Today is International Day Of Persons With Disabilities. Since 1992 December 3 has been marked by the United Nations in an attempt to ‘promote an understanding of disability issues and mobilise support for the dignity, rights and well-being of persons with disabilities’. Twenty-seven years into their campaign I’m a bit concerned by its progress.
Twenty-seven years seems like a long time. It is so long that Everton have won a meaningful trophy within that time. We have had six Prime Ministers, 10 full-time England managers and 47 different Sugababes line-ups. But when you are devoting only one day a year to the cause you should expect progress to be slow. International Day Of Persons With Disabilities registers in the national consciousness about as much as World Wetlands Day (February 2), World Day For Water (March 22), Wrong Trousers Day (June 24) and International Day Of Photographing Your Dinner (September 12). Ok, I made that last one up. Every day is World Photographing Your Dinner Day.
The point is that ‘special’ days like these are a misguided if well-intentioned token gesture. Their very existence merely encourages the notion that we can forget about disabilities, wetlands, water and our trousers for the rest of the year. There’s no responsibility attached to our ignorance of these things if we have the safety net of one 24-hour period out of every 365 spent half-heatedly encouraging people to do something that should, by now in 2019, be automatic. Supporting the ‘dignity, rights and well-being’ of disabled people shouldn’t be an effort. It should not be marked on your calendar as the day you will make a big push towards the lofty ambition of not being a total arse. Least of all your advent calendar which should only ever be used for the consumption of small pieces of chocolate.
This seems obvious but I have to tell you that there are still a sizeable number of people out there who haven’t grasped these dignity and rights concepts. Let me give you an example. The building where I am employed (I know, maybe we’ve taken this whole equality thing too far) has a very steep ramp which leads on to the main streets. In the absence of anything resembling a cafe or coffee shop on site I have to negotiate this ramp to get out for my lunch. I won’t lie. It’s hard work. I hate it. So much so that I have started taking a much longer route, visiting a supermarket much further away to avoid it. Yet the physical exertion required is only one reason why I have given it the swerve. The other is that I cannot push up this ramp without members of the public offering to help me and, in extreme cases, completely ignoring me when I politely decline.
The whole situation is embarrassing for everyone. If I have declined an offer of help, sometimes two or three times, then it surely becomes an actual crime to then put your hands on me and start pushing me anyway. Where is the dignity? Where is the respect? Has International Day Of Persons With Disabilities taught you nothing?
Of course it hasn’t because, as we’ve discussed, the only evidence you will have seen of it anywhere in the media whether mainstream, social or other is this thousand-word letter of complaint on the subject. It’s not a big deal, but then for the reasons we have seen that is probably a good thing. The last thing I want is to be lulled into believing I have dignity and respect on December 3 every year only to wake up on December 4 to find that nothing has been done -still in 2019 - to make trains legitimately accessible and that forcing a disabled person to sit in front of their partner (rather than next to them) in the theatre is still acceptable in polite society. That would bee too much to bear, wouldn’t it? I’m keeping my expectations low.
When you able bodied folk are not demonstrating your sense of superiority by insisting on providing physical assistance that has been declined, and scratching your heads about why a disabled person needs to sit next to anybody at the theatre, you swing wildly in the other direction into the realms of inspiration porn. Suddenly you are not worthy, and begin romanticising perfectly mundane tasks performed by disabled people as if they are Herculean efforts. It is not a compliment to tell a disabled person how well they have done to avoid killing themselves this morning, or how fantastic it is that they can drive a car or drink a beer (not at the same time).
Paralympians are relentlessly targeted too, as if their sporting prowess has been achieved ‘despite’ their disability. The implication is that their achievements are only valuable because they have arrived in what are perceived to be trying circumstances. But when a para-athlete is training to win gold they are not thinking in terms of overcoming a disability. They are thinking only of winning. Of beating the opponent. It is sport and disability does not enter into it.
This message never quite seems to hit home. The effect of it is that those of us who are not on telly like Ade Adepitan, who are not in the House Of Lords like Tanni Grey-Thompson and who have not won her multiple Paralympic titles and those of many others are viewed in an even dimmer light than we were before. Having seen what has been possible to achieve for these highly talented, highly dedicated people, thoughts start to turn to why there are some disabled people knocking about that haven’t matched that level of attainment. Aren’t these people just lazy scrounges? The Paralympic ‘Superhumans’ as they are often depicted on Channel 4 have become the standard by which the rest of us are judged. If you’re not breaking records, influencing political debate or both then you really mustn’t be trying very hard. It has become almost impossible for disabled people to be viewed as ordinary or, dare one utter the shudder-inducing term.....normal. We are either celebrities to be revered for all the wrong reasons or we are pitiable, inferior Undateables fodder who definitely need a push up a steep ramp whether we like it or not.
I have been alive for 16,127 days. You can actually Google that. I haven’t been sat here for the last two hours trying to work that out and having an internal argument with myself about whether leap years coincide with World Cups or Olympic Games. It’s the latter, if you’re wondering. But anyway, 28 days dedicated to dignity, respect and well-being in a life spanning 16,127 days and counting hasn’t been nearly enough. We have a long way to go.
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