Replay: Living with Dwarfism - sport and “disability”
I like this post from the Wellcome Trust's blog on WordPress. I'd like to tell the author that I like what she's written, and that I've posted the link to this comm on LiveJournal. But this week I'm using a slow Internet connection which doesn't cope well with WordPress. So if you use WP, perhaps you'd like to tell this author that argylesock (my username over there) appreciates what she's said. She'd be welcome to join our discussions here.
Anyway, I do dislike terms like 'differently able' which I find patronising, and I'm not convinced by the term 'superhuman' which is being used about Paralympian athletes. Watching proud athletes in wheelchairs moves me and warms my heart. But it also reminds me of the times I've been laughingly told that I 'will soon be in the Paralympics' as though I wanted to do competitive sports, or that I 'will start doing wheelies in the park' as though wheelies were a comedy stunt. The move I call the mini-wheelie, getting your wheelchair over small obstacles, is invaluable and I hope to learn the full wheelie because that lets you wheel over any terrain. I'm not superhuman. I haven't 'ended up in a wheelchair' and I'm not 'confined to a wheelchair'. I'm a real person living my life.
On the other hand I want everybody to become comfortable speaking about disability. We're here, we're crips, get used to it! So I avoid picking fights about what words people use.
Anyway, I do dislike terms like 'differently able' which I find patronising, and I'm not convinced by the term 'superhuman' which is being used about Paralympian athletes. Watching proud athletes in wheelchairs moves me and warms my heart. But it also reminds me of the times I've been laughingly told that I 'will soon be in the Paralympics' as though I wanted to do competitive sports, or that I 'will start doing wheelies in the park' as though wheelies were a comedy stunt. The move I call the mini-wheelie, getting your wheelchair over small obstacles, is invaluable and I hope to learn the full wheelie because that lets you wheel over any terrain. I'm not superhuman. I haven't 'ended up in a wheelchair' and I'm not 'confined to a wheelchair'. I'm a real person living my life.
On the other hand I want everybody to become comfortable speaking about disability. We're here, we're crips, get used to it! So I avoid picking fights about what words people use.