The History Book Club discussion

This is the thread to discuss the civil rights for the disabled.

This looks like an interesting book.
byJoseph P. Shapiro
From Library Journal
With 35 million disabled Americans, the American with Disabilities Act and its implications are here to stay. Shapiro, a U.S. News & World Report journalist, explores in depth the thoughts, fears, and facts behind the disability rights movement. The premise throughout this compelling historical account is that there is no pity or tragedy in disability--it is society's myths, fears, and stereotypes that make being disabled difficult. Shapiro's coverage is thorough, ranging from the movement's beginnings in Berkeley in the 1960s to the issues that will emerge in the future. Those interested in gaining a basic understand of the disability rights movement, will find this title is well organized, thoroughly researched, and thought-provoking. For all collections.

another offering on the topic:
by James I. Charlton
James Charlton has produced a ringing indictment of disability oppression, which, he says, is rooted in degradation, dependency, and powerlessness and is experienced in some form by five hundred million persons throughout the world who have physical, sensory, cognitive, or developmental disabilities. Nothing About Us Without Us is the first book in the literature on disability to provide a theoretical overview of disability oppression that shows its similarities to, and differences from, racism, sexism, and colonialism. Charlton's analysis is illuminated by interviews he conducted over a ten-year period with disability rights activists throughout the Third World, Europe, and the United States.
Charlton finds an antidote for dependency and powerlessness in the resistance to disability oppression that is emerging worldwide. His interviews contain striking stories of self-reliance and empowerment evoking the new consciousness of disability rights activists. As a latecomer among the world's liberation movements, the disability rights movement will gain visibility and momentum from Charlton's elucidation of its history and its political philosophy of self-determination, which is captured in the title of his book.
Nothing About Us Without Us expresses the conviction of people with disabilities that they know what is best for them. Charlton's combination of personal involvement and theoretical awareness assures greater understanding of the disability rights movement.

An examination of policy ~
by Jacqueline Vaughn Switzer
"Freedom and Justice for all" is a phrase that can have a hollow ring for many members of the disability community in the United States. Jacqueline Vaughn Switzer gives us a comprehensive introduction to and overview of U.S. disability policy in all facets of society, including education, the workplace, and social integration. Disabled Rights provides an interdisciplinary approach to the history and politics of the disability rights movement and assesses the creation and implementation, successes and failures of the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by federal, state and local governments.

Disabled Rights explains how people with disabilities have been treated from a social, legal, and political perspective in the United States. With an objective and straightforward approach, Switzer identifies the programs and laws that have been enacted in the past fifty years and how they have affected the lives of people with disabilities. She raises questions about Congressional intent in passing the ADA, the evolution and fragmentation of the disability rights movement, and the current status of disabled people in the U.S.

Illustrating the shift of disability issues from a medical focus to civil rights, the author clearly defines the contemporary role of persons with disabilities in American culture, and comprehensively outlines the public and private programs designed to integrate disabled persons into society. She covers the law's provisions as they apply to private organizations and businesses and concludes with the most up-to-date coverage of recent Supreme Court decisions-especially since the 2000-2002 terms-that have profoundly influenced the implementation of the ADA and other disability policies.

For activists as well as scholars, students, and practitioners in public policy and public administration, Switzer has written a compassionate, yet powerful book that demands attention from everyone interested in the battle for disability rights and equality in the United States.

A historical perspective on an early advocate:

The Manliest Man: Samuel G. Howe and the Contours of Nineteenth-Century American Reform

by James W. Trent

Synopsis:

A native of Boston and a physician by training, Samuel G. Howe (1801–1876) led a remarkable life. He was a veteran of the Greek War of Independence, a fervent abolitionist, and the founder of both the Perkins School for the Blind and the Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Children. Married to Julia Ward Howe, author of “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” he counted among his friends Senator Charles Sumner, public school advocate Horace Mann, and poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Always quick to refer to himself as a liberal, Howe embodied the American Renaissance’s faith in the perfectibility of human beings, and he spoke out in favor of progressive services for disabled Americans. A Romantic figure even in his own day, he embraced a notion of manliness that included heroism under fire but also compassion for the underdog and the oppressed. Though hardly a man without flaws and failures, he nevertheless represented the optimism that characterized much of antebellum American reform.

The first full-length biography of Samuel G. Howe in more than fifty years, The Manliest Man explores his life through private letters and personal and public documents. It offers an original view of the reformer’s personal life, his association with social causes of his time, and his efforts to shape those causes in ways that allowed for the greater inclusion of devalued people in the mainstream of American life.

A Disability History of the United States

by Kim E. Nielsen

Synopsis:

The first book to cover the entirety of disability history, from pre-1492 to the present

Disability is not just the story of someone we love or the story of whom we may become; rather it is undoubtedly the story of our nation. Covering the entirety of US history from pre-1492 to the present, A Disability History of the United States is the first book to place the experiences of people with disabilities at the center of the American narrative. In many ways, it’s a familiar telling. In other ways, however, it is a radical repositioning of US history. By doing so, the book casts new light on familiar stories, such as slavery and immigration, while breaking ground about the ties between nativism and oralism in the late nineteenth century and the role of ableism in the development of democracy.

A Disability History of the United States pulls from primary-source documents and social histories to retell American history through the eyes, words, and impressions of the people who lived it. As historian and disability scholar Nielsen argues, to understand disability history isn’t to narrowly focus on a series of individual triumphs but rather to examine mass movements and pivotal daily events through the lens of varied experiences. Throughout the book, Nielsen deftly illustrates how concepts of disability have deeply shaped the American experience—from deciding who was allowed to immigrate to establishing labor laws and justifying slavery and gender discrimination. Included are absorbing—at times horrific—narratives of blinded slaves being thrown overboard and women being involuntarily sterilized, as well as triumphant accounts of disabled miners organizing strikes and disability rights activists picketing Washington.

Engrossing and profound, A Disability History of the United States fundamentally reinterprets how we view our nation’s past: from a stifling master narrative to a shared history that encompasses us all.

Alisa wrote: "A Disability History of the United States

by Kim E. Nielsen

Synopsis:

The first book to cover the entir..."

adding this to my list

Great, Peter, let us know what you think when you get to it. I was pleased to find it.

This book looks at how the ADA is practiced throughout the country and how it has helped or hindered those with disabilities.

Voices from the Edge: Narratives about the American with Disabilities Act

by Ruth O'Brien (no photo)

Synopsis:

Fear, rage, courage, discrimination. These are facts of everyday life for many Americans with disabilities. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), has made working, traveling, and communicating easier for many individuals. But has this significant piece of civil rights legislation helped those with disabilities become fully accepted members of society? How does an individual deal with discriminatory situations that the law cannot, does not, or will not cover? What is life like in post-ADA America? The stories in this collection give readers a chance to visualize and perhaps resolve these questions for themselves. Using the techniques of both fiction and creative non-fiction, the contributors bring to life the everyday problems that people with disabilities face. Rather than analyzing the law, the writers dramatize the complex set of issues underlying the ADA as it is practiced and interpreted around the country: at a small Southern college, in the Library of Congress, on a New York City sidewalk. The stories from these local battlegrounds form a unique portrait of a continuing struggle. Ruth O'Brien's legal commentary on the Americans with Disabilities Act supplements these nar(

Jill wrote: "This book looks at how the ADA is practiced throughout the country and how it has helped or hindered those with disabilities.

Voices from the Edge: Narratives about the American with Disabilities ..."

Added to my pile

May 1 20014
to whom may concern:
my name is Koleen
and I was born with Cerebral palsy and I am a disability young women and I am 25 years old and
yes is true that the Americans with Disabilities Act did help a little
but not as well as many people lead to believe if your comprehensive skills are two points higher the standard learning disabilities IQ test your not concretized disability , and there is program available for you.
so it suck being a women with a disability.
and some time I should tell all the then I was told by high school teachers like Koleen you with never be ability to read and now I can read classic novels like Tale of Genji and I can comprehended what I had read. and I had tutors and I worked hard to get at the level that I am reading at.
law and society and culture do need a changes there view on people with Disabilities.
I am work hard on online college and I go to college. and I work hard on it on my own I still need some paper work what the government call a ticket to work to prove that I am ability to go to work. I have been working on it for 9 years and I have not got anywhere.
best regards

Welcome Koleen to the History Book Club and for sharing your story on this thread. I want to applaud your efforts and your courage. It is true we have a long way to go to help all of our citizens in the US with disabilities. Your first hand knowledge of what you have gone through and the struggles you face every day is important to our discussion.

Thank you for sharing and keep pursuing your dreams. The belief you have in yourself is what is most important not what a high school teacher said. Do not be limited by other's remarks. They obviously do not know you or know anything about your courage and tenacity.

I am assuming you reside in the United States because you referred to the ADA.

Best wishes to you Koleen and good luck with your studies.

A very timely book as our service men and women return from the Middle East with terrible disabilities, both physical and psychological.

Disabled Veterans in History

by David A. Gerber (no photo)

Synopsis

Disabled Veterans in History explores the long-neglected history of those who have sustained lasting injuries or chronic illnesses while serving in uniform. The contributors to this volume cover an impressive range of countries in Europe and North America as well as a wide sweep of chronology from the Ancient World to the present. The essays address the emergence of "veteran" as a political category with unique privileges and entitlements and of disabled veterans as a special project--and indeed one of the original projects--of the modern welfare state.

The introductory essay, "Finding Disabled Veterans in History," offers perhaps the first attempt at synthesizing knowledge about disabled veterans in Western societies. The other essays examine the representation of disabled veterans from Sophocles' Philoctetes to American feature films; the relations of disabled veterans to the state and society in such public policy issues as pensions, medical care, physical rehabilitation, and job retraining; and the disabled veteran's agency and experience in reentering the peacetime world. Other topics include the place of disabled veterans in societies defeated in war; the fate of disabled veterans in societies experiencing frequent changes of political regimes; the emergence of pensions and vocational rehabilitation for disabled veterans; and the abiding problem of alcohol abuse among disabled veterans.

The contributors come from a variety of disciplines, including history, physical rehabilitation, Slavic studies, sociology, communication and media, and museum studies. The book will be of interest especially to researchers in the fields of war and society, the welfare state, and disability studies, as well as those in the medical, rehabilitation, and counseling fields.

Miracle Boy Grows Up: How the Disability Rights Revolution Saved My Sanity

by Ben Mattlin (no photo)

Synopsis:

Ben Mattlin lives a normal, independent life. Why is that interesting? Because Mattlin was born with spinal muscular atrophy, a congenital weakness from which he was expected to die in childhood. Not only did Mattlin live through childhood, he became one of the first students in a wheelchair to attend Harvard, from which he graduated and became a professional writer. His advantage? Mattlin’s life happened to parallel the growth of the disability rights movement, so that in many ways he did not feel that he was disadvantaged at all, merely different.

Miracle Boy Grows Up is a witty, unsentimental memoir that you won’t forget, told with engrossing intelligence and a unique perspective on living with a disability in the United States.

Thank you Kathy

History of Disability in Civil Rights Movement
Published on Jul 14, 2014

Marca Bristo shares with her perspective on the evolution of the civil rights of people with disabilities. It's a unique opportunity to hear from one of the real pioneers in the disability rights movement. This program was produced by Chicago Access Network Television (CAN TV).

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-W0ca...

Source: Youtube

What We Have Done: An Oral History of the Disability Rights Movement

by Fred Pelka (no photo)

Synopsis:

“Nothing about us without us” has been a core principle of American disability rights activists for more than half a century. It represents a response by people with disabilities to being treated with scorn and abuse or as objects of pity, and to having the most fundamental decisions relating to their lives—where they would live; if and how they would be educated; if they would be allowed to marry or have families; indeed, if they would be permitted to live at all—made by those who were, in the parlance of the movement, “temporarily able-bodied.”

In What We Have Done: An Oral History of the Disability Rights Movement, Fred Pelka takes that slogan at face value. He presents the voices of disability rights activists who, in the period from 1950 to 1990, transformed how society views people with disabilities, and recounts how the various streams of the movement came together to push through the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, the most sweeping civil rights legislation since passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Beginning with the stories of those who grew up with disabilities in the 1940s and ’50s, the book traces how disability came to be seen as a political issue, and how people with disabilities—often isolated, institutionalized, and marginalized—forged a movement analogous to the civil rights, women’s rights, and gay rights movements, and fought for full and equal participation in American society.

Thank you Francie for all of the adds.

You are welcome; )

Sexuality, Disability, and the Law: Beyond the Last Frontier?

by Michael L. Perlin (no photo)

Synopsis:

Sexuality, Disability, and the Law approaches issues of sexual autonomy and disability from multiple perspectives, including constitutional law, international human rights, therapeutic jurisprudence, history, cognitive psychology, dignity studies, and theories and findings on gender constructs and societal norms. Perlin and Lynch determine that if our society continues to assert that persons with mental disabilities possess a primitive morality, we allow ourselves to censor their feelings and their actions. By denying their ability and desires to show love and affection, we justify this disparate treatment. Our reliance on stereotypes has warped our attitudes and our policies, and has allowed us to avoid important issues of humanity and of dignity that should be at the basis of any policies that affect this population.

In Helping Those With Disabilities, ADA Improves Access For All
July 24, 2015

When the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) became law 25 years ago, "everybody was thinking about the iconic person in a wheelchair," says civil rights lawyer Sid Wolinsky. Or that the ADA — which bans discrimination based on disability — was for someone who is deaf, or blind.


President George H.W. Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act on the South Lawn of the White House on July 26, 1990. "Let the shameful wall of exclusion finally come tumbling down," he said that day. Barry Thumma/AP

But take a tour of New York City with Wolinsky — and the places he sued there — and you will see how the ADA has helped not just people with those significant disabilities, but also people with minor disabilities, and people with no disability at all.

Stop 1: Dyckman Street Subway Station, Inwood, Manhattan

At this subway station at the northern tip of Manhattan, Wolinksy — who is joined by Jim Weisman, an attorney with the United Spinal Association — points to the elevator that was added after they sued the city in November 2013. Now, wheelchair users can get to the platform.


Attorneys Sid Wolinsky (left) and Jim Weisman specialize in accessibility lawsuits to ensure the Americans with Disabilities Act is being properly enforced.
Adam Wolffbrandt/NPR

On this day, the elevator is in constant use, gliding up and down, the doors opening with a ding as people use it instead of climbing the steep stairs nearby.

But Dustin Jones, a wheelchair user who joins us, notes: "I have not seen a person with a disability yet ride that elevator. It's all been walking people."

Over the course of an hour, no one — other than Jones — is in a wheelchair. Jones watches a mother get on, holding the hand of one young child and pushing a baby in a stroller, while carrying bags.

"This is one of those stations where it would be really tricky to navigate a small child, a small baby with the stroller and bags, if you had to solely use the steps," he says.

Weisman, a veteran of accessibility lawsuits, also doesn't see any people with any visible disabilities enter the elevator.
"See, the elevator use is constant. So there must be a reason: Elderly people, people with vertigo and balance problems and knee problems and coordination, people choose to use the elevator," he says.

"This elevator is a gift from the disability community and the ADA to the nondisabled people of New York," says Wolinsky, who co-founded Disability Rights Advocates.


The elevator at the Dyckman Street Subway Station in Inwood, Manhattan, helps people of all abilities reach the platform. Michael Rubenstein for NPR

The ADA, which was signed into law on July 26, 1990, banned discrimination based on disability in employment. It also required access to government services and public accommodations, and included a rule that public transportation be made accessible.

That means adding an elevator to a major subway station, or including elevators when building new stations, or adding one when there's a substantial renovation at a station.

So when the Dyckman Street Station was renovated, the lawyers sued to have an elevator included. It can sometimes be expensive to provide access. In this case, the tricky work of installing the elevator at an old station located on a rocky cliff cost about $7 million, or a little more than 20 percent of the overall cost of the renovation. And that was just for one elevator, to the downtown trains only.

NPR analyzed transit systems in New York and 16 other cities across the country. In New York, only 21 percent of subway stations are accessible. That's the highest percentage of inaccessible stations of any system in the country. New York's subway has the nation's highest number of riders, but most of the city's current stations were built before 1940, long before wheelchair accessibility became an issue.

Kevin Ortiz, a spokesman for New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority, notes that the system has made progress, and has committed hundreds of millions of dollars on a promise to make 121 stations wheelchair accessible by 2020. That would bring up the percentage of accessible stations in the city to roughly 25 percent. In addition, Ortiz says, "every single one of our 5,700 buses is accessible," another change mandated by the ADA.

Read the remainder of the article at: http://www.npr.org/2015/07/24/4232309...

Other:
Link to NPR podcast: http://www.npr.org/2015/07/24/4232309...

Discussion Topics:

a) Discuss the broader impact of the American With Disabilities Act since it became law in July 1990.

b) Discuss the changes that have been made to public transportation subsequent to the passage of the ADA including far-reaching benefits.

Source: National Public Radio

Thank you for these great adds Lorna - I do hope that members join in and discuss the podcast, article and questions that you added.

Disability Suits Fuel Rise in Civil Rights Claims Against Schools

By SHAUN HEASLEY August 22, 2017


A new analysis finds a significant uptick in civil rights lawsuits involving schools and universities, many of which relate to students with disabilities. (Don Kelsen/Los Angeles Times/TNS)

Civil rights lawsuits against schools are on track to double compared to four years ago thanks in large part to disability-related claims, according to a new review of federal court filings.

So far this year, 497 suits have been filed in federal courts across the country involving schools or universities that allege various civil rights violations.

More than 40 percent of the cases center on the treatment of students with disabilities. And nearly half involve allegations brought under the Americans with Disabilities Act and similar laws.

The figures come from an analysis of court data put together by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. The organization regularly assesses trends in various areas of civil litigation in U.S. district courts.

Based on activity so far, the report projects that nearly 600 civil rights lawsuits involving educational institutions are expected to be filed this year, more than in any year since the courts began tracking these types of cases in late 2011.

Most of the civil rights litigation filed this year was brought in the Southern District of New York in Manhattan followed by courts in New Jersey and Washington, D.C., the report found.

Link to article: https://www.disabilityscoop.com/2017/...

Other:

by Joseph P. Shapiro (no photo)

Source: Disability Scoop

Thank you Lorna

Rolling back the civil rights of the disabled harms us all

By FORMER GOV. TOM RIDGE (R-PA.), OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — February 13, 2018


© Getty

When President George H.W. Bush signed the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) into law nearly 28 years ago, he eloquently declared, “Let the shameful wall of exclusion come tumbling down.” That was a watershed moment for our country. After decades of willful exclusion and benign neglect, people with disabilities finally secured the civil rights they deserved to be full participants in our great society.

President Bush observed that the disabilities law would:

“Ensure that people with disabilities are given the basic guarantees for which they have worked so long and so hard: independence, freedom of choice, control of their lives, the opportunity to blend fully and equally into the rich mosaic of the American mainstream.”

Those guarantees are now at risk. The House of Representatives will soon vote on H.R. 620, labelled the “ADA Education and Reform Act.” This bill could significantly reduce access for people with disabilities to stores, restaurants, hotels, doctors’ offices, social service establishments, private schools, and other places of public accommodation. In so doing, it would put a damper on opportunities for people with disabilities to participate as full and equal members of society.

The ADA, which passed in 1990 with overwhelming bipartisan support, was carefully crafted to balance the concerns of businesses with the need to ensure access for people with disabilities. It did not require costly retrofitting of buildings built before the ADA; businesses were required to remove barriers in those buildings where that could be done without significant difficulty or expense. But the law contemplated that businesses that could easily remove barriers would do so. They would be accessible when people with disabilities showed up at the door, to shop, to obtain services, and to work. If H.R. 620 were to pass, many more people with disabilities would encounter barriers when they showed up and getting in would require a long and arduous process.

That’s because H.R. 620 would eliminate any incentive for businesses to comply with the ADA proactively. A business that did not comply would face no consequence until after it received a legal notice from a person with a disability who was harmed, detailing the specific violation of the law. And then the business would have six months to do something about it and would merely be required to make “substantial progress” in removing barriers, instead of actually providing access.

Twenty-eight years after the ADA was passed, it is unacceptable to roll back the civil rights of people with disabilities. We should ensure access, not progress. We should expect businesses to know and comply with their obligations, not require our neighbors and colleagues with disabilities to shoulder the burden of informing and educating businesses about those obligations. We should not turn the simple business of everyday life into a complex and lengthy ordeal for people with disabilities.

H.R. 620 is also bad for business. The more than 57 million Americans with disabilities are an important customer base that businesses cannot afford to lose. Further, inaccessible businesses lose out on an enormous talent pool of employees with disabilities.

In my work with the National Organization on Disability, I have had the opportunity to witness firsthand the benefits that leading companies reap from welcoming employees and customers with disabilities. This bill would rob businesses of the customers and the talent they desperately need.

Back in 1990, President Bush told the business community they hold in their hands the key to the success of the ADA, for it can “unlock a splendid resource of untapped human potential that, when freed, will enrich us all.” He characterized passage of the ADA as one of his proudest achievements. Let’s not undo that success.

Link to article: http://thehill.com/opinion/civil-righ...

Other:

by Kim E. Nielsen

Source: The Hill

'DISABILITY RIGHTS ARE CIVIL RIGHTS': INSIDE THE CAP'S NEW DISABILITY JUSTICE INITIATIVE
A conversation with Rebecca Cokley and Rebecca Vallas.

By DAVID M. PERRY August 14, 2018


Rebecca Cokley and Senator Tammy Duckworth at the launch of the Disability Justice Initiative at the Center for American Progress, July 26th, 2018, in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Center for American Progress)

Why aren't more Americans mobilizing around disability? In the last presidential election, according to our best numbers, 46 percent of all disabled Americans and a slightly greater percentage of their families supported Donald Trump for president. This pattern held true even though Trump has espoused policies that have been harmful to people with disabilities. One possible explanation, according to many leaders in the disability rights world, is that, while the disability community has its own network of non-partisan non-profits and independent activists, the larger world of well-funded progressive think tanks has been slow to recognize that disability matters as a matter of policy and basic human rights. The Center for American Progress, one of the best-known liberal think tanks in Washington, D.C., aims to change that.


On July 26th, the 28th anniversary of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), CAP launched a major new project: the Disability Justice Initiative. The organization's plan is to include disability expertise in all internal conversations and projects, while modeling the necessity and utility of such inclusion to other groups that work in progressive spaces. The thinking behind the Disability Justice Initiative is that we can't address core progressive issues—poverty, health care, the environment, and more—without recognizing the specific vulnerabilities that disabled people face, and the contributions that disabled people can make. What's more, disability isn't a niche issue; there are over 57 million Americans with disabilities. Too often, though, disability remains an afterthought, even in progressive policymaking. The CAP itself, in its former proposals around health care, didn't really address the disability-related gaps in the Affordable Care Act. Its leadership now says that such an initiative has been too long in coming, and that they want progressives across the board to do better.

I spoke with Rebecca Cokley, the new director of the Disability Justice Initiative, and Rebecca Vallas, vice president of the Poverty to Prosperity Program, about their plans.

How did this new initiative get started?

Rebecca Cokley: Right now there's an opportunity. 2017 saw the disability community get the attention it has deserved—that it has deserved for the last 40-plus years—for its holding the line for civil rights initiatives across the board. Progressives are taking note that disability rights are civil rights.

Our center has a couple of different focuses. [One is that] we want to add the disability lens throughout progressive space, making sure disabled folks are having their voices heard and centered in the issues affecting them, including stuff not usually seen as disability issues.

Like what?

Cokley: [We need to go] beyond special education and Medicaid, [to issues like] nutrition programs or immigrants being traumatized.

The other piece, really, is also continuing to build out disability policy that centers multiply marginalized disabled folks, making sure it centers black and brown leaders, immigrants, LGBT folks, Muslims with disabilities, etc., because we haven't done a good job in that space as well. We're talking about people with chronic illness, eating disorders, in recovery, people who have never seen themselves as people with disabilities but either accessed accommodations or had the right to access accommodations. That's what we're trying to build.

Tell me a bit about what it means at the CAP to have a disability center. What's the difference in defining this as a disability justice center rather than just hiring folks like Cokley?

Rebecca Vallas: Our view is that, for too long, the notion of disability policy and disability issues has lived in a silo, artificially and counterproductively separate from the fight to end poverty and tackle inequality, separate from the fight for climate change, criminal justice reform, opioid addiction, or even—absurdly—universal health care. Siloed thinking paves the way for policy that's ableist, like straw bans; [like] policies that restrict access to opioids that manage chronic pain [or] so-called universal health-care proposals that leave out people with disabilities because they don't include long-term support and services.

So as wonderful as it is to see disability activism get recognition by the progressive community [because of disability rights groups like ADAPT], it's not enough. The disability community must be understood not just as part of an outreach strategy; fighting for social justice doesn't make our work accessible or inclusive on it's own. It doesn't mean just calling up ADAPT to get arrested to get earned media around a cause.

We're going to apply disability as a lens across each and every issue we work on, building an inclusive movement, and that's why we're launching this disability justice initiative.

Link to remainder of article: https://psmag.com/social-justice/insi...

Other:
by Nancy J Hirschmann (no photo)

Source: Pacific Standard

Thank you so much Lorna for the adds

People with disabilities are the forgotten vulnerable community in the age of COVID-19

By Rep. JIM LANGEVIN (D-R.I.) and JAY RUDERMAN April 7, 2020


Getty

The skyrocketing infection rate and increasing death toll from COVID-19 has revealed just how vulnerable our communities are to a global pandemic. Older Americans are considered to be at a particularly high risk for complications from the virus.

However, what too often flies under the radar is COVID-19’s threat to an even larger demographic community – the one in four Americans living with a disability. Many people with disabilities have underlying medical conditions that place them in a higher risk category, but there is not nearly enough discussion about the difficulties they face during these fraught times. Simultaneously, in some U.S. states, the disability community’s civil and human rights are being dangerously flouted as they face unprecedented levels of risk.

For people with disabilities, navigating community barriers is a challenge even in normal times. In a pandemic, those barriers become even more complex. If a person has a mobility issue, they may not be able to obtain supplies that are critical while they are isolated. If a home health aide gets sick, who will provide life-sustaining supports? For those with mental health conditions, losing access to all forms of face-to-face human interaction due to social distancing could exacerbate existing feelings of anxiety and depression.

People with disabilities should be among the first Americans protected by the medical system and their governments in the age of coronavirus. Yet scenarios once relegated to dystopian novels are becoming frightening realities, especially in regard to the rationing of lifesaving medical care and equipment, including ventilators. In Alabama, “persons with severe mental retardation, advanced dementia or severe traumatic brain injury may be poor candidates for ventilator support.” Washington state recommends transferring patients with “loss of reserves in energy, physical ability, cognition and general health” out of hospitals and into outpatient care.

Appropriately, the federal government is taking action to prevent these disturbing developments on the state level. On March 28, the Office for Civil Rights within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a bulletin with guidelines aimed at ensuring that entities covered by civil rights authorities keep in mind their obligations under laws and regulations that prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability, age, sex, and exercise of conscience and religion in HHS-funded programs.

Nevertheless, fears remain that Americans with disabilities such as Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and autism will be cast aside by a health care system that is increasingly overwhelmed by COVID-19, conjuring images of the harrowing reports of Italians over age 80 being “left to die.”

While some may feel that the treatment of younger, abled-bodied individuals should be prioritized over people with disabilities and compromised immune system, we cannot make judgments on who lives and who dies. We cannot cast aside any human because of their age or disability. We can and must do better.

This complex ethical conundrum will not be resolved overnight. But even for Americans who do not work in health care and its associated regulatory bodies, or those who do not hold elected office in state legislatures and on Capitol Hill, there are modest steps that can be taken immediately to support the most vulnerable among us — from seniors to people with disabilities to other at-risk individuals.

Be human. Be a good neighbor. A simple text message, phone call, or video chat makes an immeasurable impact. Going a step further, by ensuring that at-risk individuals have the supplies they need while maximally adhering to hygiene and safety standards when providing assistance, can save a life. Lend a hand, but from a safe distance. Strictly follow all local, state, and federal guidelines on COVID-19, as the last thing people with disabilities and other vulnerable populations can afford is exposure to infected individuals.

Simultaneously, we will do everything within our power to ensure that COVID-19 in not a threat to the civil rights of people with disabilities. America’s medical system must not discriminate against people with disabilities in need of treatment on the basis of a disability alone. America was built on certain inalienable rights, and even a pandemic should not threaten those.

Link to article: https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-bl...

Other:
by Rosemarie Garland-Thomson (no photo)

Source: The Hill

Amen and Amen ... as an architectural firm’s employee, I know the importance of carrying out the ADA laws ... but your article, Lorna, concerns those who really are on the front-lines. Thank you for reminding all of us.
Regards,
Andrea

Great add Lorna.