Let's talk about language! How to avoid being accidentally ableist

Part 2: Piss on pity

Hello, and welcome back to this special series on language and disability.

As I said last week:

Language matters. With the words we choose, we can perpetuate stereotypes or reinforce outdated narratives. But if we think about what we’re saying, we can also do the opposite.

So this is a cut-out-and-keep guide to not being accidentally ableist.

Check out part 1, from last week, about using the word ‘disabled’ and avoiding icky euphemisms.

Let's talk about language! How to avoid being accidentally ableist

The title of today’s theme - piss on pity - comes from the rich history of the UK disability rights movement and the campaigners who closed down ITV’s pity-porn telethon in the 1990s. It’s a useful - and memorable - phrase to keep in your head when talking about disability: if what you’re about to say contains even a whiff of pity, flush it down the drain.

So without further ado, let’s look at the words and phrases that most indicate pity, and why you should avoid them.

Part 2: Piss on pity

So many of the phrases we use about disability perpetuate the idea that disability is bad and disabled people must therefore be having a terrible, sad, very hard time. This is ableism at its most offensive and is incredibly reductive. If we are to move away from these ideas, we need to change our language so that we can truly reflect the varied realities of disability instead of harmful stereotypes.

Some phrases to banish from your lexicon:

• Wheelchair bound - yep, people still say and write this on the reg. It’s vile. Stop it. It is not only completely inaccurate (do you think we have morphed into cyborgs? Do you think we sleep in our chairs?) but grossly offensive, because behind this phrase is the idea that using a wheelchair is a trap, a failure, confining this poor person to a sad little life. Here’s why that’s not true: wheelchairs are freedom. Phrases to use instead: wheelchair user/uses a wheelchair. It’s not hard

• You are an inspiration - this one makes me want to vomit. People think they’re being nice when they say this but what they’re actually saying is: I believe your life is so bad that I am impressed that you bother to do anything. Doesn’t sound so nice when you put it like that, does it? And it betrays a complete lack of expectation for disabled people; you assume we’ll make nothing of our lives and so anything we do is worth cheap praise. And one last thing, in case you haven’t got the message: disabled people do not exist so you can feel better about yourself or for you to be inspired by. Go away. (Yes, this one really grinds my gears. It’s just so offensive.) Need more convincing? Watch the iconic Stella Young’s equally iconic TED talk: “I am not your inspiration, thank you very much”

• Suffer - disabled people generally do not suffer from their disabilities but from ableism and inaccessibility. This is not to say that we aren’t sometimes in pain or fatigued, but rather to say that you cannot make a judgement that our quality of life is inherently worse based on the fact we are disabled, because that, my friend, is ableist. It is possible to be sore and happy!

• Warrior - used a lot for people with chronic illness, this implies that you believe someone is in an existential battle with their malfunctioning body when, more likely than not, they are just existing. (See also: you’re such a fighter)

• If I were you, I’d kill myself - it should be unfathomable that people say this, and yet here we are. Imagine someone telling you that they think your life is so bad, that they pity you so much, that they’d rather be dead than live how you do. In my experience, this is said most often when talking about care - people would apparently rather kill themselves than have help to the loo. And the thing is, they’re not really talking about themselves (people rarely reckon with the fact that they, too, could become disabled); they’re actually saying that they don’t understand why I choose to go on living. A whole other level of offensive, really, isn’t it?

I know some of you reading this will be thinking: “people don’t really say this stuff, do they?”

Well, just look at how many times these phrases come up in this thread of disabled people’s most hated sayings to see that they really, really do.

Disabled people don’t need pity. It’s offensive. It’s also deeply unhelpful. If we spend all our time thinking that disabled people’s lives are inherently crap, we don’t put effort into changing the external issues that actually are important. The first step, as ever, is changing attitudes. So take all that pity, piss on it, and move the hell on.

Next week, this special series continues. Stay tuned for part 3: Disabled people are people - pass it on.

Part 3 will be for paying subscribers only; sign up now so you don’t miss it.

See you soon for more anti-ableism,
Lucy

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Links of the week

• The Guardian is running a nice series on managing anxiety and this piece on lowering the bar on success rang very true for me. It sounds obvious but in a panic it’s not; hopefully reading this will help lodge it in the mind

• Is disability representation in fiction getting any better? I found out for this Guardian piece