burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

Thanks to everyone for your time this morning.

I’ll clean up the notes from the meeting and work with [M.] on a Doodle poll for 45-minute tours of his online course.

In the meantime, while we were settling in, [F.] had mentioned struggling to explain to her 7-year-old that the people who are supposed to protect us aren’t, and I had offered to share some picture book recommendations.

In the chat, [A.] shared A Kids Book About Racism (https://akidsbookabout.com/products/a-kids-book-about-racism) and I shared Something Happened in Our Town: A Child's Story About Racial Injustice (https://www.apa.org/pubs/magination/441B228).

A friend had recently posted to Facebook crowdsourcing for “useful, honest books about race in the United States for different age cohorts” and someone linked to this GoogleDoc of books for kids ages 0-12 in a bunch of topical categories (including “Police Brutality/Racist Attacks/Black Lives Matter/Incarceration”): https://docs.google.com/document/d/15H1nzEIbC53OojvsLnlxM2zGYktooOGlOFMZ9xO74zk/mobilebasic

Myles Brand died today. While no one truly believes that the NCAA values the student above the athlete in the lives of student-athletes in Division I colleges, Brand at least introduced some important reforms, like tying scholarships to graduation rates. Under his tenure, the NCAA also disallowed colleges and universities that are overtly racist from hosting championships. (The NCAA, under Brand, was pushing all schools who use racist nicknames to change their mascot. So far it hasn't taken.)

But really, he'll forever be remember as the guy who fired Bob Knight at Indiana.

Let’s start with that point from earlier that it DOES suck — in this society — not to have the same freedom of movement an abled person. (Although of course, here, we’re already starting in with ableist assumptions, because a big portion of the reason it sucks is because society is set up for people with bodies we consider normal.) OK, so let’s rephrase. Having functional legs is useful. Therefore, the state of having legs which are not as functional as other legs is not as nice as the state of having normally functional legs. (Again, there’s some ableism around the concept of normal, but moving on.)

But even accepting that impairment to mobility is itself a sucky thing, MAYBE DISABLED PEOPLE DO NOT APPRECIATE BEING THE CULTURAL GO-TO FOR THINGS THAT SUCK.

You are on the right track, but here is the thing about saying something like “the logic of having a mobility impairment totally sucks is self-evident.”

It’s not, really. People with disabilities most of the time do not go around saying, God! It sucks so bad that my legs don’t work! They are just who they are, a whole person with varying characteristics, some of which society has labeled as a disability.

Take being gay, for example. One could argue, and some have, that this is a form of disability and that it sucks. Gay people inherently have things to deal with, like fertility issues or the fact that they have to find different ways to socialize within a smaller range of people (the arguable 10% of the population that is gay). Or, to get really technical and TMI about it, they might have to find different ways to be intimate with each other. Doesn’t this inherently suck? Isn’t it logical to think that being gay is inherently inferior to being straight? Isn’t it easier to be straight? And that isn’t even counting the artificial attitudinal barriers of being gay. They can’t marry, or get on each others health insurance plan, or adopt as easily as straight people. It must suck so bad to be gay! Its logical that gay must mean sucky!

Right?

Well, no. What LGBT people have done exceptionally well (and are still working on) is to show people that their lifestyle and sexuality is on a continuum of normal. That gender does not have to be binary and people should be able to express gender in a way that feels comfortable for them and that is a normal part of the human condition. They are not mentally ill, or some kinds of freaks who have a horrible condition, they just are who they are…humans.

So, people with disabilities are the same way. The body comes in all shapes, sizes and conditions and all are part of the normal condition of human existence. Disability is a normal part of life. Do some things suck about a specific disability? Sure. Just like it must suck for LGBT people who want to have children and can’t go about it as easily or as cheaply as heterosexual couples can. Just like everyone on the planet has something about themselves that they can’t control that sucks. (Run faster, be better at math, sing better, not be bald, whatever.) It goes beyond saying that logically, being lame sucks but we shouldn’t hurt disabled people’s feelings by using that word. It goes to trying to get people to stop singling out one physical (or mental) aspect of ourselves as being sucky and having that thing define who we are–our entire life experience. To us, whatever characteristic we have that makes us disabled is just a part of our whole selves, and most of us are quite fond of our whole selves, thankyouverymuch. Many people will tell you that being disabled has given them experiences and opportunities that they wouldn’t exchange for anything.

In my case, my PC word peeve is “blind”. (I’m deaf blind) I’m not talking about the word “blind” itself. I’m fine with people calling me blind and prefer it to all the many euphemisms people come up with like “sight impaired” or whatnot. I hate it when blind (or deaf for that matter) is used in place of the words unknowing or stupid. i.e. She was blind to the fact that her use of the word “lame” was offensive. Blind people actually do not walk around in the dark completely unaware of what is going on around them. We actually know stuff. My point is, I think it is a matter of looking at the word (lame, blind) and really understanding what you are using that word to mean (sucky, stupid). Is that a fair use of the word? Does it really represent the people that are usually defined by that word? If not, maybe it is time to think of some better, more fitting words to describe things.

jesse_the_k

oyceter

Uh-huh. I've come to realize, after following and participating in many an internet or IRL argument, that the ego is hands down the most exhausting, obstructive entity in existence. How curious that it's so very preponderant among privileged POVs, but so rarely the reverse! It's almost as if some people are taught their voices are more important than others'! :O

I just wish, when playing at allyship, people's FIRST act was to sit and listen (and think! and deconstruct themselves! BASICALLY: What bell hooks said), before they tried to yell and scream and maintain their socially enforced positions as Most Important and Listened to Speaker at all costs. Trying to maintain privilege in this area truly obstructs even approaching unpacking it everywhere else, and yet somehow there's this privileged assumption that talking and posting and dripping privilege and ignorance all over the world is a great form of allyship, something that's going to help you, and the people around you, learn and grow and change! It all comes back to ego, I guess: I'll get more out of basically talking to myself, of talking over you and convincing myself that I'm saying something new and changing slowly but surely, than I will out of listening to you.

coffeeandink

delux_vivens

something i've seen repeatedly brought up on lj over the years are objections to the concept of 'safe space'.

and particuarly, the objections that somehow if there is a 'safe space' the people in it are somehow depriving themselves; of a commitment to intellectual rigor, of any opportunity for mental growth and development, of any sort of opportunity to learn from people that are different from them because, of course, safe space means that you squelch any and all dissenting opinions, about, well, everything.

I was under the impression people within a particular community can be a part of that community and have extreme disagreement, but also agree to disagree. Case in point: sex_and_race and interracial dating. I'm just sayin'. There's folks there who are married to white people, and those who refuse to ever even consider the possibility of ever letting a white person see them nekkid and most likely cut someone for suggesting it. Yet and still they manage to understand each other's position, no matter how much extremity people may feel about it.*

This is fascinating to me. because, really, participation in an online (or offline) community somehow means that I and others am devoting my life to the pursuit of avoidance of aaaaaaaaany exposure to anything else *but* that community? Somehow by doing that I can insulate myself from the larger world that as Hanifa Walidah** put it 'dont wish me right' and make it all just go away.

Uh huh.

This sure as hell doesn't make any sense to me, so i'm starting to wonder if this means something else.

So when brownfemipower asks this question: But isn’t that interesting how when women of color control the space, racist ignorance is not rewarded? I'm starting to think its about safe space as a challenge to power imbalance. I'm just saying.

sparkymonster

isilya

I would not have felt this fear if Kate had not set herself up as a platform, if she had simply admitted that Shapely Prose is a bunch of white girl friends with white girl voices, and that is how she likes it.

But it terrifies me that someone can be "committed to diversity" and yet choose someone who "feels like part of the family" or "someone who feels like they just fit in" or "someone they click with" instead.

A) I am going to make a hell of a lot of potential employers feel uncomfortable. I challenge the status quo, I am not what they are expecting. I am everything a white male doctor is not. It scares the fuck out of me that even white people who are educated about white privilege can still decide to rely on their "gut feeling" that they "click" with other white people and not even look any further.

B) What the fuck does diversity even mean if your primary criterion is "someone who feels like they are already part of the family". Does that mean someone who feels white?

Panelists:
Edith Guffey, Associate General Minister of the national United Church of Christ
Anthony Holloway, Somerville Chief of Police Chief
Elena Latona, Director of Organizational Learning and Research at Third Sector New England and former Executive Director of Centro Presente
Peggy McIntosh, associate director of the Wellesley Centers for Women and co-founder and co-director of the national SEED Project on Inclusive Curriculum (Seeking Educational Equity & Diversity)