A new week, a new mega! Welcome all disabled comrades. As always, we ask that in order to participate in the weekly megathread, one self-identifies as some form of disabled, which is broadly defined in the community sidebar:
“Disability” is an umbrella term which encompasses physical disabilities, emotional/psychiatric disabilities, neurodivergence, intellectual/developmental disabilities, sensory disabilities, invisible disabilities, and more. You do not have to have an official diagnosis to consider yourself disabled.
What is Disability Justice?
… In 2005, disabled queers and activists of color began discussing a “second wave” of disability rights. Many of these first conversations happened between Patty Berne and Mia Mingus, two queer disabled women of color who were incubated in progressive and radical movements which had failed to address ableism in their politics. Their visioning soon expanded to include others including Leroy Moore, Stacey Milbern, Eli Clare and Sebastian Margaret. These conversations evolved over time, at conferences, over the phone, formal and informal, one-on-one and in groups.
While every conversation is built on those that came before it, and it’s possible that there were others who were thinking and talking this way, it is our historical memory that these were the conversations that launched the framework we call disability justice.
Given the isolation enforced by ableism and capitalism, many of us have often found ourselves as leaders within our various communities, yet isolated from in-person community with other disabled people of color or queer or gender non-conforming crips. Many of us have found “liberated zones” online that celebrate our multiple identities. Disability justice is a developing framework that some call a movement. We are still identifying the “we,” touching each other through the echoes of each other’s hopes and words.
Given this early historical snapshot, we assert that disability justice work is largely done by individuals within their respective settings, with Sins Invalid and the Disability Justice Collectives based in NYC, Seattle, and Vancouver, B.C., being notable exceptions. These groups and organizing structures often come into being, fall apart and regroup with different names and configurations over time. Online groups like Sick & Disabled Queers can offer opportunities for people with disabilities to communicate and create new norms together. Some voices may emphasize a specific aspect of disability justice over another, which can be expected in all early movement moments. However, what has been consistent across disability justice - and must remain so - is the leadership of disabled people of color and of queer and gender non-conforming disabled people.
Disability justice activists, organizers, and cultural workers understand that able- bodied supremacy has been formed in relation to other systems of domination and exploitation. The histories of white supremacy and ableism are inextricably entwined, created in the context of colonial conquest and capitalist domination. One cannot look at the history of US slavery, the stealing of Indigenous lands, and US imperialism without seeing the way that white supremacy uses ableism to create a lesser/“other” group of people that is deemed less worthy/abled/smart/capable. A single-issue civil rights framework is not enough to explain the full extent of ableism and how it operates in society. We can only truly understand ableism by tracing its connections to heteropatriarchy, white supremacy, colonialism, and capitalism. The same oppressive systems that inflicted violence upon Black and brown communities for 500+ years also inflicted 500+ years of violence on bodies and minds deemed outside the norm and therefore “dangerous.”
Furthermore, racism, anti-Islamic beliefs, ableism and imperialism come together to feed us images of the “terrorist” as a dangerous Brown enemy… All this is compounded by the ways ableism, along with queer-hatred and the violence of the gender binary, label our bodies and communities as “deviant,” “unproductive,” and “invalid.”
A disability justice framework understands that:
- All bodies are unique and essential.
- All bodies have strengths and needs that must be met.
- We are powerful, not despite the complexities of our bodies, but because of them.
- All bodies are confined by ability, race, gender, sexuality, class, nation state, religion, and more, and we cannot separate them.
These are the positions from which we struggle. We are in a global system that is incompatible with life. The literal terrain of the world has shifted, along with a neo-fascist political terrain. Each day the planet experiences human-provoked mudslides, storms, fires, devolving air quality, rising sea levels, new regions experiencing freezing or sweltering temperatures, earthquakes, species loss and more, all provoked by greed-driven, human-made climate chaos. Our communities are often treated as disposable, especially within the current economic, political and environmental landscapes. There is no way to stop a single gear in motion — we must dismantle this machine.
Disability justice holds a vision born out of collective struggle, drawing upon legacies of cultural and spiritual resistance. Within a thousand underground paths we ignite small persistent fires of rebellion in everyday life. Disabled people of the global majority — Black and brown people — share common ground confronting and subverting colonial powers in our struggle for life and justice. There has always been resistance to all forms of oppression, as we know in our bones that there have also always been disabled people visioning a world where we flourish, a world that values and celebrates us in all our beauty.
Source: Sins Invalid
Mask up, love one another, and stay alive for one more week.
incandescent rage at the welfare system today. in my country it’s very transparently a capitalist humiliation ritual designed to remind you that you are part of an underclass seen as subhuman. i managed to get one payment but the state owes me another 3 that “expired” because i didn’t go in time, apparently i am still entitled to the money just more hoop-jumping required. genuinely at the end of my tether.
ME posting:
- I have to lie in bed at least 14 hrs a day and most days more. Now as I have lost significantly amount of muscle due to inactivity it’s become less comfortable to be in bed for so long.
- not being able to help friends and family as much and being so dependent on other people is hard. I used to cook for my family and now I can’t even cook for myself so they have to do it for me. Being able to do such things for my family was a source if pride and happiness and now I have lost that which sucks.
- I’m fucking lonely because I don’t see anyone else most days
I recently had a weird talk with a therapist I ahve been thinking about. In thr in take forms I checked that I have no history of mental illness. I reported my ADHD in thr history. She was like, “so you are mentally ill” and I said I not ill I am just adapted to a diffrent environment. There was an awkward silence
meeting this morning to discuss my autism assessment results
✨ I’M NOT READY ✨
it was originally supposed to be a week from when she emailed them to me, but then I got covid and our testing schedule got messed up and here we are: it hasn’t even been 2 whole days
tbqh, idk that 2 whole months would be enough time 😅
extremely grateful that I have a supportive partner who will help me with the appointment, because I’m pretty sure it’s going to be hard for me to talk at all
spouse was very helpful
assessor really truly incredibly kind
feel some overwhelming something that I’m having a hard time naming, probably because it’s a big tangle of several complicated things
and now we’re ready for the holidays
circling the drain even harder, idk why I thought this would help
honestly seems like such a bad idea in retrospect:
Have Someone Tell You Exactly What Is Wrong With You
why did I expect that would help?? 🤦😂😭
genuinely not sure how I could feel worse right now
why did I scrape up hundreds of dollars for this horrible, detestable information
there’s so much better I could have used it on, people need help with rent, why did I use this money to feel bad about myself
I regret wanting answers. questions were better. then there was the chance that maybe it wasn’t the way that it is
😭😭😭😭
People at my school are posting “make sure to take care of yourself post election 🥺 drink water and do self care” stuff on discord. All these people who walk around who haven’t been masking since 2022, just shaking as if the Democrats haven’t killed at least a million people from their COVID policies alone. This is what got me to finally leave the Disabled Students Union server. Cry me a river.
I posted the PFLP’s statement on the election to my COVID club’s group chat because I’m not having any of that in the student group I run lolll.
NYT with a “no shit” article: When Chronic Diseases Come With Chronic Financial Pressure
Some statistics in the article:
- 129 million USians “deal with a major chronic disease”
- 30% of “adults reported not taking medications as prescribed over the past year because of cost”
- 40% of adults have at least two chronic conditions
- Women are more likely than men to have chronic conditions, and “women and people with disabilities are particularly likely to skip or delay medication because of financial concerns”
jfc everything hurts so fucking bad, it should be illegal to have arthritis in your 30s
So I was thinking about the post someone made in the past thread about being stuck in waiting mode, and it finally hit me that I’m kinda stuck a bit. As opposed to the “I have to be somewhere in 3 hours so I’m thinking about that and can’t really get into anything,” this is more of a “who knows what’s gonna happen but its just kinda like a recurring itch and when I’m not distracted I’m kinda feeling weird and ruminating” thats been going on for a couple of weeks now.
Sorry for being so vague but I’m wondering if anyone has general advice? Distracting myself with interests has been helpful but work is the least interesting thing so when I’m supposed to be working I dont distract myself with fun stuff and then it just kinda is creeping up on me.
Another day of trying to use “fantasizing about successfully suing the United States of America for giving me a migraine” as a painkiller
I don’t have a disability, but my partner does. Is this a good place to rant when the machinations of the system seem bent on socially murdering them?
Rule 1 states this comm is open to everyone, and in fact I’d even encourage you and others in your position to share your stories if you want.
Also
yes
I let slip in my interview last week that I’m autistic. Idk why, I guess just over the last year or 2 since I’ve been learning where I do and don’t mask, and when I should mask around normies, I’ve slowly become aware of my own Self more. But the question was related to what kind of person I am. I’m fucking goofy. Like I know when I need to be serious or whatever but even my partner has pointed out that I crack stupid jokes as a defense when I’m nervous and such. I’m just a goofy and weird person and I really don’t wanna change that.
I do feel obligated if that wasn’t a deal breaker to explain that I need directions explained literally to me otherwise I can spend hours dissecting what they are really asking from me. I get fired for that part a lot(for not knowing precisely what I should be doing etc). After I learned that little nugget about me, I can see why in the past I might have gotten fired for being “confrontational”, or “lazy”, or whatever. Other big reason is burnout causing my performance to slip.
But I think I might bring that up if I get a third interview. And that is what I am waiting on now. Idk when that will be but I hope it’s soon because I’ve been studying for a potential drug test and I just wanna fucking get high and disassociate for a few days. These last 2 job prospects have felt a lot like work.
E: I didn’t get the job. Looks like I may be medicating tonight…
Thinking of skipping class today tbh. Just… really not feeling it.
Knowing your limits and acting decisively when reaching them is very based. It can suck tho if there’s a lot to catch up on later…
I don’t want to go to work tomorrow. I can’t work in a monitored PC, in an open office, with stand up meetings that interrupt me and a 2h commute (total thankfully). I know I have it good with my slow-ass coding job, but this kind of environment isn’t conductive to taking breaks so I just overwork myself. I already used the “feeling sick” excuse last week to work remotely, so I will have to survive another day. Being AuDHD is suffering
Hi mega :ralsei-wave:
Which auadhd symptom is the one that makes me not enjoy concerts? Followup what is the treatment protocol for that? I feel like I can enjoy drinking at a concert but not the actual concert.
crowded + loud + nobody is paying any god damned attention to what’s going on around them so you have to do it for everybody the whole time = stimulus overload
I work in music, etymotic earplugs help a great deal with volume at concerts. And you can hear the music better!
Oh damn, gonna check that out
I keep them on my keychain and use them all the time. Even in just loud rooms with poor acoustics, they are a godsend. Most are relatively similar across the price range, just with differences of decibel reduction. I recommend 10 or 15 db.
Maybe some autism sensitivity like the music being too loud for you
I had not considered this but in retrospect I feel like that is probably part of it.
