#violent erasure of disability

[epistolaryfairy]

ooooooooh is that why you named yourself paul

It is! The short version is: He is my namesake because the Beatles Phenomenon is my Special Interest. The longer version is that Paul is my ‘avatar’—yet another thing in my life which was Mysterious until i had words for Autism. If yall don’t mind the Old Dog telling another Autism In The Time Of Violent Erasure story:

When i was growing up, my communication disability was significant, but was universally misinterpreted as Shyness. When i expressed distress at being unable to talk to others, i was told ‘just be yourself’. I found this Baffling, as i had never tried to be anything else. I remember thinking, ‘but what if my “Self”, doesn’t talk?’ I knew I would suffer harm and deprivation for not speaking, and yet I was not holding back—the problem was that very often, no words came at all.

I had no words to express any of this. Because productivity is valued over humanity in our culture, any framework which did not paint my disability as something negotiable was rejected by every adult in my life, and replaced with solutions and explanations that were for other more solvable problems and not my own. In this case i was led to believe my Wordlessness was not Me, but rather a symptom of ‘anxiety’ i needed to overcome, so that i could ‘be myself’. Because I was essentially forbidden to embrace the nonspeaking part of me as Myself, I felt empty of personality.

I often sought comfort in The Beatles; they are my Special Interest. One day when i was maybe 14 or 15, it occurred to me that, although i did not know what I would say in a given situation, I could often guess at what Paul might say. So, i just began to imagine myself as him, and say his Words where i had none. Back then i wrote that i had ‘grafted Paul’s Personality Matrix onto my own’, where mine had been deemed insufficient.

Because he made sense to me—and very likely because he was not a woman—this did not feel like the impossible, suffocating imposition ‘pretending to be a normal 90s girl’ was. It was workable, and that was lifesaving. My Beatles friends (in retrospect likely fellow Beatles autists) sometimes gave this name weight by each taking a ‘beatle name’ and role of their own. I have been ‘The Paul’ to probably three such groups, so the name is deeply meaningful in a relational sense as well; for example it represents a mutual and weighty connection with those in my life who have resonated with John.

Either way, this solved the issue of my Silence in places, and gave me words to say, yet i was aware my interpretation of Paul was only an approximation, a reflection of what i could see as a Fan observing his actions through the lens of history and notoriety, thirty years after The Phenomenon occurred. I often explained: ‘I am Paul, and also, I am not Paul.’

Over the years i ran into others who did this with other personalities. In fact i believe it may be what John Linnell (edit: i am told this is Flans, my bad) is talking of when he says ‘put your hand inside the puppet head’. I imagined it as a sort of ‘sock puppeting’, yet this gave the impression of artificiality, distortion, even deception, and that was not true for me, because unlike someone wearing a sock puppet, I also am the puppet, and often cannot directly interact without it. On learning of the spiritual term ‘avatar’ to describe nonhuman entities’ needing to manifest as imperfect extensions of themselves to interact with the earth since they do not ‘belong’ in our realm, my friends and i began to call these our ‘avatars’.

Thanks for asking about the name; I didn’t realize it had been so long since i talked about it!

[dragoncoven]

The one thing from Sonic 3 that irks me is the erasure of Maria's disability as it's a big part of her story in the games. It could have been a good talking point with kids and their parents irl about illnesses, like how her death (she still gets violently mirked by GUN, just in a slightly different way) could be. I haven't even played the games, the movies being my main introduction to the franchise, but I did find out about Maria as well as Shadow's backstory in general through fandom exposure since the first two movies.

Sure, the writer's excuse could be "it isn't relevant to the plot" or "it's not supposed to be exactly like Sonic Adventure 2". But it still wierds me out that they included Maria but not her illness (that appears to be debilitating and would lead to death), which good or bad is a whole thing in her very short involvement in the game's story. It feels like taking away Tails' extra tail or Sonic's personality. Not to mention ableist.

So screw it Sonic 3 AU where pretty much everything is the same except Maria has her illness/disability.

Let's say there's a flashback where Shadow and Maria are playing as usual when she suddenly coughs and/or faints. Shadow tries to shake her awake (could be another foil later on when Sonic tries to wake Tom up after Shadow hurts him) when Gerald and the other scientists reach them.

Next shot or flashback for Shadow is him standing outside Maria's hospital room in the bases' infirmary (do military research bases have these? Idk. Let's say so for this AU) seeing her passed out in bed hooked up to machines and ivs. Gerald comes up to him and explains Maria's illness and that he brought her to the base because he thinks that the research they're doing with Shadow could stabilize or even cure her. Shadow agrees to do whatever testing is needed to help his friend/sister.

And the research actually helps ease Maria's symptoms and improve her quality of life where her and Shadow can play more often. But there are whispers between Gerald and some GUN agents that this is at the cost of the initial weapons research on the edgehog-to-be (please let me know if this wasn't what they were collecting his power for) and it turns into a verbal argument that both children can hear. Gerald notices and storms off to shoo them away or tuck them into bed or something.

Maybe on that infamous night Gerald was planning to leave the base for good, taking Maria, Shadow, and all the research related to him, with him all because GUN was shutting down the research that would benefit Maria to focus more on the initial goal of Project Shadow. Maybe they were shutting it all down due to a lack of results for the project's initial goal and not giving a crap about the side project for Maria.

Or maybe that night Gerald knew that GUN wanted more projects from him (cough cough, the giant nuclear space lazer station in the final act, cough cough) and he refused to give it to them for whatever reason (maybe hubris, I like to think that he had a lot of that in the movie before Maria's death and that this was a fatal flaw that indirectly resulted in it). So he tried to leave, taking just Shadow and Maria with him.

Maybe Maria's side project is why some of the GUN agents were willing to shoot her. Or maybe they were just heartless assholes, idk.

Maybe in the events after the movie in this AU, Stone meets up with Shadow and helps him continue "Project Maria" to help other children with the same illness in her memory.

Please let me know if I got anything wrong, I only saw the movie once so far and don't want to get anything wrong about the initial game's plot, as well as the movie's plot, or come off as ableist myself.

[dailyanarchistposts]

I identify as an autonomist leftist largely based on personal experience. Autonomist can be used somewhat synonymously with anarchist — I use the term because peoples’ conception of anarchy usually = total chaos, which more often than not derails any further conversation about it.

I was first introduced to Philippine nationalism when I was younger, but I’ve moved away from primarily nationalist political spaces because of constant authenticity checks, essentialism, and erasure of indigenous peoples under state-enforced identity. I also was looking for ways to speak — and resist — in more intersectional terms.

I’m a brown queer femme. I’m anti-imperialist, anti-state, anti-patriarchy, prison abolitionist. I’m for third world liberation and joint struggle. I’m 1.5 generation — all of these things mean that I am constantly building my home in the margins.

I understand anarchism as a collective means of living/a form of relationship that strives to be explicitly non-hierarchical and anti-authoritarian in its decision-making processes.

Principles that I stick to are non-hierarchical collectivism — which basically means that anyone can and should be able to plug in based on their abilities and capacity. I’m about accessibility in organizing — especially around disability and chronic illness. I’m not down with strict leadership models that sacrifice those at the very bottom in order to “advance” the revolution.

For me, anarchism involves a commitment to combat and challenge all forms of oppression, an integration of communal care practices and mutual aid + mutual investment, and creating spaces for people to be their full selves (in a way that isn’t violent towards others) without fear, shame, or threat to their existence.

My understanding is based a lot less on dead white guy theory and very heavily on what type of organizing can include the parts of who I am. The single biggest reason I began identifying as an autonomist is because it made the most sense for me in terms of how I organize and build with people. Anarchism + abolition are really about dismantling all fucked up hierarchies and systems of oppression, which means I can talk about all the parts of myself (sick brown queer femme) without having to stick to what “the party” dictates.

I try not to make “real organizers are/do [x thing]” statements because I don’t necessarily see a division between Organizers (with a capital O) and everyone else. It feels like the same hierarchical distinction made between Leaders and followers, and it also feels low-key ableist to imply that some people stand at the forefront while everyone else just takes orders.

I’m also really over the idea of leftist martyrdom “for the masses” — as if we aren’t also part of the people trying to get free, trying to have livable lives. None of us are exceptional or superhuman. We have no obligation to run ourselves into the ground and self-sacrifice for the sake of a movement that isn’t mutually invested in our own survival.

[librarycards]

re: the endo ask and that you said that the paper is weak bc lack of trans voices and being binary - genuinely, how do you think could this be improved when talking about misogyny in gynecology? like, genuinely, is this just about language when discussing it? or a completely different understanding of gynecology and it's issues?

I think that cissexism + intersexism in this case can be improved, at the provider-client level, in much the same ways as we can improve other forms of reproductive care: be explicit and specific in what we mean when we talk about particular services (for example, we say menstrual products because pads, tampons, and cups have to do with menstruation, not the absurd euphemism of 'feminine hygiene').

on a deeper level - and this is necessary for material change - improvements will come when we actually interrogate the foundations of "gynecology" (including the way that the word itself invokes binary sexgender), including its predication on the subjugation of enslaved black women denied access to the social position of [white] womanhood, and, to the present, the routine abuse and erasure experienced by those whose bodyminds somehow deviate from the idealized Good Patient, and even those who don't.

it's clear that part of the reason for the degree of malpractice that occurs in gynecological care specifically has to do with its association with gender/sexual marginalization. it, with abortion/birth control, is feminized –– not exclusive to all women, but associated with them –– and therefore devalued/vilified.

within the practice, though, there still needs to be an understanding that the cisheteropatriarchal illogics that devalue / vllify reproductive care are the same ones that categorically exclude intersex/trans (disabled, poor, of color, fat, etc) from the "cared for." there is actually no way of addressing misogyny in gynecology in isolation from other systems of oppression without deliberate & violent exclusion.

[werewolf-girl-knot]

SO. About W5...

I ended up "legally acquiring" a digital copy of the core book and just finished my first read through of it. Some thoughts.

First of all, let me say my major gripes about it re: indigenous and disability erasure remain present, and do end up being a deal breaker for me regarding Paradox and giving them any money.

Still, there's some interesting stuff in here. I am personally a V5 enjoyer. I dislike 'gothic superhero' type chronicles, cumbersome lore and mechanical bloat. I do like Personal horror, power that comes with serious costs, character-focused storytelling, urban fantasy that feels contemporary and grounded, and brave, direct political themes. so V5 ended up being a general improvement for me over V20, give or take some small things. These are the biasas I'm carrying into my thoughts on W5.

The good: Rage Dice make a return from V5's hunger dice, and with improvements! Hunger dice were controversial in V5, but personally I found them to be a fantastic way to keep the Beast as a present threat in your chronicle. Finally, a reason for being a vampire to actually feel like a curse! And Rage dice in W5 I like even more. I enjoy how they turn failure into success when you're trying to accomplish something violent, but otherwise can cause critical problems with your approach when you're *not* trying to be violent. It really encourages you to get into character and play your character more impatient and aggressive when your rage is higher. Finally, Rage that actually feels like a double-edged sword! The things Rage does is also an improvement for me. I dislike extra actions in TTRPGs, ironically I find that they just slow things down with too much dice rolling. Making Rage something you spend to regenerate faster is a much better idea.

The forms are more distinct and interesting now as well. This is one of the things W5 takes from Forsaken than it very good. Finally, a reason to use Hispo and Glabro! Crinos feels extra powerful, *and* risky, with its rule that it will enter a frenzy if you don't kill something that round making it much more threatening and dangerous, which is precisely how it's always been described in the lore, but never really represented in the game very well until now. Claws are high damage but only deal mundane types of damage and Bite is lower damage but Agg. Also good from a design standpoint, makes the rule about not eating human flesh finally matter.

Harano and Hauglosk. Harano finally becomes a present threat for Garou. Something they need to fight against, and help their pack against. It seems to operate a bit like a humanity stat, only that your sweet spot is in the middle. Too far in the other direction, and your character starts to flirt with fanaticism. This is just fantastic for making Werewolf have an actual morality system, a balance in their faith/convictions based on actions taken in the chronicle. Much more interesting than Gnosis as being an essentially meaningless resource. I have seen some braindead takes about this being a way for STs to punish players?? Don't play with STs who try to punish you and force you to do what they would do. Simple as.

The bad: new takes on the tribes. Generally I like how the book explains lore concepts, but the new tribes are so sanitized with any possible ounce of controversy taken out of them, that the political themes most of them were built to explore are totally absent, or significantly muted. In a vaccum I would think making the Get of Fenris fall would be a very interesting way to drive forward the plot, but the execution here makes them feel a little cartoonist. Very roundabout in saying that they've become werewolf eco-facists, a better way to do this be making a Hauglosk-ed version of each tribe to represent the corruption of each tribe's ideology. The cult of Fenris work as a general condemnation of the worst side of Garou in general, but having the bad guys camps in W20 just worked better for this, and had lots of room for improvement. As with all the other tribes, the Get of Fenris feels flattened and removed from its cultural context.

The Ugly: Paradox being horrible and racist. If you haven't read about this already, then... Idk how you found this post really. But this post covers it more thoroughly than I could.

The book attempts to address this with a note I put in the bottom, listing some facts about the issues experienced by indigenous groups, while making a half hearted attempt to connect it to the Garou. In the face of this erasure from their actual game though, it feels like a platitude.

As for the removal of crinos-born Garou, it's another flattening of a complicated part of the game's politics. It might have been nice to see Garou culture advance a bit, but removing them entirely removes the representation they embodied. Most of the direct representation in this game has been removed, but I think the the indigenous and disability represent the most egregious loss, especially in a game about those who are most actively being sacrificed in the name of capitalism. Which isn't some fandom interpretation, it is literally stated in the book.

This all leaves me very sour on the game's fiction, which for a storytelling game like Werewolf the Apocalypse, is important. Which is a shame, because I see a lot of good steps forward in the mechanics, making a game that's more fiction-first, without all the terrible attempts at capturing D&D's wargame combat. But frankly, it's hard to want a game who's treated it's writers so poorly to do well, even if I do think the current writers did very well with the constraints they were given. It's hard to recommend that anyone pay money for this.

[singsongraptor]

Can we also discuss how this violently erases and white washes and straight washes history? How this is lateral ableism and ableist erasure of history? The ADA was passed because of the tireless work of disabled activists, especially Black and queer disabled activists. The Capital Crawl and a multitude of other sit-ins, occupations and demonstrations would *not* have been possible without the Black Panthers providing, food, care, and armed protection against the police.

Queer disabled people and Black disabled people have been holding the community down since the sixties. You have a lot of nerve to throw them under the bus and insult their liberation efforts as fucking *trendy*. What the fuck is wrong with you?

Trendy? Do you hear yourself? What part of "disabled people of color are subjected to the most violence by the state, especially police, because police perceive them as a greater threat even when they're unarmed, on the ground, and begging for help" Did you miss? What part of "people of color and queer people are more likely to become disabled due to the violence, neglect and substandard care of the medical system" are you missing?

The audacity to insult your elders as if they didn't fight tooth and nail for whatever rights and gains you currently enjoy! Trendy? There's nothing trendy or lacking here, you just aren't looking for those who are fighting. You're actively ignoring them. Actively shoving them under the bus. As if only white cishet people can be disabled! As if having multiple axes of marginalization don't compound and transform the ableism! You didn't hit any nail on the head, but you sure pounded on people and we see how valuable you think we are besides being stepping stones and body blockers.

Look, I get it, disability support is not as trendy as being an LGBTQ+ supporter or against racism, we might not have all that cool music and colourful parade floats, our flag has a lot of black. It’s not fashionable. No business puts the disabled flag in their logos on July.

Some of us make non-disabled people uncomfortable (to their own admission) because of how we exist in this world. Some of us slouch and drool, some of us have tics and spasms, some of us are missing limbs or parts of our faces. We might have bulky mobility aids and big and noisy equipment, some of us can’t avoid to attract attention, some of us are shaped in a “weird” way. We might walk and move too slowly or take a lot of time to express ourselves, to form thoughts and words. Some of us don’t speak. Many of us can’t fit in, can’t hide our disabilities and the way we look.

No, it’s not trendy or fashionable. I get it.

But the problem is that society has decided that there is only one standard to exist, to look, to be. The rest is abnormal, wrong, sick, broken…

It’s the mindset that needs to change. We should open up to all the different possibilities we could encounter, to the idea that what we are used to see is not necessarily the only right thing. Because there is no a “right” way to exist, to go through this World, to live, to look, to be. The more we open up to all of this, the more liberating it will feel. And it will be easier to accept the possibility of a future disability that might happen, to us and the people we love.

It’s not enough to just say “yes, disabled people deserve rights”. There should be an active step forward. Be uncomfortable. Get used to the idea of being around people who are not the “standard”. Be uncomfortable with the idea of a body and a mind that don’t work like you are used to.

[trans-axolotl2]

I've been reading Cripping Intersex by Celeste Orr and one concept that I think is absolutely crucial and one of the best resources I've found for understanding my own experiences as an intersex person is the term Compulsory Dyadism.

Dr. Orr coins the term: "I propose the expression 'compulsory dyadism' to describe the instituted cultural mandate that people cannot violate the sex dyad, have intersex traits, or 'house the spectre of intersex' (Sparrow 2013, 29). Said spectre must be, according to the mandate, exorcised. However, trying to definitively cast out the spectre via curative violence always fails. The spectre always returns: a new intersex baby is born; one learns that they have intersex traits in adulthood; and/or medical procedures cannot cast out the spectre fully, as evidenced by life-long medical interventions, routines, or patienthood status. And the effects of compulsory dyadism haunt in the form of disabilities, scars, memories, trauma, and medical regimens (e.g., HRT routines). Compulsory dyadism, therefore, is not simply an event or a set of instituted policies but is an ongoing exorcising process and structure of pathologization, curative violence, erasure, trauma, and oppression." (Orr 19-20).

They continue on in their book to explore compulsory dyadism as it shows up in medical interventions, racializing intersex + sports sex testing, and eugenic and prenatal interventions on intersex fetuses. This term makes so much sense to me and puts words to an experience I've been struggling to comprehend--how can it be that so many endosex* people express such revulsion and fear of intersex bodies and traits, yet at the same time don't even know that intersex people exist? Why is it that people understand when I refer to my body in the terms used by freak shows, call myself a hermaphrodite, remember bearded ladies and laugh at interphobic jokes--yet do not even know that intersex people are as common as redheads? Understanding the term compulsory dyadism elucidates this for me. Endosex people might not comprehend what intersex actually is or know anything about our advocacy, but they do grow up in a cultural environment that indoctrinates them into false ideas about the sex binary and cultivates a fear of anything that lies outside of it.

From birth, compulsory dyadism affects every one of us, whether you're intersex or not. Intersex people carry the heaviest burden and often the most visible wounds that compulsory dyadism inflicts, as shown through often the very literal scars of violent, "curative" surgery, but the whole process of sex assignment at birth is a manifestation of compulsory dyadism. Ideas entrenched in the medical system that assign gender to the hormones testosterone and estrogen although neither of those hormones have anything to do with gender, a society that starts selling hair removal products to girls at puberty, and the historical legacy of things like sexual inversion theory are all manifestations of compulsory dyadism. For intersex people, facing compulsory dyadism often means that we are subjected to curative violence, institutionalized medical malpractice that sometimes includes aspects of ritualized sexual abuse, and means that we are left "haunted by, for instance, traumatic memories, acquires body-mind disabilities, an ability that was taken, or a 'paradoxical nostalgia....for all the futures that were lost' (Fisher 2013,45)." (Orr 26).

Compulsory dyadism works in tandem with concepts like compulsory able-bodiedness and compulsory heterosexuality to create mindsets and systems that tie together ideas to suggest that the only "normal" body is a cisgender one that meets capitalist standards of function, is capable of heterosexual sex and reproduction, and has chromosomes, hormones, genitalia, reproductive system, and sex traits that all line up. Part of compulsory dyadism is convincing the public that this is the only way for a body to function, erasing intersex people both by excluding us from public perception and by actively utilizing curative violence as a way to actively erasure intersex traits from our body. Compulsory dyadism works by getting both the endosex and intersex public to buy into the idea that intersex doesn't exist, and if it does exist then it needs to be treated as a freakshow, either exploiting us to put us on display as an aberration or by delegating us to the medical freakshow of experimentation and violence.

Until we all start to fully understand the many, many ways that compulsory dyadism is showing up in our lives, I don't think we're going to be able to achieve true intersex liberation. And in fact, I think many causes are tied into intersex liberation and affected by compulsory dyadism in ways that endosex people don't understand. Take the intense revulsion that some trans people express about the thought of medical transition, for example. Although transitioning does not make people intersex and never will, and the only way to be intersex is to have an intersex variation, I think that compulsory dyadism affects a lot more of that rhetoric than is expressed. The disgust I see some people talking about when they think about medical transition causing them to live in a body that has XX chromosomes, a vagina, but also more hair, a larger clitoris--I think a lot of this rhetoric is born in compulsory dyadism that teaches us to view anything that steps outside the sex dyad with intense fear and violence. I'm thinking about transphobic legislation blocking medical transition and how there's intersex exceptions in almost every one of those bills, and how having an understanding of compulsory dyadism would actually help us understand the ways in which our struggles overlap and choose to build meaningful solidarity, instead of just sitting together by default.

I have so much more to say about this topic, and will probably continue to write about it for a while, but I want to end by just saying: I think this is going to be one of the most important concepts for intersex advocacy going into the next decade. With all due respect and much love to intersex activists both current and present,I think that it's time for a new strategy, not one where we medicalize ourselves and distance ourselves from queer liberation, not one where we sort of just end up as an add on to LGBTQ community by default, not even one where we use a human rights framework, nonprofits, and try to negotiate with the government. I agree with so much of what Dr. Orr says in Cripping Intersex and I think the intersex and/as/is/with disability framework, along with these foundational ideas for understanding our own oppression with the language of compulsory dyadism and curative violence, are providing us with the tools to start laying a foundation for a truly liberatory mode of intersex community building and liberation.

*Endosex means not intersex

Endosex people, please feel free to reblog!

[gaylactic-fire]

Thinking about the disability erasure and weird ableism in HTTYD 3 and getting violent.

[genderkoolaid]

Article from 11/5/22

The first time I had a pregnancy scare was shortly before 2020, when I was in my early 20s. I googled how to access plan B and was surprised and relieved at how easy the process was. I felt some resentment too: I shouldn’t have been surprised. That was what feminists and activists before me had fought for. Easy and affordable access to reproductive care. I entered the details required to place the order, and within minutes I received a cancellation notification on my phone. Assuming an error, I tried again; the money was still pending on my card. It was canceled for a second time. I called my best friend, asking to borrow money to buy some medication. At that point, almost 24 hours had passed, and I knew I would have to wait the following day to head to the pharmacy. After the third order was canceled, I started panicking. I knew the chances of being pregnant were low, given my medical history, but the thought of needing an abortion was scary. I knew I could access it fairly easily, should I need to. I knew my partner would come with me, and be supportive. I knew my best friend could drive me there. I finally got an email from the pharmacy, explaining why the orders had been canceled: “We cannot sell plan B to men, please ask your partner to order her medication directly.” Needless to say, my partner in this case had no use for plan B. Nor could they have ordered it on my behalf. I didn’t expect similar feelings – the same pain, fear, frustration – to emerge again recently, even more violently. My partner – transgender as well – was lying next to me in bed, browsing social media, when they suddenly stopped and looked at me. “They’re overturning Roe.” was all they said. It took me a moment to understand what they meant. Even longer to understand what that would mean in the upcoming days. Once again, I felt my body paralyzed with horror. But I still had to look it up myself, so I started reading tweets, articles, and news – all the “No uterus, no opinion,” “Stand with women,” and “Protect women’s health” slogans. It’s hard to describe the pain of feeling excluded by a problem that’s still affecting you. There is a fine line between combating erasure and being worried your experience will be used to distract from that problem. As a trans man, I need access to abortion and contraception, whether they’re labeled for women or not. But erasure runs deeper than semantics, and it’s rarely accidental. Following the Roe v. Wade leak, a great part of the debate has shifted to the language used when discussing abortion. Part of it is aimed at including trans men and non-binary people who might have a uterus, engage in penetrative sex, don’t have access to contraception, or have to terminate wanted pregnancies for health reasons. The connection between reproductive rights and equal rights for the LGBTQ community has always been clear, both from community involvement and legislation, but we’re only just starting to see the harm of describing abortion as a women’s rights issue. Overturning Roe v. Wade is not just a women’s issue. Framing it as such not only erases transgender and non-binary people who might need access to it, but also fails to recognize the threat it poses to body autonomy. It creates a concerning precedent by restricting agency in healthcare by targeting specific minorities. Personal interest in this conversation shouldn’t be the leading argument: there are women (cisgender and transgender) who cannot get pregnant who are still pro-choice; there are disabled people who have been advocating for body autonomy since before Roe v. Wade was introduced; there are BIPOC who have historically faced violence and reproductive health disparities.

[heljar-heimur]

Huh, ableist... is it weird that seeing that is semi comforting..... I usually see people declaring screening for birth defects as a genocide or eugenics. Sometimes just for daring to offer women to do a screening for birth defects.

Being from Iceland ofc the biggest issue is down syndrome. Not everyone is ready and able to handle a downs child, they might not survive to see adulthood. Most require multiple surgeries in their first year due to heart issues and other very common birth defects.

Activists like to point at adult downs people and say see how happy they are ..... They aren't always and recently some downs individuals spoke out and said that this made them uncomfortable because they felt that they couldn't express themselves fully in public. Downs can have meltdowns and be violent to their parents and caretakers but activists ignore that and claim no anyone can have a downs baby no problem, they are so happy and give life a new perspective etc.

Doctors are now starting to be able to fix or minimise the consequences of spina bifida by doing surgery on a fetus in the womb. That is only caught by doing some sort of screening and the benefits for the quality of life for the unborn child are huge.

This is not some attack on disabled people, this is not a planned disability erasure. However, some parents are just not ready to have a special needs kid and if the parents and community are not ready that child will not get the life they deserve and the life they could have.

Not to be That Person but isn't being concerned about birth defects ableist?

--

No.

[akihiko-march]

Where I've Been Lately

Small reminder that English is not my first language. Some topics will contain mentions of imperialism, abuse by military [sexual and physical] and culture erasure.

Hello everyone, I promised my return to be this month. I did announce that my wife was sick but thankfully now she is very healthy. Thank you for everyone's wishes.

Around the time of her recovery, there was the assassination that happen in Japan. The imperialism in Japan causes a lot of locals to target small groups in Japan that are against their political idea violently.

This is unsettling to me as I am an ethnic indigenous Japanese person, and the endangerment of other ethnic Japanese groups as well as the Zainichi Taiwanese, Chinese and Koreans here in Japan.

I've seen many speak up about this on tumblr, but what is really disheartening for me is the blind support that international people accidentally give to those Japanese oppressors. I understand that my ethnicity is not a trend so you may not be aware of Ryukyuan people.

I haven't translated any of my experience so far, because it is hard for me to sit here and spend time translating horrors I've personally faced against Japanese imperialism and American military that occupy Ryukyu.

In my neighborhood, I was unsafe for this month until recently where we moved to a different town. My wife is a mainland Japanese person, but she also face a lot of scrutiny for still wanting to stay with me, who is disabled Ryukyuan. Some comments I am allowed to share was other people encouraging her to divorce me and such.

Besides that, my family who stay in Ryukyu was in much danger. Throughout the time I managed to send them money to help them, however it doesn't help that I cannot be with them. I can only constantly phone them to communicate and comfort them. The women of my family are afraid of going outside on the instance of sexually targeted by the American soldier. The saddest part is that a couple of families including mine have lost our ancestral shrine as the soldiers tore it down. Ancestry is an important part of our culture, and there is nothing to replace the shrine.

I am comfortable once again to pursue my hobbies, but I talk about this because even though the assassination isn't trending anymore, please continue to uplift the voices of the ethnic minorities in Japan [not expats]. Even if they are a descendant they deserve to be heard.

If you are a descendant, I hope you are currently safe and with your families. Thank you for reading this far.

If you are an outsider, please seek to learn about the minorities mentioned here. I am willing to share to an extent, but I have my limits as I have first hand experience that is very painful to recall.

Please listen to other descendants who talk about this, and instead of invalidating them, comprehend their speech and understand them.

[a-stitch-in-time-and-space]

actually wait, I’m going back to the agenda I had last year when I was writing a ton about the overlap between androids, holograms, augments, and x-borgs and how any characters who are cyborg/synthetic have narratives about how they need to “become” more human or palatable to other humans and are even punished/threatened with punishment for not conforming 

and the “humanity” they’re expected and forced to try to imitate is endorsed by the writing of the show - it’s not presented as a violent system of assimilation (I wonder if this was what Picard was... trying... and failing... to try to convey? I need to rewatch it, because it’s been long enough now that I can’t quite remember the details of everything that annoyed me about its writing of the xBs and androids, but I remember I was annoyed) - it’s presented as correct and good and at the same time these characters are informed (to a greater or lesser extent) that actually they will never be human enough, no matter how much they pass

and the reality for any marginalised person - but in this case especially disabled people, for whom I think these characters present the strongest metaphor (some disabled people literally call themselves cyborgs, which makes a lot of sense, considering the ever-growing use of technology - and especially “smart” tech that sends data and updates - for disabled peoples needs, and I say that somewhat ironically, because it’s also a capitalist hellscape, anyway, tangent) - is that this assimilation is one of the most common forms of violent erasure, with more violence promised if the assimilation isn’t achieved, and the exact same narrative: no matter how much you pass, you will never be human enough

this is my eternal hyper-hyperfocus. the tunnel of my star trek specific vision.

[spite-and-waffles]

Finally saw the WFA comic about Talia. Y'know, I don't whitewash her character and I see her as a complex antagonist who has done some pretty bad things as a leader of the League of Assassins (even though the LoS is in itself a racist, Orientalist nightmare, and Talia's character based on exoticized Arab tropes). I don't reject anything about her canonical portrayal before Morrison. But this was so goddamn upsetting. She's not a fucking child abuser who would deny her child animal companionship!

WFA rejects all of Bruce's canonical child abuse and neglect, the erasure of Barbara's disability and Damian's race, the sidelining and alienation of Cass and Stephanie from the Batfam, and reject most of Jason's characterization as a hot-headed thug. But when it comes to the misogynistic racism of Talia's portrayal? *crickets*

Cheshire, Shado, Lady Shiva - every single Asian female villain or anti-villain is a child-abusing, child-killing, genocidal Tiger Moms (Chesire was changed just as drastically as Talia). Meanwhile Poison Ivy, Harley and Selina, also DC's antagonists, are allowed to be anti-villains who are kind to children and animals.

Man, fuck DC and every single fan who lets this go. When people of colour say that something is racist and has violent, real-life consequences, fucking believe us.

[intersexcat-tboy]

Ah yes, calling intersex individuals weird, great start. What "other weirdo", who are you talking about? Also, no, I'm not. Can you actually quote me on that rather than making one up?

"there were more people said it was stupid" you realize the majority of society is bigoted and will side with the majority, right?

*it, not they. Feel free to provide any evidence to corroborate this, but it just looks like more and more like DARVO, which I won't be convinced by.

It said "the studies you were referencing" which don't need to be linked as there are only a few studies "proving" it and yes they're misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic and intersexist. I have yet to read one that isn't. You're free to provide the exact ones you're referencing or any evidence that it's the "scientific consensus"

You're genuinely running in to defend someone who asks if she can have an "n word pass" because she "needs to let [her] anger out" on some shitty Black person? Someone who is very obvious that her support of minorities is dependent on if they never do anything wrong?

Why does it matter whether or not it's a credible threat when she's being violent towards minorities 💀 something being a joke doesn't prevent it from being harmful

And um. No. I've talked about it before, majority members have no place to tell the minority something isn't bigoted towards the minority that had just explained how it is bigoted. It is less than worthless, it's actively harmful to the minority by reinforcing the bigoted status quo. I brought this up as my first response.

Why do you, someone of the majority, believe you have a better understanding of a minority's oppression than they do? Especially when you talk about how confusing our identities are*

If a cis person asked you what cis meant and you tell them they can Google it and they respond by threatening to kill you, that's transphobia. If you tell an abled person they're spreading harmful misinformation and they threaten to kill you, that's ableism. Bigotry includes how you treat the minority as well, see conscious vs unconscious bias.

Where am I hiding to shield from criticism 💀 what criticism has been made about me? You're the one implying being disabled prevents one from being ableist. What's the excuse for the behaviour toward Status-quo-hater? Was it "attacking" her too?

I ask these questions but I'm really not interested in further bringing violent bigoted individuals onto my timeline after these two (which is probably why Status-quo-hater went to DMs), especially as it's obvious you are *genuinely intersexist (link) by denying intersex individuals the ability to identify and describe their experiences, saying it's erasure of nonbinary identities, that it's stupid just bc it doesn't fit your perisex ideals.

okay so someone who's done their research and is more well versed in intersex stuff please come over here and tell me wtf perisex is. I wish to know. if you could also provide information about intersex as a thing, the issues intersex people have to deal with (I think it's all classed as intersexism but idk), and other stuff, that'd be great.

[bi-furiosity]

i just. man. honestly such a big fuck you to the upperclass white gays who have meticulously curated the narrative of the hiv/aids epidemic to erase the fact that cis white gay men weren't the only ones that were demonized and left to die. acting like the epidemic was ever solely about homophobia ignores the violent racism, classism, transphobia, and ableism that continues to kill hiv+ people today. the way i've had upperclass white gays tell me to my face that i can't grieve or understand the losses of the epidemic because i'm not a cis gay man is fucking bullshit. the horrific stigma against addicts that killed them in the 80's is still fucking happening today whether it's an overdose or aids. healthcare is still inaccessible as fuck when you're poor or marginalized in other ways. it is not a coincidence that Black people esp Black women in the south are the most at-risk when it comes to hiv in the united states.

your erasure of the deaths of our various communities in order to center your own distant sense of loss is nauseating. the hiv/aids epidemic is not over. the wins that the lgbt+ community as a whole has gotten over the last several decades would never have happened without the work of activists of color and disability + addiction advocates. no coherency here just rage. yall need to do more research than just watching a handful of hollywood movies about the epidemic because your ignorance is suffocating and i'm going to kick something now.

[luidilovins]

Some thoughts on gendered ableism when it comes to autism specifically because April is around the corner again.

The topic of gendered autism diagnositics is important to me because I wasn't quiet. I wasn't shy. I didn't cry a lot. I was an "austistic girl" with "autistic boy" traits. I was violent. I was opinionated, I had meltdowns. I bit teachers. I screamed when I was upset and threw things at people when they touched me. Back in the late 90s autistic girls were considered rare and their qualifications had to be developnentally drastic and fit a very exact criteria.

Quiet and Shy autistic girls get underdiagnonsed but Violent and Agressive autistic girls get misdiagnonsed. I was put on ritalin when I didn't need it. I was put on lithium when I didn't need it. I was rediagnosed every few years and I was put on medications that changed my fucking brain development forever. I don't get that shit back.

I'm not bipolar. I'm just not. Lithium should be a last ditch effort medication because it's a course first wave antipsychotic directly after the creation of thorzine and a salt that builds up in your brain system and should ONLY be taken by the people who don't produce lithium on their own. It was maybe one of the worst points of my life. I was a misdiagnonsed autistic kid and I was put on lithium and here's what they don't tell you: It makes you ANGRY. I had constant violent homicidal intrusive thoughts and they only got worse the longer I was on lithium. I was miserable, my skin hurt and I was so stressed I was biting chunks out the side of my mouth and pretending I was biting into whoever was standing in front of me until i drew blood. I shredded at the corners of my fingers and punched walls to make my knuckles hurt and then pick at the scabs. I finally started spitting the pills out into the sink once I discovered I was lactating. I was 11.

People were using ritalin on every child suspected of the mysterious terrifying plauge known as ADHD in a late 90s scare around the same time as the satanic panic and hotly debated children's television censorship and these medications and it was a methylphenidate that was pushed by pharmaceutical companies at the time. Kids were getting diagnosed by doctors endorsing the company and they suffered onsets of psychosis and suicidal tendancies.

The first time i tried to commit suicide I was on ritalin. I walked into oncoming traffic and my mom yanked me by the shirt and asked me what the hell I was thinking it was dangerous and I replied "because it's better this way." I was seven.

The company underwent and lost two lawsuits and people are still getting financial comepsation from the long term effects the meds had on their bodies.

I was on Abilify when my PE teacher clled my mom telling her that I was refusing to participate and when she asked me why I started crying told her my joints hurt every time I did a jumping jack on the blacktop. She looked and saw my at my wrists and ankles were swollen and I had skin rashes and took me to the hospital. I was suffering with sever fluid retention and I had water around my heart to the point where it was teetering on fatal. I was given a perminant excuse from PE for the rest of the year to recover. Abilify is used to treat psychosis, which I didn't have. My mom chalked it up to a dye allergy. I was 10.

I wish I could say it's gotten better since i was a kid but the amount of erasure and speaking over autistic people has not laxed since the discovery of autism in girls and minoreties. The sentiment remains a common practice and shows no signs of changing in the near future.

The moment you add gendered criteria to diagnostics you are glazing over the people who don't meet the status quo and condemning them to both negligence and medical malpractice at the same time.

I am talked over by autism parents and unliscenced ABA therapists and doctors who don't even specialize in behavioral psychology or psychiatry. I am still disected and categorized for my disablity and an arbitrary construct that I neither fit the criteria of NOR believe in and I'M the one who has to live with other peoples ignorance, prejudice and mistakes.

I'm not arguing with warrior moms and #Autism$peaks and child phisicians anymore about their beliefs of what an autistic child looks like in comparison. I want my fucking brain back, I want my childhood back, and I want parts of my cheek back and if you can't do that for me then shut the fuck up and never speak on the subject ever again.