position. They will be victimized.

A manager approached me at CVG to apologize as I landed. No one will apologize to those women. They will be victimized. It’s not right how disabled people are treated at airports, and frankly, it’s not legal. But they know that our voices are not listened to and so they know that they can get away with it. Do you know how AA found me from my angry tweets? All they had to do was look at the DM history. I’ve sent them so many complaints over the years. They haven’t changed. They don’t care.

And as much as my body hurts after experiences like that, my heart hurts more. I’m so tired of people not caring.

In Gwen’s backstory scene you can see the shadow of her beating up Green Goblin right?

Now if you pay attention to the Green Goblin’s shadow you can see it turning into a man like this;

This is Peter Parker, in Gwen’s universe Peter Parker is her best friend and also the Green Goblin

You can even see the green blue scales left on his body after he is back to his normal state

And you can see the look of terror on Gwen’s face after she realizes what she has done, and they don’t even show her face

Then later when Peter meets MJ in the restaurant Gwen tells Peter that “it’s not your MJ, trust me I’ve been there”

She is directly talking about him, right in front of him, and he doesn’t even know it

Gwen goes through the entire movie having to look at Peter B. Parker and remember that she killed her Peter

Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss

Little leaf cutter bee waking up in her tiny leaf bed 🐝 

Cat finds a new friend 

American woodcock luring worms 

There is a core group of individuals who have been on site for TWO YEARS. Other volunteers come in and out to help and live onsite for anywhere between a few days to a few months at a time, but there’s a few individuals who have been on country for TWO YEARS, without pause. They have been camping, unceasingly, on the land to protect these sites (several trees with varying types of cultural importance, including an 800 year old birthing tree which has been the site of over 10,000 Djapwurrung babies being born) for two years. The sites haven’t been left unmanned even for a few hours since this all started.

One of these indigenous protectors has:

been deliberately sprayed in the face with weed poison by a local farmer

been endlessly targetted by the local cops, including being arrested for having an expired licence (even though he was driving a truck on a private field at the time, and not out on the road, so there was no grounds to arrest him) and put in jail for several months over this offence (even though a white would never be arrested for an expired licence. In the end when it finally got to court, the judge was like “You’ve imprisoned this man for months for an expired licence? What the fuck, get out of here, charges are dropped, give the man a warning and let him go”

had the local MacDonalds threaten to call the cops on him for the “crime” of loitering (read: eating a meal in-store)

had a different MacDonalds threaten to call the cops because he didn’t want to give the staff his name and phone number (the COVID restrictions require restaraunts to ask for phone numbers in case of a break out so they can notify people, but it’s not actually a requirement of diners to give those details, and the restaurant certainly doesn’t have the grounds to call the cops on someone for not supplying their number)

strained himself so much by insisting on staying on the land to protect the sites that he wound up hospitalised with various illnesses that struck him because he was physically and emotionally exhausted by the whole situation

walked from the site into Melbourne city, on foot, in an effort to raise awareness (over 200 kilometres/41 hours worth of walking)

The front line camp is alongside a busy road, and all the asshole locals and truck drivers who go past that are pissed about the protest make sure to express their displeasure by honking their horns loudly and repeatedly whenever they go by, whether that’s at 2 pm or 2 am, which I’m sure you can imagine does wonders for the protectors ability to get a good night sleep

That’s just a snippet of what this one person has gone through. That doesn’t cover the constant abuse faced by all of them, the attempts at property destruction, the attitude they get by locals whenever they go into town for supplies, the constant red alerts because someone’s heard that the machinery is being mobilised and that they’re moving to start works tomorrow. There were several occasions where police were called to disperse the protectors so that works could begin, and it’s only because there were more protectors than cops that everyone wasn’t arrested and dragged off.

I could literally go on for days with details about this. An archeologist came out to the site and was absolutely staggered by the stuff that was there – in addition to the trees themselves, there was more archeological evidence of the local indigenous tribe that had lived there, sitting untouched on the surface of the earth than this archeologist has seen at any other site throughout Australia. A detailed report was sent to the supposed Minister for the Environment, who summarily ignored it and gave her stamp of approval for the works to commence without reading any of the reports. The protectors went to court over this and it was found that yeah, the Environment Minister hasn’t done her job at all, and a full review has been ordered —- but the works haven’t been cancelled altogether.

All this for a road that will shave a few minutes of travel off the road that currently already exists. All this for a road that’s got a speed limit of 80 that they want to boost to 110. All this for a road that could go a different route. There’s another route available that the protectors have been pitching for since the start, but VicRoads refuses to consider it for reasons they won’t specify.

This route that they’re insistent on not only cuts directly through several indigenous sites (some of the only ones left in Victoriaof this kind) it also costs around $630 million more. This route is full of hills and valleys that need to be flattened, and it’s twisty and turny. The Northern Route - the one protectors have been wanting since the beginning - is flat and straight, will be literal hundreds of millions of dollars less expensive, will take less time to complete, and doesn’t cut through any indigenous sites.

If you could sign this petition, that would be awesome. Here is another petition.

Here is a copy of an academic petition sent by RMIT to the Victorian government, signed by over 150 academics.

Here is an article written by an indigenous woman (which I am not, by the way; I’m just a white woman who is outraged by what my government is trying to do to these people) on the topic that has some more information.

Calls for Justice for Aurora’s Violinist Elijah McClain Grow

Elijah McClain was a kind and gentle 23 year old who worked as a massage therapist in Aurora, CO. On his lunch breaks from work, Elijah would go to the animal shelters and play violin for the animals because he thought that they were lonely in their cages and thought that the music would calm them. 

In August 2019, Elijah went to the gas station to buy some iced tea for himself and his cousins. Because he suffered from anemia he would often wear a ski/ runner mask over his face to stay warm. On his way home, the Aurora Police department were called to reports of a “suspicious man.” 

(Warning: for violent description) Elijah was apprehended by a group of three cops, despite committing NO crime and being unarmed. A struggle occurred, and he was held in a very dangerous carotid hold around his neck while he cried for help, cried out that he couldn’t breathe, cried out that he was nonviolent and couldn’t even kill a fly, and was repeatedly throwing up. Elijah weighed a mere 140 pounds. You can hear on the audio footage, an officer instructing another to move their body camera out of view.

While 3 Aurora Police Dept officers violently restrained him they called Aurora Fire Dept, who injected him with ketamine (a powerful drug used to tranquilize horses or in surgeries by a trained anesthesiologist and illegal to be administered by anyone else) even though he was already cuffed and calm.

He went into cardiac arrest , slipped into a coma, and his family was advised to take him off life support 6 days later.

The cops were transferred to another department but never received charges. 

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN HELP:

DONATE 

Click this Link to call these Representatives and DEMAND JUSTICE!!

Especially call these numbers:

Call CO Governor Jared Polis (303) 866 2471

Call Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman (303) 739 7015

Call District Attorney Dave Young (303) 659 7720

Source / Police Video (Trigger warning) 

#WAKEUP

The Tekua Itakupe tribe managed to put the fire out themselves but a lot of people were hurt.

They’re asking for donations to help them. They need water, they have wounded ppl, and also need to make repairs. I think only Brazilians can donate this way bc it’s direct deposit.  So let me huh. Well. translate

If you could share this with your Brazilian mutuals, friends, and followers, that’d be great!

Brasileiros do tumblr, a tribo Tekoa Itakupe sofreu com um incêndio ontem dia 21/06/2020 (#incêndiojaraguá) e embora tenham conseguido apagá-lo, muitas pessoas estão machucadas, e ocorreu danos à floresta e à distribuição de água. Desculpa se qualquer info aqui estiver sem detalhes, eu acabei de ver isso no twitter. Se puderem fazer doações para a tribo, aqui está a informação da conta bancária.

@ultrastimpaks​ @cephalonsuda​  acho q vcs sao os unicos BR aqui q eu conheço, se puderem repassem para BRs que voces tenham contato aqui, vai  q alguem pode doar