On the word Disabled and “Allies” who don’t like that word
So I have a discord full of friends and I had posted a tweet from Four Wheel Workout on twitter (go follow her) that I will link and transcribe:Â
“Today I was told to my face that I am not disabled. I politely directed her attention to the 200lb+ wheelchair I’m in and my invisible legs. She said: No. you aren’t disabled. You are SKILL-able. Y’all I may or may not have snorted. I done heard it all.” https://twitter.com/4WheelWorkOut/status/1111841655164813312
Now a friend of mine had asked why skill-abled, because it sounded like the abled person in this story was making it seem like Four Wheel Work Out had skills that the abled didn’t (I mean we do, but that’s not the point of the story). And I had elaborated that ables (usually white ables) tend to dislike the word “disabled” and will try to stop using it even when the disabled person in question identifies with it. So they’ll change it to anything that isn’t disabled, like handicapped, differently abled, and the dreaded handicapable. And my friend had replied, “That’s really dumb, it sounds like you’re talking down to them.” And I had replied, “That’s usually because it is, even if they’re not actively thinking about it.” But then I thought, what if white, cishet, ables did this with other people?Â
Like imagine tomorrow, all white cishet ables started calling gay people “differently attracted” or something equally wordy. There would be an rightful outcry about it, with white cishets taking the right to name themselves out of gay people and putting into their own hands. Or what if trans people to white cishets was “differently gendered”, we’d be taking like five steps back in the trans rights movement with white cishets naming trans people for them. And that’s not to forget when white cishets have tried to do this to gay and trans people in the past, but those words usually have been shot down and cast aside. But like, imagine if differently attracted stuck and white cishets ables began to only call gay people that. Imagine how rightfully angry gay people would be. And now imagine society, and people who use differently attracted, that you should be grateful for them not calling you gay or worst. Imagine how pissed you would be. That’s what disabled people have been going through since the 90s at the very least.Â
