On being an anti-racist racist

A few year ago, I attended a couple of talks by Dr. George Yancy, a philosopher at Emory University who, as one of the very few Black philosophers in this country, studies and thinks about race and whiteness. Though I have always considered myself to be anti-racist and ally to people of color, these talks dramatically changed how I think of myself and my role in racism.

In these talks, Dr. Yancy asserted the controversial notion that all White people in America are racist. He went on to explain that being White in America means not only absorbing all the implicit and explicit racist messaging surrounding us on a daily basis, but that we have benefited from that racism, whether we recognize it or not. This means, he noted, that the best a White person can be is an anti-racist racist. He drew a comparison with sexism, saying that as a man in America, the best he can be is an anti-sexist sexist.

Dr. Yancy’s The New York Times article that lead to vast backlash & even death threats

These talks dramatically impacted the way I see my role in fighting racism in America. I had already decided to ensure I openly talked against racism in my professional and private life. But this perspective changed how I situated myself in this work and in these conversations, and furthered my dedication to not only confront my own racism, but that of others as well.

In justice and equity work, self-reflection is a critical and ongoing step in recognizing one’s privilege or marginalization, power or disempowerment, and responsibility to the community. As a White, cis-gendered woman, I began to think more deeply about my privilege as well as the ways I have been enculturated into White supremacy and racism. Once admitting this to myself (and others), I could begin to more purposefully and fully engage in strategies to counteract this particularly insidious form of socialization.

Over the years, I have realized there are several critical features to being an anti-racist racist.

1. Recognizing our racism: No one…and I mean no one…escapes the racist messages embedded in our society. It’s everywhere — TV, film, books, the news, our education system, etc. Further, if you are White, you have been more easily accepted in most cultural spaces than people of color. This acceptance is a huge step up. We must explore our privilege and our racist conditioning and how it emerges in our daily lives and thoughts.

2. Humanize the ‘other’: When we are not exposed to people of difference, we typically hold one dimensional ideas of the ‘other’. Counteracting this notion is critical to becoming an anti-racist racist. Read, watch, listen to, and consume media and material made by people of color. Actively engage with this material to gain a sense of the complex lived experience of black and brown communities and individuals. [side note: it is not the responsibility of your friends, colleagues, and neighbors of color to teach you this information — we have vast information we can easily access for our own self-education]

3. Recognize our limited understanding: If you are white, no amount of reading or research will allow you to fully understand experience of being a person of color in America. Understand this limitation. You will never be the expert on the experience of racism in our communities. The best we can be is informed and willing to engage in lifelong learning.

4. Understand we are responsible for racism, and for its destruction: People of color are the victims of racism. White people are the perpetrators. It is our responsibility to fight racism and spread inclusion throughout our communities.

5. Speak up and speak out: We need to act to counteract racism. Otherwise these other steps are all for naught — the self-education and the self-reflection stays in the self, where it is helping no one. Actively fight racial injustice when and where you can. Be, as Dr. Bettina Love describes, a co-conspirator.

I want to be clear, admitting our racism and actively and constantly addressing racism in our communities is not easy. Neither is it a task to be weighed down by guilt. Guilt will only slow you down. Guilt will shifts the focus and attention away from those impacted by racism, to you who has benefited from it. Accepting that we have been raised in a White supremacist society and absorbed those messages is only helpful if you dedicate yourself to fighting the perpetuation of these messages and the consequence racist acts in our society.

I know I am an anti-racist racist. Only when I admitted this to myself was I able to effectively dedicate myself to eradicating racism in our country. Recognizing the part I play makes racism personal to me.

I am an anti-racist racist. Are you?

Books, Websites, Podcasts, Films to get you started:

Black Lives Matter

1619 by The New York Times

We need to talk about injustice by Bryan Stevenson

The Urgency of Intersectionality by Kimberle Crenshaw

Ibram X. Kendi on How to Be Anti-Racist at UC Berkely

The Canary Effect by Robin Davey & Yellow Thunder Woman

13th by Ava Duvernay

We Are Not a Stereotype: Breaking Down Asian Pacific American Bias by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center

Native Land Digital

A Guide to Indigenous Land Acknowledgment by Native Governance Center

Pause on the Play

Intersectionality Matters!

Ear Hustle

…..Add your own in the comments!!

Can DEIB Advance Human Rights?

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.

-Article 22 of the UDHR

Photo by Steve Leisher on Unsplash

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was developed by a collection of world leaders, led by Eleanor Roosevelt, in 1948. This document set out ideals for an equitable, kind, humane world. Developed on the heels of WWII and the Nuremberg Trials, it was, and is, a greatly needed document. Since, then, the goals of the document have lessened in scope and power.

When I taught human rights at Emory University, my students would regularly feel frustrated by the limitations of modern-day human rights rhetoric and application. They (rightly) felt there was limited accountability for implementation and that even when nation work to meet basic human rights, it still seemed to fall short of truly lifting people up.

As I shifted my career into diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB), I began to see some important overlaps between human rights and DEIB. Specifically, I wonder if good diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging work is in the spirit of some of the most aspirational goals of the UDHR — equality, through equity.

A brief overview of the UDHR

The UDHR has 30 articles outlining human rights and freedoms. Though there is some criticism of the universality of the document, it is generally considered groundbreaking as a document that aimed to apply to all people, regardless of nationality, religion, ethnicity, age, gender, race, political ideology and more. The rights and freedoms include what are called negative rights (or rights of non-interference) such as the right to practice one’s religion, to peaceful assembly, to privacy, to marriage, to seek asylum, etc. There are also positive rights (or rights requiring action or resource support), such as the right to education, the right to work, and the right to health and well-being.

Eleanor Roosevelt holding a copy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

The positive rights are ones that most directly help ensure a person’s economic and social rights. Otherwise known as social rights, these are the rights that are most often ignored or sidelined throughout the world. Most assume these rights are ignored in the Global South, which is characterized a too poor to provide these resources. But the trend of denying these rights was actually led by the Global North, including the US; countries that were increasingly being driven by capitalism and neoliberalism.

As Samuel Moyn describes in Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World, when the UDHR was created, socialism was waning but not entirely gone. There was a push, particularly in nations emerging from colonialism, to create states in which everyone had equal access to goods. While new nations developed constitutions that included some basic provisions, it was not entirely mirrored in developed nations. As the rich became richer, capitalism rose globally, and socialism was roundly vilified. The consequences were that social rights fell by the wayside.

Along the way, an emphasis on sufficiency replaced equality for human rights. Nations and governments started defining the fullfilment of human rights as having ‘enough’ to live on and get by. What was ‘sufficient’ for survival, not what would create an equal distribution of goods, services, and rights. Not equity.

“The idea of belonging shouldn’t be considered a privilege available only to some. It should be considered a basic human right.”

- Linda Mullen, Executive Director of the Sparkle Effect, as quoted in Rhodes Perry’s Belonging at Work

With the rise of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) initiatives, it’s possible that the original aims of equality may be elevated even in our modern neoliberal, capitalistic environment.

The Role of DEIB

With a focus on ensuring people have the resources needed to thrive in their work life, DEIB is working towards fulfillment of the social rights noted above — more economic resources and social resources to participate in society and have one’s voices heard.

“By including social and economic rights in the struggle for human rights, we help to protect those most likely to suffer the insults of structural violence.”
- Paul Farmer, Pathologies of Power

In other words, by ensuring peoples social rights, they can better enact all their human rights, including political and civic rights, and feel a sense of belonging in their communities. How can people work to improve their community if constantly distracted by ongoing poverty or exhausting workloads?

DEIB efforts — at least those that are done thoroughly and with a commitment to widespread change — center on creating mutual respect by increasing our understanding and appreciation of human difference and diversity. While most efforts are focused on the private industries, we do see similar moves in government, institutes of education, and community spaces (including human rights organizations themselves!).

And the proof of concept is there. Companies with good DEIB strategies have better employee retention. While this outcome is traditionally used to demonstrate the organizational benefits of DEIB, it is also good for individuals. Employees that feel safe, comfortable, and supported at work are not distracted by workplace stress and are less likely to desire to find a better work environment. When we aren’t distracted by negative experiences in our workplaces, we can be better, more involved citizens and humans.

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

So, could the growing DEIB movement be the bridge between the quasi-socialist ideals of the UDHR and the current neoliberal capitalist ideology? And in doing so, could it be a way to demonstrate that equity and equality improve upon our contemporary social ideals and aims?

I don’t want to suggest DEIB as a strategy to perpetuate capitalism, but just in a ‘nicer’ way. That is how some DEIB work is being done now — as a response to cultural trends that are all talk and no action and aimed only at company bottom lines. However, if DEIB has staying power and if it is increasingly done well — meaning it is integrated into mission statements, policies, onboarding, human resources, SOPs, etc and is seen as an ongoing process — perhaps there is hope that our local and global community will start to reevaluate the sufficiency versus equality divide. Maybe we will recognize the widespread benefits of making sure everyone thrives, instead of just survives. And possibly good DEIB work could contribute to a reduction of social and wealth disparities and all the social ills we are seeing as a result of the increasing divide.

Call me an idealist, but I think it has the potential.

The Pandemic and the Myth of Independence

tl;dr: Independence is a myth. Interdepedence is what defines us. Taking care of others is taking care of ourselves. Mask up. Get vaccinated.

Image by Chris Nagahama on Unsplash

I started studying disability studies and theories in 2008 when I began my doctoral program. Prior to this, I had never really engaged with critical theory and the work coming out of disability studies and from disabled thinkers. As someone who did not identify as disabled, what I was learning from these scholars gave words to much of the disquiet I experienced as a special educator. This field helped me understand why I felt unease employing behaviorism with autistic children, confusion over why we had to change behaviors that seemed to comfort the kids I worked with, and, most importantly, helped me think through the problems I saw in how our society treats disabled community members and each other.

As the pandemic proceeded, my knowledge of disability and feminist perspectives became critical to contextualize the public response to the pandemic. I thought specifically of the work examining individualism and independence, two American ideals that seem to form the foundation of our society. Exhausted with people refusing to get vaccinated and mask up, I tweeted about this back in August. With Omicron tearing through the world, I feel the need to revisit and reemphasize this perspective.

First, let’s talk about independence. Throughout the Global North, particularly in America, we are taught that we can do anything we want as long as we put our minds to it. We encourage people to ‘pull themselves up by their bootstraps’, ‘stand on your own two feet’, and idolize ‘rags to riches’ stories. It is the American dream after all.

This dream is instituted into the very foundations of modern democratic society. It was expounded and perpetuated by early liberal philosophers. John Locke, whose work inspired the American revolution, emphasized individualism as well as property ownership and religious freedom. Utilitarian idol John Stuart Mill wrote about the importance of individual happiness, the calculation of which means some people’s happiness is forgone. Inspired by these and other Enlightenment thinkers, Thomas Jefferson centered individual ‘inalienable rights’ in the Declaration of Independence, where he wrote that ‘all men are created equal’ and have the right to ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness’.

John Locke

It’s important to recognize that this early work came from a specific perspective — that of the white, cisgendered, land-owning man. These men had wives and mothers who cooked their food, cleaned and mended their clothes, and raised their children. What these men failed to realize was that their experience of independence actually relied on a lot of support. And, of course, these rights were developed with them and their peers in mind — they didn’t exactly apply to women, people of color, children, or people with disabilities.

Some of this early work on liberalism, individualism, and independence reflect modern values that should continue to be valued: freedom of religion, free speech, the basic right to live one’s life as one wishes. But the ideal of independence has grown into an imperative — if you are not independent, then you are not a good citizen, you are not a good person. Dependency has become a bad word.

And so now, we have people who are refusing the get a vaccine or wear a mask because of their natural right to independence and liberty. People who prioritize themselves and their circle over the good of the community. Who consider their individual interests as of equal import to the interests of society. Where has this independence as gotten us? As of the time of writing, it has contributed to the death of over 800,000 Americans and nearly 5 ½ million people worldwide.

But independence is a myth; it is, in fact, a dream. Unattainable. In reality, our actions and perspectives impact others. None of us exist in a silo. We rely on loved ones for emotional and material support. We rely on doctors for healing. We rely on farmers for food. We rely on religious leaders for guidance. We rely on teachers for knowledge.

In short, no one could get through a day entirely independently.

Photo by Mike Erskine on Unsplash

Some may argue that this is an exaggeration. That, sure, we all have our place in society and provide certain goods and services for communities, but there is a point at which we become responsible for ourselves and our futures. But this imaginary line in the sand is nebulous and ill-defined, even for those who believe in it. What level of dependency is too much? What is an acceptable level of dependency?

Disability and feminist scholars and thinkers emphasize the fact that no one is fully independent; we are all interdependent. While we may have different needs and rely on others to various extents, no one escapes interdepedence entirely.

In other words, interdepedence is a unifying feature of humanity itself. And so the myth of independence and the equation of dependence with weakness and even immorality — which drives ableism, sexism, elitism, and more — is at it’s core inaccurate. One could say it’s fake news.

What would happen if we embraced and celebrated interdependence and dependence? What would happen if we were taught the value interdependence rather than independence from birth?

I’m not arguing necessarily for collectivism—for transforming our identities into ones that are inseparable from that of the community (though I’m also not necessarily opposed to it). But I believe that we can hold both the idea that we can be our own people and that we need to care for our community as we care for ourselves. That we recognize and appreciate that we exist and survive because we live with and beside other humans, not in spite of them.

As we watch Omicron sweep the world and disrupt our lives — forcing students out of schools, hospitals to cope with overcrowding, travel to be disrupted, and visits to vulnerable family members halted — we should think about how much we truly value the illusion of independence. And ask ourselves why it is an illusion we hold on to so tightly, when in fact, our strength is in our dependency.

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For more on the myth of independence, explore the works of Eva Kittay, David Mitchell, Sharon Snyder, Mia Mingus, Nirmala Erevelles, Sarah Ahmed, Martha Fineman, and Gayle Binion.

Readers: Feel free to also add other scholars or specific readings in the comments.

Autistic and Black While Walking: The Case of Armani Sharpe

By: Jennifer C. Sarrett

Update: As of August 25, 2021, all charges against Armani have been dropped in both Hazel Park and Ferndale!!!

When Armani Sharpe was in the 3rd grade, he arrived at school one day to discover the teacher had rearranged the room. Although Armani had the same desk, the change in the arrangement of furniture confused him to an unusual degree. His distress at this change eventually led him to be diagnosed with autism.

Now, Armani is a 20 year old, 6’2” black man who enjoys being out in nature (even though he’s allergic to some trees and grasses!), watching Disney +, and the morning walks prescribed by his therapist. But lately, he hasn’t been able to take his walks. He stays in his room most of the day and his mom, Monique Jewel, says he showing signs of depression. All this because Armani was wrongly accused of indecent exposure and disorderly conduct in two cities — Ferndale, MI & Hazel Park, MI — for the same event.

On Sept. 6, 2020 Armani set out for his usual morning walk. However, on this day, construction prevented him from taking his usual route. He had to reroute, which brought him to West End, a street that straddles the two cities of Ferndale and Hazel Park, both of which are predominantly white. As we walked, he was approached by two white women, both with dogs, who repeatedly asked him why he was in their neighborhood and where Armani lives.

Changes in routine and transitions causing confusion are common traits of autism and one that Armani had been experiencing since childhood. Armani, already distressed from the new route, only grew more uncomfortable during the intense interaction with these women. He cursed at the women, telling them to leave him alone.

They called the cops.

Image from protest feature Armani Sharpe holding a “Black Autistic Lives Matter” sign. Image by Antranik Tavitian, Retrieved from Detroit Free Press

When the multiple cops arrived, the women accused Armani of exposing himself to them and making lewd remarks. The interaction with the police, the women, and Armani was confusing. But Armani, who, like many autistic people, is not one to lie, consistently held that he had not pulled his pants down nor had he made those lewd remarks.

The police, however, sided with the women and charges have been brought against Armani in both Ferndale and Hazel Park, despite one of the officers knowing Armani was autistic from a previous interaction and announcing it to all at the scene. But a tall, young, verbal — but soft-spoken — black man doesn’t, to many, “look autistic”.

Racism, Ableism, and Sexuality

When we look at common attitudes and assumptions about both race and disability, it is no surprise these women accused Armani of lewd behavior. As someone who researches disability in the criminal justice system, I am all too aware of the ways race and disability can lead to these kinds of accusations, which have a long history with blackness and intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Our country has a dark past of racial terror lynchings. Many of these murders were prompted by false accusations of a black man assaulting, being interested in, or simply looking at white women. Think Emmet Till, whose accuser recounted her story over 60 years later. Think the Exonerated 5, who were falsely accused of assaulting a jogger in Central Park, but were incarcerated for decades before they were exonerated.

The Exonerated 5 at the BET Awards, from left to right: Kevin Richardson, Korey Wise, Raymond Santana, Antron McCray, and Yusef Salaam. Photo credit Kevin Winter/Getty, Retrieved from People.com

The image of what some call the brute caricature — which are portrayals of black men as criminal, dangerous, and uncontrollable — has spanned centuries. From the end of the 1800s and through the middle of the 1900s, these portrayals replaced earlier depictions of enslaved people as childlike. And even when it became socially unacceptable to write black characters as brutish, the trend found other avenues: as, for example, crack addicted violent criminals who emerged only briefly in police procedural shows. But the impact remains — remember Breana Harmon Talbot, the white 18 year old girl who, in 2017, claimed three black men with ski masks kidnapped and raped her. It was all a hoax.

And then there is the ableism. People with intellectual and developmental disabilities, like autism, have also had a long history of being associated with ‘unbridled sexuality’, while simultaneously also being assumed to be immature to warrant sex education in school. We all read Of Mice and Men in high school wherein Steinbeck had Lenny kill a puppy and a woman.

Many times, people with intellectual or developmental disabilities are not only wrongly accused of sexual misconduct or assault, but then coerced in to confessing. Recent research by Melanie Clark Mogavero shows that both people with intellectual and developmental disabilities and those wrongly accused of sexual assault falsely confess. This puts Armani at risk of being pressured to confess, or accept a plea deal that will remain on his record.

He could end up like Edgar Coker, who at 15 was wrongly accused of raping his girlfriend, who later recanted. Edgar falsely confessed in order to avoid being sent to an adult prison. He was later exonerated based on constitutionally deficient defense but not before being incarcerated in a juvenile facility for 15 months and put on the sex offender registry until the age of 22. Like Armani, Edgar is black and disabled.

Edgar Coker and his mother, Cherri Dulaney. Edgars name was on the sex offender registry until he was 22 years despite the charges being vacated years earlier. Photo by Peter Cihelka and retrieved from The Free Lance-Star

The Risk for Armani

Being falsely accused of something like indecent exposure does not come without long lasting harms. If convicted, Armani could incur incarceration and hundreds in fines. Even if he takes a plea deal to avoid jail time, he will have a record follow him, making it difficult for him to work or even find housing. Not to mention the mental health impacts he is already experiencing that will continue to be exacerbated the longer this case goes on.

And if he has another run in with police, which given his blackness and disability is a strong possibility, Armani is at high risk of harm. This case exemplifies the perfect storm of ableism and racism, which can be a fatal combination when police get involved. This risk is heightened if police see he has a record. Combined with the historic stigmas of unbridled sexuality of black men and people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, an official record of being accused could significantly damage Armani’s future.

As a community, we must see that Armani gets justice. We must not allow the pressure of these charges and threat of incarceration push Armani to falsely confess or to accept a plea deal for something he did not do. Dropping the charges will help open his future and help his family move on. It will also, perhaps, help us as a community begin to question these historic assumptions about black and disabled men.

This piece was written with the help and approval of Monique Jewel, Armani’s mom, Camille Proctor of The Color of Autism, and Lisa Franklin of Warriors on Wheels of Metro Detroit.

Race and Girlhood in America

How Rochester Officers Came to Pepper Spray a 9 Year Old Girl

Not even a year after the tragic killing of Daniel Prude at the hands of Rochester police, the City of Rochester released body cam footage of police officers restraining, handcuffing, and pepper spraying a 9-year-old girl. This incident is shocking and horrific. And it leads to several pressing questions, the most critical being: Why did adult, trained, police officers thinks it was okay to pepper spray a 9-year-old?

In order to understand this event, it must be placed into our social and historical context. The ways these officers treated this child can be traced to a social foundation created at the intersection of racism, sexism, and ableism that sees young, Black girls in a very different light than their peers.

Image by Steven Depolo / CC BY 2.0

On January 29th, the police were called for a ‘family disturbance’, noting a girl was distressed. A total of nine Rochester police officers arrived with the aim of transferring the girl to a mental health care facility. The girl did not want to be restrained and sent to a hospital, so she tried to get away. In that process, this 9-year-old fell onto the snowy ground, was forced into a police car covered with cold snow, and was told: “This is your last chance or pepper spray is going in your eyeballs.” And then they followed through with the threat.

Nine adults — trained police officers — resorted to pepper spraying a 9-year-old girl.

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“Officer, please don’t do this to me”, she cried.

“You did it to yourself, hon,” the officer in the front seat replies.

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We have been in a critical cultural moment where, as a nation, we are reckoning with police violence against our Black community members. Most of this attention has focused on unarmed Black men. Increasingly, we are recognizing the role mental health plays, such that up to a half of all police killings involve a mental health concern. Both racism and ableism (the discrimination against people with disabilities, including mental health disabilities) are central to this girl’s traumatic experience. But in this case especially, we have to examine how sexism further shapes this racism and ableism.

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“It’s burning too bad,” the girl says.

“It’s supposed to burn. It’s called pepper spray,” an officer responds.

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The wave of awareness about police violence that began last summer has taught the world that Black men are seen as more violent and more likely to be guilty (think of George Floyd, Rayshard Brooks, Ahmaud Arbery — all killed in 2020). Further, Black boys are often perceived as older than they actually are (think of Mike Brown, Tamir Rice) and are six times more likely to be killed by police than their white peers. And while we are starting to also bring attention to Black women facing police violence (think of Breonna Taylor, Sandra Bland, Atatianna Jefferson), we haven’t quite started to understand how Black girls are being impacted.

A report by Georgetown Law’s Center on Poverty and Inequality on Black girl childhood concludes that “adults view Black girls as less innocent and more adult-like than their white peers.” Black girls are seen as needing less support and protection, as being more independent, and knowing more about sex and other adult topics. Adults often describe Black girls as “loud”, “very mature”, and “controlling for their age.” The result is that they experience harsher punishment in school and, as this story shows, in the community.

Photo by Eye for Ebony on Unsplash

Relying on the work of Dr. Priscilla Ocen, the report also describes how this perspective is linked to slavery, in which Black children were disassociated with typical aspects of childhood, like play and exploration. Legacies of this dehumanization continue to impact children.

The resulting process of ‘adultification’ robs young Black children of their childhood, and, sometimes, their lives.

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“Stop acting like a child” one of the Rochester officers said.

“I am a child” She cried.

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I’ve written before about how racism and ableism are implicated in police violence. About how, for Black men and women, this dangerous combination of prejudice starts in schools and extends into adulthood along a path I call the “special education to prison pipeline.”

While it’s true that we are in a moment when cities and municipalities are creating alternatives to police to respond to mental health crises, as this event shows, this isn’t enough. The way this call was coded — again, as a ‘family disturbance’ and not a ‘mental health crisis’ — led to police responding instead of the city’s Person in Crisis (PIC) or Forensic Intervention Team (FIT) .

These police alternatives are great and should be more fully supported, funded, and developed. But we can’t think that these teams are the sole solution to the problem. Having these teams paired with good police training on de-escalation and mental and behavioral health is better, but still not the best solution. We need to identify and address the needs of community members as risk for police violence and develop strategies that prevent crises like these from occurring. Families and individuals need good, safe housing; culturally appropriate medical care, including mental health care; good paying jobs; access to nutritious foods; and well supported and resourced schools.

Image by Steven Depolo / CC BY 2.0

But we also need to look at changing harmful attitudes towards children of color throughout our communities. We need to have better media representation of Black boys and girls (and men and women), ones that don’t rely on damaging stereotypes. Our teachers need to be more diverse and be trained in how to equitably interact with all students. We need to integrate our neighborhoods, so everyone has equitable access to resources and more personal interactions with people if different backgrounds and identities (see here to explore residential segregation in your town).

The problems we are seeing with policing are reflections of wider, systemic problems. This means the solution can not solely target policing or mental health care. We need to fix our society, eradicate White supremacy, and make our communities more equitable, more just, and more supportive for everyone.

Language Matters: Ableism in Everyday Language

Our language has moral baggage.

I think a lot about this. The words and phrases we choose don’t exist in a vacuum. They refer back in time, to events and attitudes that we do not necessarily choose when we use them in the present. Words and phrases have the power to shape our thoughts and perspectives, and for this reason we have a duty to think carefully about the way we speak.

I’m not exactly talking etymology, which traces the origins of the roots of words. For example, the etymology of the word ‘salary’ is that it is from the Latin salarium, meaning ‘salt money’. In Roman times, people were often paid in salt because of its value in preserving food and health benefits. This is an interesting fact, and the source of many words are just that: interesting.

Photo by Waldemar Brandt on Unsplash

But there are many words and phrases we use on a daily basis that have more complicated histories and baggage because they have been used to refer to certain people or certain qualities of people. These are words that have been used to oppress, discriminate against, and stigmatize people and continued use continues these processes. Through the history and baggage of these words and phrases, people are belittled, marginalized, and rejected. Some of these terms and phrases are obvious, and most of us have eradicated them from our language out of disgust for their original meaning and offense. Often these words and phrases are racist, xenophobic, or sexist. I’m sure we can all think of some examples without me salaciously (from the Greek salax, meaning ‘lustful’) listing a few.

Yet there are a host of words and phrases that we commonly use that don’t always get called out as ableist. These words and phrases refer to disabilities in demeaning ways—as bad, broken, or inhuman—but are often considered ‘fine’, ‘not that bad’, or ‘just a word’. However, given that 20% of our community identifies as disabled, there is a chance that these words have a deeper impact on those around us than we realize.

People with disabilities know this. They feel the hurt this language brings. So here, I’m talking to non-disabled folks. As an ally to the disability community, I see it as my responsibility to think carefully about the consequences of my language and to work to stop using ableist language and inform other non-disabled people on how to do the same.

There are two main ways to think about the way language can be ableist: when our words and phrases suggest a stigmatizing inaccuracy about disability and when used as a metaphor, which almost always perpetuates disability stigma.

The Damage of Inaccuracies

One common example is the phrase ‘wheelchair bound’. This phrase continues to be widely used in media, such as this story, this story, and that story. But let’s look at this phrase. The word ‘bound’, in the sense used here, means tied or fastened to, suggesting that people and their wheelchairs are constantly and inevitably connected. This is just factually inaccurate. Anyone who gets in to a wheelchair can get out of a wheelchair.

This phrasing also suggests a lack of choice in movement and confinement, which we think of as punishment in this society. So when this phrase is used, it is done to convey a state of limitation and suffering, which leads to pity. And pity furthers the distance between ‘us’ and ‘them’. Pity is othering.

However, wheelchairs are the exact opposite. For people with ambulatory disabilities, wheelchairs are instruments of liberation and freedom. They facilitate community interaction and independence. Wheelchairs should be celebrated. Instead, say ‘person who uses a wheelchair’, which is factual and value free.

Another example are alternatives to the word disability itself, such as ‘special needs’, ‘handi-capable’, or ‘differently abled’. Rather than look at what these terms actually mean, let’s think about what their intent is—to avoid the use of the word ‘disability’. When we avoid (from the Anglo-French avoider “to clear out, withdraw (oneself)”) words it suggests that the words are bad or offensive in some fundamental way—which is the main point of this article. But is ‘disability’ offensive or bad? To suggest the word itself is bad is to suggest that the state of being disabled is bad or wrong; it suggests disability is a ‘bad thing’. Use the word disability, it is accurate and helps normalize the presence of disability in our world.

The Damage of Metaphor

There have been some good efforts to address ableist language in the form of disability labels as metaphors, such as the efforts to end the “R” word. This movement continues to gain ground and hopefully soon we will no longer hear it used as a pejorative (from the Late Latin peiorare, “to make worse”) in the media and the streets. But in the mid 20th century, before this word was an insult, it was a clinical diagnosis.

Prior to the 1960s, the words ‘moron’, ‘imbecile’, and ‘idiot’ were official scientific classifications for intellectual disability. When these words got taken up in the public as insults, the clinical word shifted to ‘retardation’. And as that term became an insult, we began to use ‘intellectual disability’. This cycle feeds on ableism; only when we destigmatize diverse minds will we stop using these labels as insults.

Image from page 18 of “Mental defectives in Virginia: a special report of the State board of charities and corrections to the General assembly of nineteen sixteen on weak-mindedness in the state of Virginia”, circa 1915

All words are symbols and metaphors. Being aware of the referents of these symbols and metaphors can help us avoid common ableist language. Take the word ‘crazy’. We all know this is a referent to mental illness. But it is also very often used to refer to everyday events, and not always necessarily in a negative way. This is why I think people have a hard time recognizing the harm in using ‘crazy’ as a metaphor. When someone tells you that last night’s party was ‘crazy’, you know it was a good time.

But think about what that word is actually referring to—that the party was, perhaps, wild, unpredictable, and even a bit out of control. These associations are the moral baggage of the word ‘crazy’, even when used to describe something we like. And when we use it to describe things, that baggage of metaphors—wild, unpredictable, out of control—gets attached to people with psychiatric disabilities as well. This association fuels the stigma and dehumanization of those with mental illnesses.

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These ideas are not new, and not just mine. In 1978, Susan Sontag published Illness As Metaphor, which explores the damage of using illnesses, like cancer, as a metaphor for real world events. A host of related works have followed in the decades since from historians, linguists, ethicists, and others. If there is one underlying message to this work, it’s to be more thoughtful in our language. While no one is expecting everyone to know the history of every word and phrase ever used, we can use common sense (for practice, use the above example of ‘crazy’ to think through the use of ‘lame’ or metaphors of blindness).

My advice from years thinking and teaching about this topic is to pause when using metaphors that stem from labels applied to people. Think of what you are actually trying to say—what adjectives could be used—and whether you would be okay having someone use those adjectives to talk about you. And follow your gut, if a word or phrase seems possibly inappropriate (from in-, meaning opposite, and the Latin appropriatus, ‘to make one’s own’) it’s worth taking a few moments to think it through.

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For more, I recommend these resources create by disability activists:

1. Autistic Hoya, “Ableism/Language”
2. Autistic Self Advocacy Network, “Identity-First Language”
3. Bitter Gertrude, “Anti-Ableism 101: How to be a Better Ally”

How Racism and Ableism Killed Daniel Prude (and Countless Others)

Seventeen naked protestors outside of Rochester, NY City Hall following the death of Daniel Prude. Image by Larrymoss~commonswiki

The Need for an Intersectional Approach to the Defund the Police Movement

Daniel Prude’s brother called police to help Daniel during a mental health crisis. The officers who responded, trained to quell and respond to violence from neurotypical people, hooded Daniel and kneeled on his back until he lost consciousness. A week later, he died.

This is yet another unnecessary death of a person with a psychiatric, developmental, or intellectual disability from a police interaction. It is also another death of a person of color in a moment of nationwide protests against racialized police killings. With up to half of violent police interactions involving people with mental health disabilities and vast disparities in fatalities of people of color, we can no longer ignore the intersection of these disabilities and race.

Part of the current conversation about police violence has brought to light efforts to defund the police. And these conversations are making a difference; the Rochester police department fired top officials and is considering other important changes. The defund the police movement urges shifting some, most, or even all of the $100 billion spent on police forces every year to community-based resources for citizens. Mental health care is one resource those in the defund police movement frequently note as in need of this funding.

Calls to defund the police include plans to shift funding from police forces to mental health care. Image by Taymaz Valley

There are also calls to change the way police are trained. Recently released internal documents from the investigation by the Rochester police of the Daniel Prude case concluded that “The officers’ actions and conduct displayed when dealing with Prude appear to be appropriate and consistent with their training.” The problem is that this is likely true. Officers are trained to respond in certain ways that often conflict with de-escalation tactics. We definitely need to address and improve this training and stop sending police on calls they are not prepared to handle.

Fortunately, there are models already in place to do so, which align with calls from the defund the police movement to create non-armed response teams to respond to emergency mental health crises. There has been success with these police alternatives, such as the CAHOOTS program in Oregon, which sends a medic and trained crisis worker to mental health calls and has inspired similar programs in Denver, Portland, and Oakland.

Daniel, and many others like him, died because he was Black and disabled and police perceived that combination of identities as a threat.

Programs like these do alleviate some of the negative outcomes from police responses to calls that they are simply not trained to respond to, and for which, quite frankly, they should never have been responsible. However, these programs only address part of the problem of race and disability in our justice system and throughout our society.

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As Dr. Sinead Younge from Morehouse College and I have found from interviews conducted last year, Black men with psychiatric, intellectual, and/or developmental disabilities who are also unhomed experience significant disparities in the justice system. These disparities begin early and are embedded throughout the system. Our interviewees frequently explained how the school system failed them by not addressing their disabilities properly, leaving them without the skills needed to competently navigate the criminal justice system. These men reported not being able to read forms, understand judges, or follow orders from officers and, consequently, are incarcerated, arrested, abused, or bullied in the system.

For example, one informant told us: “I was in jail one time because when I didn’t understand the questions the judge was asking me, and she sentenced me to three months in [county jail] because I didn’t understand.” He asked her for clarification but, “she still sentenced me. She said, ‘I don’t have time for this. You’re going to [the county] jail.’ Three months. And that was just for disorderly conduct.”

A lack of understanding of how disability and race—and the presence of other disenfranchised identities—impacts one’s experiences is the foundation of disparities in the carceral system. Our society was built without a consideration of intersectionality and the ways our social identities (i.e. race, class, disability, gender, sexuality) shape our experience and so it is destined to perpetuate harm for some, and reward others.

For instance, a failure to properly address a student’s disabilities can lead to academic failures that compel students to skip school or drop out early. Leaving school early is a risk factor for arrest and incarceration. And given that Black students are more likely to be in special education than their peers, they are more likely to experience academic frustrations. Further, responses to student misbehavior increasingly mirror those of the justice system, such as the presence of officers at the school, metal detectors, and an increase use of suspensions and expulsions, all of which disproportionately target both Black students and students with intellectual and learning disabilities.

The conflation between Blackness and disability with criminality does not end in schools. This discrimination follows people into our housing system, wherein having a criminal record can get you kicked out of government housing. It follows people into our healthcare system, wherein Black patients, particularly women, and people with disabilities are repeatedly assumed to be lying about their pain and symptoms or unable to properly assess their own illness experiences. And difficulties with housing and health care can increase one’s risk of coming into contact with the criminal justice system. Without attending to how our intersecting identities can lead to protection or risk in all of these systems, efforts to improve one is destined to fail.

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Programs like CAHOOTS most often do, and must, take intersecting identities into consideration in training their professionals and responding to calls. This approach must be integrated throughout our justice system, including our police who, even with these programs, will interact with people with disabilities. But we also need to integrate intersectional appreciation in all our social systems, including our education, employment, housing, and even transportation systems, as a way to reduce the likelihood of police interactions. Shifting funding from police will help, but without thoughtful, intentional, intersectional approaches, inherent ableism, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, and classism will undermine these efforts.

Photo by Matteo Paganelli on Unsplash

Daniel, and many others like him, died because he was Black and disabled and police perceived that combination of identities as a threat. His death is another in a long line Black men and women who died resisting threatening authority figures. He died, like many disabled people before him, at the hands of people whose racism and ableism did not allow them to grant him his full humanity.

But he didn’t have to die. And the men we interviewed didn’t have to get caught up in a system that targets their race and fails to understand their disability. So yes, defunding the police and setting up mental health resources is critical. But so is imbedding an appreciation of multiple intersecting identities throughout our social systems because these systems are also intersecting and interlocking.