SF Signal's Disability Car Crash

I noticed a tweet flashing past last night indicating activist and fan Elsa Henry (@snarkbat) was seriously pissed off with something. So I went to check what, and found it was a new post on SF Signal, the SF/F news/magazine site. It was in their 'Special Needs in Strange Worlds' column (a title I loathe) and it was the most utterly bizarre and offensive post I've seen in a long time.

( Content warnings for: cure narratives, erasure, offensive stereotyping (especially of autism) magical crips, locking the crip in the attic, and generally being utterly 'special' about us. )

Activist Coffee

I met a fellow local disability rights activist for coffee this afternoon - we've known each other on line for years, but because her job was in London until recently it's the first time we've actually met.

It was interesting, in the worst way, in terms of finding anywhere we could both go. I may be a wheelchair user nowadays, but if I run into steps I can hop out , they can't. That ruled out the place I meet friends on Saturdays, and while the place I go in the week is accessible to me in the chair, they didn't think they could get their powerchair in. Nor is the new Costa accessible - they gutted the entire place,  took floors out, but left a step at the entrance! Ultimately we ended up in the tourist info, which has a cafe at the back - ironically she then had to ask if I would be able to manage the internal slope in the building  - effectively a 50 foot ramp from front to back - to get back out again!

Cue an hour and a half of comparing notes, on activism, ridiculous disabled loos we have known, and experiences of discrimination. It shouldn't be like that, but it is. I had to give her the prize (?!)  for worst experience - I've never had a doctor look at the chair and try to decide not to treat me for something life threatening (emphasis on the try, she handed him his head).

Lovely to meet her finally, but also sobering. So much still to do.