The Curb Cut Effect, or Why It Is Basically Impossible To Appropriate From Disabled People
In my treks over the internet, I have seen various people (mostly social justice people) worrying that they are somehow harming Real disabled people if they use a wheelchair if they can still walk a little or use stim toys or these nifty color communication badges if they aren’t autistic. Similarly, I have seen various people (mostly anti-social-justice people) who believe that Fake Disabled People are running around pretending to be disabled and using color communication badges and wheelchairs and so on, and this hurts disabled people somehow (they have never quite specified how).
This is completely fucking wrong.
In universal design, there’s something called the curb cut effect. Basically, things intended to benefit people with disabilities wind up benefiting everyone. Curb cuts, which are intended for wheelchair users to be able to get on sidewalks, help bicyclists, parents with strollers, delivery people, and a dozen other nondisabled groups. Similarly, closed captioning, which was originally meant to benefit Deaf people, helps people who have trouble with auditory information processing (hi!), people who like talking during films, and people trying to watch TV in noisy bars.
The curb cut effect is accessibility activists’ secret weapon. You see, people don’t generally want to accommodate disabled people any more than they have to. Accommodating disabled people is a pain in the neck, and disabled people are generally a small and relatively powerless group with limited ability to complain. However, if any TV network tries to remove closed captioning, they won’t just have to put up with complaints from Deaf people. They will have to put up with complaints from everyone who has ever tried to watch TV in a noisy bar. The latter is far more likely to strike fear in the TV executive’s heart.
Furthermore, pretty much anything that’s limited to disabled people only has to have some sort of process for figuring out who’s disabled. This presents numerous issues. Many disabled people don’t know they’re disabled. (Raise your hand if you’ve had a conversation with someone who thinks that ADD or depression isn’t real because everyone acts like that, right?) Many disabled people struggle with feeling like “fakers” and won’t ask for accommodations that they need. Many disabled people who do know they’re disabled can’t prove it: healthcare access is often limited for poor people, people of color, trans people, and so on; navigating bureaucracy requires skills like being able to talk to people, show up places at a scheduled time, and do things that you intended to do, that many mental illnesses and developmental disabilities make difficult. Every time you say “this is for disabled people only”– whether by limiting it to disabled people institutionally or by criticizing people who do it and whom you don’t think are disabled enough– a lot of disabled people don’t get access to it.
Sometimes this is a cost worth paying. For instance, we can’t let everyone bring their dogs into every public space, because service dogs have to be specially trained to not be disruptive in stressful situations. This training is expensive but service dogs are usually free, meaning that the number of service dogs available is limited, so we can’t have service dogs available to everyone who wants one. In this case, the alternatives are much worse and the cost is worth paying. But the cost is still a cost.
And notice that the people who decide who gets service dogs are the client’s medical professionals, not random strangers. It is never okay for random strangers to decide if someone is disabled enough for an accommodation. For instance, some store owners will only let service dogs in if they think the person is “really” disabled. This is wrong (and also illegal by the Americans with Disabilities Act). Other people will make fun of wheelchair users who can stand up. It is a major violation of privacy to expect random strangers to disclose their private medical history to you. You are far more likely to be harassing an actually disabled person to be criticizing a nondisabled person. And even if the person is nondisabled… who cares? Nondisabled people using wheelchairs does nothing but create a larger pro-wheelchair demographic, which benefits disabled wheelchair users. There is no call to be the Disability Police.
For a specific example, consider one of my friends, who started flapping his hands when he was happy because he thought it was adorable and later found out that flapping your hands when happy is a common symptom of autism. He freaked out, worrying that he was appropriating autism somehow. However (as I told him at the time) actually nonautistics flapping their hands works out great for autistic people. A culture in which the default reaction to happy hand-flapping is “ohmigod, adorable” rather than “you freak” is a culture in which autistic people do not have to waste energy suppressing their natural ways of moving. And because he’s nonautistic, it’s much easier for him to explain to people who dislike hand-flapping why it is wrong to do so, which helps to create a more welcoming environment for autistic people.
Similarly, I’m nonautistic, but I do flap my hands when I’m experiencing intense emotion. Unlike many autistic people, it is possible for me to stop. Think about it like not smiling when you’re happy: it’s possible for most people to do so (especially if they get mocked for being weird every time they smile) but instead of being fully present in the moment you’d have to be continually conscious of your facial expression lest your lip twitch when you’re not thinking about it. If we say “you must be This Autistic to flap”, then I still have to police what my hands are doing, which goes against the whole point. But if we say “everyone gets to express happiness in the way most natural to them, unless you express happiness by punching people in the face or something”, then everyone gets to express happiness in the way most natural to them (yay!) and we have lots of people invested in creating a culture where that stays true (yay!).
In conclusion: if an accommodation helps you and you can get it without proving you’re disabled (i.e. as you must to get a service dog), you should use it. If using a wheelchair helps you move faster and farther than you would otherwise, use a wheelchair. If stimming makes you happy, stim. If those nifty communication cards help you express your communication preferences (and they are available at whatever event you’re at, which seriously why is that not every event, they are so cool), use them. And it is wrong to disability police people. If someone does not seem disabled enough to use an accommodation to you, then you should be quiet and mind your own business instead of harassing them about it. In the vast majority of cases, nondisabled and less disabled people using something is helpful to more severely disabled people, and when it is not, it is the job of medical professionals to decide, not you.
Every time you say “this is for disabled people only”– whether by limiting it to disabled people institutionally or by criticizing people who do it and whom you don’t think are disabled enough– a lot of disabled people don’t get access to it.
this is such a good post.
Tag: ableism
I have my suspicions as to who this is, though I will not make any definite assumptions.
Well, unwelcome “guest”. Thorin at least is sorry for his fuckups. He’s sorry when he hurts people. He listens when they have something to tell him, and tries to learn. He works to alleviate and manage his depression – and yes, he is absolutely doing his best. In this ask you display a remarkable lack of basic reading comprehension (seriously, 32 chapters, and you still haven’t gotten the point???) and a despicable lack of basic compassion.
You think it’s appropriate to tell me that you want a character with crippling depression to die. Guess what: Thorin would not. And I can say this for Thorin too: he’s never been the sort to leave anon hate.
Congratulations on being a far, FAR worse person than your most hated character. I hope it feels real good.
Go away. You’re not wanted here. Go away.
Hi dets! 1) thanks for killing me with emotions over the latest chapter. Such feeling, so dead, wow. 2) I was wondering if I could ask you a teacher question. I’m going to be teaching my very first class EVER next week, and as someone who clearly gives representation and diversity a lot of thought in your writing, I was wondering if you had any recommendations for sources on inclusive teaching? Am desperate and SO nervous that I’m going to fail epically because of my anxiety :/
Hey Nonnie!
ahhh, thank you – I am sorry about all the emotional stabbity 😀 I hope you enjoyed it nevertheless!
And yeah, holy heck yeah, do I ever. Lots of babbling and examples and links and general thoughts, under the cut:
FIRST OF ALL: you are going to be nervous, but you are also going to be fine. It’s going to be fine. It really is. Please keep in mind that IT IS OKAY NOT TO KNOW STUFF. IT’S OKAY TO NOT BE A TEACHING PRODIGY STRAIGHT AWAY. IT’S A-OKAY TO BE NERVOUS. IT’S OKAY. IT’S OKAY. IT’S OKAY.
It’s tough to be a beginning teacher, there’s a whole bunch of pressure to know everything and be everything, to have the answers 1000% of the time and to do everything perfectly. Not only that, but you’re expected to do so in front of teenagers AS WELL as experienced teachers, nnngh. But – personal anectdote time – I’ve found that if I tell a class, ‘you know what? I don’t know the answer to that question! Let’s find out – right now, together!’ that it gets better results than trying to bluff my way through it. That always makes me TEN TIMES more nervous. If I don’t know something? I say so. I’m not there to be wikipedia, after all 🙂 The students have a good time, I have a good time, we all learn something.
This is the best thing anybody ever told me, when I began teaching: Be ready to throw out or adapt your lesson plan, if necessary. Sometimes it simply doesn’t work… and that’s fine. Try a couple of approaches, but if it simply isn’t taking hold, MOVE ON and don’t keeping flogging a dead horse. Adapt it. There’ll be something there that the students are responding to: use that. As the old saying goes (ish), we teach people, not lesson plans.
So, differentiation. You’ve probably already learned about the different kinds of learners, and the different kinds of intelligences (Gardner). When I create a lesson, I try to involve every single kind of learner, and at least three kinds of intelligence. The idea here is to create as many pathways to the skill and/or information as possible.
e.g. a music lesson on rhythms: First, we see it written (in DIFFERENT ways, such as notation, or shapes, or symbols), then we arrange or write it out, we hear it tapped on several different instruments, then we try it for ourselves. Sequence: visual, aural, kinaesthetic learning. Intelligences used: Musical, visual-spatial, physical, mathematic.
Check out the 10 signifying practices of middle-years schooling (Pendergast and Bahr, 2005). This is great for students with learning difficulties. When it comes to students with diverse needs, you need their input constantly. You get great results when they share responsibility for their learning with the teacher, when they have a level of ownership and self-direction.
Make sure you have different levels of assessment, and assess understanding constantly! Assessment doesn’t have to be a test. It can be as simple as asking one student, ‘do you need a hand with [thing], or is [part of thing] giving you a bit of trouble?’ and them saying “nah, I got it” or “yeah, I don’t get [part of thing] at all”. Being specific helps. A lot of kids will say they have a concept down when they don’t, because they’re embarrassed to say so in front of the whole class. Asking them individually, as much as you can, and breaking down [thing] into [part of thing] can help you pinpoint the problem area.
Removing pedagogic and environmental barriers to learning is key to differentiation. Some students will pick up the learning quickly. Some won’t. This isn’t a failure on your part, or theirs. Scaffolding is your friend!! I like to use a LOT of student participation and student-led learning, but this isn’t always a good idea for a first lesson… or even the first week.
I know people are probably banging on in your ear about Literacy and Numeracy and embedding it everywhere: yeah, I’m gonna totally join in on that 😀 Hammer it home. It’s hard to find the kids whose literacy and numeracy problems have slipped notice before, and it is SO important to their future.
Oh yeah – be wary of the ‘info-dump’ – many students with different needs and learning abilities (or disabilities) aren’t great at the whole “NEW INFORMATION IN BIG CHUNK” at the beginning of a lesson. (this is the sort of thing I mean by ‘pedagogic barrier’, jsyk). Try breaking up a concept over the course of a lesson, interspersed with exercises/fun things that demonstrate each part.
Group work in a first lesson is always dangerous! But if you decide to go this way, select them carefully. It’s great to allow them to choose a group name and draw a poster with their names on it and hang it up: Green Giants, Rocketbabes, and Warboys were some group names from a class I taught last year, and oh my god you should see the posters! They were fully invested in their groups as a result 🙂
If you have a very pushy, talkative, interrupting student, they may require a different sort of approach from you. I like to make that student in charge of something: opening the windows, getting the instruments out, handing out worksheets, whatever. Give that student a task that you can praise them for, and make sure it’s physical! You’ll be amazed at the rapport you can have with that student: they’re probably not used to being treated like a person, but like a problem.
Raising your voice is NEVER a good idea, even if they’re being nightmares that day. Some kids are sound-sensitive! Set a limit, and follow through every single time. Don’t give a ’just this once’ pass: follow through. You’re NOT a friend: you’re their teacher! You have to set that boundary and STICK BY IT. Tailor your boundaries to the classroom and to the students AS WELL as to you: some children are completely ‘meh’ about being sent away from class, for instance, and for others it is the actual end of the world. Some teachers HATE noise in their classrooms: others are fine with it. Some teachers are fine with kids coming to them for help in their break: others get really shirty. Whatever your limits are, make sure you’re consistent, and that the rules are set out somewhere so the kids are never in any doubt.
Setting boundaries in conjunction with students is even better: they feel like they have an investment in making sure everyone follows the rules if they had a hand in making them. Stillness, and following through, is a better long-term strategy than yelling (which is short-term relief but only demonstrates to students that tantrums are a good way of getting what you want, sadly…!). If you fail and have a good yell, don’t beat yourself up. Goodness knows you won’t be the last teacher to do so!
Giving choice, in a limited and safe capacity, is a brilliant way of allowing students ownership of their learning as well. Give em a selection of 3 things/options for a project. e.g. I had a class musical assessment, in which the whole class had to perform a song together. I gave three possible songs for us to perform, and we had an anonymous vote (votes were placed in my hat!).
Be aware of gendered language, of cisnormativity, or a ‘boys vs girls’ thing in classrooms. It’s pernicious, and it’s even more pernicious in high schools. Also, it’s well-documented that boys are more likely to hog your attention: be aware of this in yourself. Make sure you make the boys aware that they are being unfair towards the girls in the class. Saying ‘wait your turn’ doesn’t help much, but saying something like, “did you notice that you just interrupted [girl] here? Are you aware that you are speaking over the girls in your class and forcing them out of the conversation? Do you think this is fair or appropriate behaviour? How do you think [girl] feels about it?” might just plant a seed or two.
Likewise, if you hear gendered, racist, ableist or homophobic slurs, etc (DEPRESSINGLY common in high schools, unfortunately), stamp down hard and stamp down STRAIGHT AWAY. You don’t even need reasons. The slur itself is enough. Remove that student so that they cannot continue to cause harm to others. Ask that student to report to whatever behaviour unit/resource you have available. Talk to them afterwards and in private – and be armed with as much information as possible. (I once gave one student the potted history of the word ‘f*ggot’ after I heard her using it to mock another student. She was a bit poleaxed and quiet as she left, and the next week on playground duty I heard a friend of hers telling yet another group of kids not to use it. That seems pat and trite, but it goes around. It REALLY goes around.)
Talk about bias in your classroom texts. Ask for and use your students’ own experiences: I promise you, so many of them have amazing cultural backgrounds, and they don’t see them reflected in their own learning. Encourage them to bring their cultures into their work: music is a great one for this 🙂
Some schools have very rigid ideas on assessment practices. I have taught in a school where one of my Year 10 assessments had to be a spoken presentation. Giving alternatives is a really essential part of differentiation: it doesn’t have to be a big change, but to a student with anxiety, giving that presentation outside of class (in break time, or as a video, or as a recording) it can be a real life saver. You will have insights here that many teachers simply do not have: you can use all of that, all of your own experiences and knowledge will help, even your understanding of what it means to have anxiety.
Similarly, if a student seems incredibly uncomfortable when asked to answer a question? Don’t ask them again, but talk to them privately and find out why. They may simply not understand the work – easily fixed – or it may be something more. This can be difficult if your class has a Participation Grade, but together you may be able to find a way for them to participate without having to be called upon. Being the one to collect papers, or to be in charge of the ICTs or the like: this is a good way.
Talk to other teachers. Sit in on as many classes of experienced teachers as possible (ESPECIALLY integrated/inclusive/Spec. Needs classes). Talk to Teachers’ Aides – these people have seen it all.
Some resources and articles (v brief, but I’m a bit pressed and I don’t have free university access to educational journals any more!)
Combating Racism and Prejudice in Schools: Keynotes
Anti-Racism: What schools can do
Eliminating Racism in the Classroom
Best Practices: Creating an LGBT-inclusive School Climate
Student Mental Health and Wellbeing – Education Queensland
Education World: Strategies that Work: Inclusive Classrooms
18 Inclusion Strategies for Student Success
Exceptional Children (William L Heward) – I own this book, and it is REALLY REALLY GOOD.
I really hope all this blabbing and rambling helps, Nonnie. You’re going to be great. You care about this stuff, and people – especially kids – respond to that.
You are MORE than welcome to come talk to me some more. Hit me up for my skype, if you’d like. I’m in your corner. You can totally do this! A good lesson is one in which everybody gets through to the end, something was worked on, and people learned a thing or two. (and it doesn’t even need to be the lesson objective, either! If they learned something? HIGH FIVE ON YOUR SUCCESSFUL LESSON)
wow, can you be any more neurotypical. Lo and behold, I have been blessed by the presence of the Thorin-Is-Scum anon once again, this time poorly disguised as another ‘Guest’. I am lowkey impressed at your dedication – did you really wade through nearly 400K just to tell me how much you despise and hate people with depression and MI, and how unworthy they are of anyone’s esteem or admiration? How tiresome you find their struggles?
Go away. You are unwelcome in any part of my life, and that includes FFN. GO. AWAY.
(for those who cannot read the very small pic, transcript under the cut. Though I honestly wouldn’t bother. I’m only posting it here bc I am angry and need to yell at them to FUCK THE FUCK OFF, and I can’t do that on FFN.)
[Yo, I’m sorry but I’m really not buying whatever you think you’re doing with Thorin’s character here. His speech to Dain is pretty much “I suck and am more bad than good but slightly maybe more good?” which, to me, still says nothing. It’s been 37 chapters. This character has barely changed. And this is supposed to be Thorin as “better?” he best he can be is not as fucked up, while you have so many good, PURE characters? Gimli, who got over his issues (which weren’t even that bad) in like 3 chapters.
And the more you highlight this, the more I don’t get how Thorin functioned with anyone else before. How did his family stand him? Why did anyone even follow him to begin with? You’re telling me these things but I don’t see any reasons why. Thorin said it himself, his only good trait was “courage”. But so what? Every character here is. Why did anyone care about him before he died, if he’s still super flawed now? I know families can love members just because of blood, Boromir loves his dad even though Denethor was a bad father, but just because they love them doesn’t mean the person is deserving of it.
What did Thorin do for his family, or anyone who followed him? Why does Bilbo even love him? It just doesn’t make sense to me when you have one character who is more flawed than everyone else. If he’s supposed to be only “better” because he died, what was there to like when he was alive? There hasn’t been a single talk he’s had with anyone “close” that wasn’t just a compliment after a string of flaws. It just looks like everyone has to pick up after him, and there’s nothing selling me, the reader, on why I should think he deserves it. “Just because” is not an adequate answer. Quite honestly, as tiresome as it is to read chapters of a character constantly self-flagellating, in his case I can see why. He’s saying objective fact. I don’t see where he’s being too harsh on himself. It would be much better without marinating in a character’s shitty flaws for 40 chapters.]
Like, 90% of infomercial style products were designed by/for disabled people, but you wouldn’t know that, because there is no viable market for them. THey have to be marketted and sold to abled people just so that any money can be made of off them and so the people who actually need them will have access.
I think snuggies are the one example
almosteveryone knows. They were invented for wheelchair users (Do you have any idea how hard it is to get a coat on and off of someone in a wheelchair? Cause it’s PRETTY FUCKIN HARD.) But now everyone just acts like they’re some ~quirky, white people thing~ and not A PRODUCT DESIGNED TO MAKE PEOPLES DAY TO DAY LIVES 10000X EASIER.But if at any point you were to take your head out of your own ass and go “Hey, who would a product like this benefit,” that would be really cool.
This makes informational make so much sense now.
Like… of course there’s no reason for that guy to knock over that bowl of chips. However, the person it was actually designed for has constant hand tremors that would make this pretty rad, but since we don’t want to show that in a commercial, here’s an able bodied guy who can’t remember how gravity works.
Shit. Those commercials suddenly get a lot less funny when you realize it’s pretty much just people ineptly trying to mimic disability.
the new chapter!!! it got me wondering, though….was there any particular reason dain gets to keep his peg leg, when others get their legs back?
I felt that this would be something that each Dwarf with a disability would consult with Mahal about, when he wakes them in the Halls. For some, like Nori and Bombur, it would be an easy choice. For others, not so easy.
I did a lot of reading. I REALLY didn’t want to perpetuate shitty ableism and make Dain ‘all better’ by removing such a huge part of his identity (that is in fact why I left a scar upon Bifur’s head as well). I asked a few people I know, and they said, yeah – not a cool thing to do. But it would be great to keep that facet of themselves whilst removing the negative aspects.
So I thought, okay: let’s keep Dain’s leg removed. But there will be none of the negative aspects of being an amputee: he can wear his peg indefinitely without any ill-effect, there is no pain or phantom-pain, he does not need to make any allowances for resting and wrapping the stump etc.
So, there are my thoughts.
Aw Yiss 