Hey everybody, happy Monday. This wasn't the
video I was planning on uploading today
but I felt it was important to sit down
in front of the camera and record a short
video on my thoughts of the Meryl Streep
acceptance speech that she gave last
night at the Golden Globe awards.
If you're-- if you didn't see the speech
or you're not familiar, I will show a little
clip of it right now.
But there was one
performance this year that stunned me. It
sank it's hooks in my heart,
not because it was good-- it was--
there was nothing good about it. But it was
effective and it did its job. It made it's
intended audience laugh and show their
teeth
It was that moment when the person
asking to sit in the most respected seat
in our country imitated a disabled
reporter. Someone he outranked in
privilege, power, and the capacity to
fight back. It kind of broke my heart
when I saw it. I still can't get it out
of my head because it wasn't in a movie.
It was real life and this instinct to
humiliate when it's modeled by someone
the public platform.
By someone powerful, it filters down into
everybody's life because it kind of
gives permission for other people to do
the same thing.
As you can see she's
using her time of her acceptance speech
for the Cecil B. Demille Award to call
out her opinions on the election of
President Elect Donald Trump and his... how
shall we say campaign-style. Most
specifically drawing attention to the
point in the campaign where he mocked
a disabled reporter. I personally was very
proud and glad that she took the time of
her speech and the tremendous platform
that she was not only on in that moment
but in her career to call out that moment
of inhumanity.
But I was surprised when I was reading my twitter feed this
morning and the handful of disabled
advocat---activ-- sorry the handful of
disabled activists and advocates on my
feed were somewhat critical of her for
doing this. They were saying things like
they thought her comments were ableist
and they were saying things like it's
time to move on, and that continuing to
bring up Tump's abhorrent mocking of
this reporter was in somehow continuing
to disparage our community. And I have to
say I don't really understand that. I
mean intellectually I get what they're
saying.
Anytime a celebrity or public figure
speaks up about disability, particularly
when they're not disabled,
it's kind of like the little hairs on my
arm stand up because you wonder if--even
if good intentioned-- what they are about to say
is going to be, you know, paternalistic or
patronizing, falling into the "pity
inspiration" porn trap. But you know, I've
heard all of Meryl Streep's speech and I
look at it this way: she called out a lot
of communities in her speech. She called
out African-Americans and Latinos and
a lot of behavior that she found and
does find repugnant of our
president-elect. So in that vein, I don't
think she was just focusing in on
disability and and I choose to see the
glass half full that she was pointing
out something that all too often I think
the disability community and our causes
are totally overlooked, I also find it
interesting that when Peter Dinklage, who's
a little person although, he doesn't
really hang out with us he's not part of
LPA, he doesn't come to LPA functions.
When he used his Oscar speech to call
out or bring attention to dwarf tossing, I
didn't see a lot of backlash against him. And so
I don't know if it's the difference that
Meryl Streep's not disabled and she did it,
and Peter Dinklage is disabled,
although he doesn't identify as
disabled and he did that was ok. But I
think both are great. I think both people
used the opportunity of the audience and the
camera and microphone to bring attention
to an issue that otherwise wouldn't have
been brought.
I think it's somewhat short-sighted and
kind of dangerous to criticize any time
an ally stands up for our community
and then decry what they have said or done
as ablest. Yes, absolutely
are there ablest things that are said
and done on the interwebs and in the
public eye, and on TV and movies all the time?
Yeah but also the civil rights of people
with disabilities are violated every
single day and so I think we need to be
very careful about not turning away
opportunities for you know advocacy and
allyship from people who have very big
megaphones. And I think that's last
night what Meryl Streep was doing.
Secondly this idea that we need to get
over what Donald Trump did.
I don't agree with that at all.
I'm not going to get over it, I'm
going to be reminding him and his
constituents every day of how offended I
was by him mocking that reporter. And I'm
going to not forget it and I don't
think anyone should forget it. It is not
just another as, Michelle Obama said, sad
headline in a whole campaign of
patheticness-- ok i'm paraphrasing what
she said-- but you know it's not something
just to be brushed over. That's what he
wants
that's what his supporters want that's
what his spin machine wants they just
want it to go away.
Well damn it, I'm not gonna let it happen.
And I-- again understand the overarching
argument that there are other issues,
there are bigger issues, there are areas
of sexism, misogyny, racism... There's a
lot of bad shit to talk about. But you
know when you look at how Anderson
Cooper can do a report on 60 Minutes, you
know, drawing up sympathy for businesses
who are being "attacked" or "harassed" by
lawyers who are seeking violations of
the ADA and then somehow spin it: "Oh
the poor business" when in fact these are
laws that have been on the books for
years and are violating again civil rights
of people with disabilities, we should
not have to be keeping fighting that
fight. But yet we are. And when, you know,
a whole community of disabled people are
slaughtered in Japan last year and it
basically doesn't even raise an eyebrow
in the mainstream conversation, that's
where it says to me yeah maybe we're
doing a lot of things right but we're
not quite getting there all the way.
There's still a lot of room for
improvement.
We need to be leading the charge and
reframing the conversation about what
disability is in America and in the
world quite frankly, what it means to be
disabled and it will only be best served
by those who are disabled. But yet we
cannot do it alone. I think we get so
caught in our little silos, you know, we
cheer each other on and we follow each
other's Twitter feed, and we post on each
other's Facebook pages and read each
other's blogs and that's all great, you
know. I do it too. I promote a large
segment of this Youtube channel on
disability issues and I seek
out other disabled folks to... to
exchange ideas with. But that's just all
within our own little spheres. What we
need to be doing is breaking out of our
spheres. And connecting with people
in politics, and entertainment, in
business, to you know help take up our
causes, to help carry our banners in really
thoughtful, meaningful, progressive, actual
ways. So yeah I'd really love to hear
your thoughts. I hope we can keep the
conversation respectful and the dialogue
um, you know, not defensive.
I think that's how you learn best from
each other. I really respect and admire
the disability advocates and activists
that I follow on social media and I
think that we need to stay together and
stick together and be stronger together.
And I will never give up hope that one
day we will be not fighting some of
these same old battles. A lot of progress
has been made in the last 30 years but I
feel like we're kind of on the plateau
and a lot of our rights and ways of life
are very much in jeopardy and very
threatened and so that says we must
remain diligent we must remain engaged.
And I look forward to doing that with
you. So thank you for watching. Please
give this video a thumbs up if you hear
what I'm saying, if you-- I don't want to say
necessarily you don't have to agree with
me but if you feel my vibe and I'd love
to you know feel that back. And please
feel free to comment so we can have more
discussion. And until tomorrow guys, thank
you for watching. Have a good one. Bye.
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