Category Archives: disability rights

Equal rights and the wounding of others

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I take no pleasure in wounding others. None. However, no equal rights advocate gets to choose the oppressors. They are who they are. They are accountable and must be held accountable.

You can’t play favorites as an advocate. Silence in the face of oppression is never an option. Silence empowers the oppressor. Silence in the face of oppression is not in my repertoire. It never has been.

As an advocate you will inevitably wound others along the way.  But if, for example, someone denies people with disabilities a seat at the table, I am going to say so.  If a company providing services to people with disabilities  in the community  engages in community-based warehousing, I am going to say so. If a non-profit organization designed to help others offers little more than lip service, I am going to say so. If leaders from any walk of life are  are among the oppressors, I am going to say so. It’s what advocates do.

Knowing people have been wounded by my advocacy is not pleasant. There are, however, reasons I will not stop. At the top of the list, those being oppressed suffer the deepest wounds of all. And then there’s this. Knowing that oppressors have a found a way to live with themselves as oppressors has made it much easier to live with myself as an advocate.

Those who have been wounded by my advocacy should take a moment to reflect. Perhaps they will realize their wounds are self-inflicted. Those that have complained about me remind me of  someone complaining to a friend about getting a speeding ticket.  Complainer: “That S.O.B. cop gave me a speeding ticket, can you believe it?” Friend: “How fast were you going?” Complainer: “Around 70.” Friend: “What was the speed limit?” Complainer: “Forty-five.”

Sunshine is the best disinfectant and my task as an advocate is to bring things that impede or deny equal rights into the light of day.  My suggestion? Don’t speed.

Love for Patricio

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When I learned this week that Patricio “Pat” Figueroa Jr. had died, it felt as if the air left the day. I was gutted.  He was 63, much too young to be leaving the world in my book.

Pat was, in so many ways, an extraordinary human being. Testimony to this can be found, in part, when you pause to consider the fact that I only met him once, several years ago, and yet, here I am, thoroughly staggered by his death. Granted, we had quite a few phone conversations, I write for Independence Today, the national disability rights newspaper he published. Our conversations ranged over all kinds of areas, including our love for New York City’s Lower East Side, a place where we both lived.

So what was it about this good and decent man that caused him to mean so much to me? I don’t know that I’ll be able to answer the question completely in this essay and I’m too damned sad to try. I can tell you that one of the reasons was his pure unfettered compassion for people and, in more than one instance, for me personally. He enjoyed reading this blog and after reading one piece that talked about my struggle to keep food on the table he told me the piece moved him to tears. The man knew poor, he knew struggle.

So here’s the thing, if Pat came to mean so much to me after so little time together, I can only imagine what those who knew him far better than I are going through. I’ve met his wife Denise and daughter Melissa.  I love them both too. In fact, only those who don’t pay attention would fail to love these three truly beautiful human beings.

I have no magic words to offer those deeply wounded by Pat’s death. What I can tell them, simply because it is true, is this: even death has its impotence. My father died when I was 15. For years I believed, on a thinking-level, that he was all gone. Then, one day, it hit me, he was (and is) present in my mind and heart on a daily basis. In a very concrete real way, he is still with me every day of my life. Death did not take the all of him away from me. Nor will death take the all of Pat away from those who loved him and love him still. He is not all gone.

pat figueroa

Pat Figueroa

I Hear I’m Controversial

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Sometimes a part of our truth can be right in front of us and we can’t see it. Case in point: I sheepishly confess that I was utterly entirely flabbergasted this morning when a friend of mine said, “Well, you know you’re controversial, Peter.”  It was, I’ve gathered since talking to others since this morning’s conversation, and enduring everyone’s laughter by the way, a rather prominent deer in the headlights moment for me. I instinctively responded by saying, “Why should equal rights be controversial?”

They are.

I asked them why they think I’m controversial. The theme of their answers was the same. You call out people, companies, agencies, government agencies on their actions or lack of actions. You don’t politically walk on eggs. You are deeply sensitive to all minorities and you don’t hesitate to identify those who persecute them, even when you know it is going to cost you. People know if you see people being mistreated you’re going to say it and name names. One person said, You drag things into the light.

Well, if that all makes me controversial then I’m glad I am. I was recently in a meeting where someone I respect a great deal said part of advocacy is about pushing the envelope.

One person said, Some folks hope you’ll just go away.  Those who hope I’ll just go away are those who through action or inaction support things that deny people their rights.

I know of too many people whose support for minorities like people with disabilities, Gays, Lesbians, blacks, Latinos, Jews, Muslims, Native Americans is cast in lip service and self-aggrandizement. Bad news for these folks. I’m not going away. I can’t. I’m controversial.

Actions Speak Louder than Words

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Actions speak louder than words. A cliché. When I was a boy my father reminded me there are reasons clichés become clichés, and the reasons are often good ones, which I believe to be the case with actions speak louder than words.

As one who lives with a disability, in my case a brain injury, I am weary of the many who offer up words of advocacy and support for brain injury survivors yet when it comes down to standing up to those who deny our rights they do nothing.  In the world of brain injury there are all kinds of people in the profit and non-profit arenas who, when it comes to taking a stand for equal rights, fail miserably. Too many who claim to care remain silent when they know brain injury survivors are being denied equal rights, real quality care and support, meaning, in part, that those providing the care are qualified to provide the services they are being paid to provide, paid with taxpayer dollars no less!

And so it is that this year my eye will be on the actions versus words arena. When the actions don’t match the words, I’ll say so. Yes, I know, I will upset some. I don’t care. Why should I? The ones I’ll be upsetting are the ones spewing lip service. They  don’t deserve caring, not when the rights of others are being denied and their silence and inaction makes them one of the forces contributing to the denial those rights.

Everyone and every organization is fair game. I am overjoyed that my state’s new governor has made it clear ethical standards are a must and in some instances in this state, they are severely lacking. True that governor.

Criminalize Dehumanizing People with Disabilities

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If you deny someone their equal rights you deny them their freedom, and for that you should face criminal charges.

This happens all to often in the world of disability. I’ve seen it, endured it, fought it, and will fight it until the end of my days.

If you are going to treat someone with a disability as if their humanity is less whole than yours, you should be charged with a crime. If you are going to treat people with disabilities as if each and everyone of them is a cottage industry for you to profit from, same thing, criminal charges should be brought to bear and if you are convicted you can do the community service by going to jail. In other words, leave the community.

I hear many things from many people on many fronts, particularly in the world of people like me who live with brain injuries. Sometimes I can reveal my sources, sometimes not. Sometimes discreetness is the wisest choice, sometimes in your face is. I am willing to play both cards if I genuinely believe doing so will further equal rights and or hold accountable those who willfully deny others their equal rights.

Here is an example that typifies a lot of what goes on. I know someone who lived with a brain injury. She is extremely bright and nobody’s fool. Were she in a coma she could likely outwit 99 percent of the people I know. Anyway, she was attending a day program and made it known she wanted to get a part time job. So the program tells this woman that they will clear out a little office space they have and set it up with candy and soda that she can sell a few hours a week and she can keep some of the money. This woman said to me, “Do they think I’m stupid or what? Do they think I don’t know that the only reason they’re offering this is so they can bill for the hours I’m in selling their damned candy?” In other words, all this Albany-based provider cared about was not losing the money they would lose if this woman had a part time job in the, wait for it, community!

There was a time in life when I believed that in everyone’s heart of hearts there rested an active or untapped reservoir of compassion for others. Wrong. There are plenty of people that simply don’t care, not at all. And they are the ones that need to be exposed,  criminally charged when possible, and given a leave of absence from the community, and if not the community, a permanent leave of absence from working in an arena designed to help people reach their maximum level of independence.

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