Chamblee54

There is a lovely TED talk in the weekly email. The title is “I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much.” The speaker, Stella Young, delivers the message while sitting in a wheelchair.
The concept here is that *disabled* people are people. They are not here to inspire you. They are not intended to show you how bad your life could be, so you should appreciate what you have.
Ms. Young has a talent for words. She says some things much better than this slack blogger. TED talks include a transcript, aka the lazy bloggers friend. Laziness is not considered a disability.
…these images, there are lots of them out there, they are what we call inspiration porn. And I use the term porn deliberately, because they objectify one group of people for the benefit of another group of people. So in this case, we’re objectifying disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled people. … I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve been approached by strangers wanting to tell me that they think I’m brave or inspirational, and this was long before my work had any kind of public profile. They were just kind of congratulating me for managing to get up in the morning and remember my own name. And it is objectifying. These images, those images objectify disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled people. They are there so that you can look at them and think that things aren’t so bad for you, to put your worries into perspective. …
I really think that this lie that we’ve been sold about disability is the greatest injustice. It makes life hard for us. And that quote, “The only disability in life is a bad attitude,” the reason that that’s bullshit is because it’s just not true, because of the social model of disability. No amount of smiling at a flight of stairs has ever made it turn into a ramp. Never. (Laughter) (Applause) Smiling at a television screen isn’t going to make closed captions appear for people who are deaf. No amount of standing in the middle of a bookshop and radiating a positive attitude is going to turn all those books into braille. It’s just not going to happen.”
EMIT (Educate Motivate Inspire Tripe) is in your inbox everyday. Yesterday, this tweet sent PG down the rabbit hole. ‏@chescaleigh “There’s a nasty rumor about racism, and it needs to die. Thankfully @the1janitor is here to help (via @Upworthy)” There was a link to Here’s What Morgan Freeman Had To Say About Racism, And Here’s A Guy Explaining What He Got Wrong.
The intro to the video said, among other things, “Every black person is going to have a different opinion/experience/perspective when it comes to racism.” This sentence got PG in a twitter exchange.
‏@chamblee54 @chescaleigh @the1janitor @Upworthy the intro said every black person has a different take on racism. so does every white person
‏@chescaleigh @chamblee54 didn’t deny that. but a white person’s perspective on racism lacks experiencing racism. so that’s a very different convo
‏@chamblee54 @chescaleigh i agree and disagree ~ white ppl experience prejudice ~ the semantics get in the way of understanding other people
@chescaleigh @chamblee54 white ppl experience prejudice not racism. They’re both shitty but not the same. Sounds like u need to read the link I posted
‏@chamblee54 @chescaleigh have glanced over article ~ re:#2, have been the only pwoc ~ i could go point by point, and might later on blog ~ thx 4 reply
PG saw the Upworthy video. A young man said that people need to talk about racism. He said nothing about listening. A poster for the University of Alabama football team was in the background. The exploitation of young black men, by college athletics, was not mentioned.
The article @chescaleigh linked to was 18 Things White People Should Know/Do Before Discussing Racism. It is poorly written, and full of logical fallacies. Here is item 3. “3. Oprah’s success does not mean the end of racism. The singular success of a Black man or woman (i.e. Oprah, or Tiger Woods, or President Obama) is never a valid argument against the existence of racism. By this logic, the success of Frederick Douglas or Amanda America Dickson during the 19th century would be grounds for disproving slavery.”
There was one last tweet. It was deleted a little while after being sent. Sometimes, it is best to use discretion. @chamblee54 @chescaleigh I read “18 things…” it was not very helpful.
Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”. UPDATE: Here is the reply post, The Problem with 18 things. UPDATE: Stella Young died December 7, 2014.