Today is the start of a hopeful new chapter in America, but for many with #covid_19, #longcovid and #chronicillness there is a real concern that this new chapter will look exceedingly like all former chapters. Healthcare access and support and the rampant ableism haphazardly holding the damaged system together has been a topic that’s been alarmingly silent (at the highest of levels) for decades, and especially during the throes of an active and ever-escalating pandemic. While patients have been fighting tirelessly for decades, the general public and its leaders have continuously turned a blind eye to the damages done and the many snowballing at the moment.
We all have seen what happens when we band together to enact political change. We need the same drive, support and awareness-spreading to dismantle the rampant, baseless and institutionalized ableist policies and practices, as the repair is needed now.
So please. Please share.
To do so for your political party but not for your species as a whole - for humanity - is precisely why we find history repeating itself with each consecutive ‘ism’ that we’re striving to dismantle. If you’re pro-humanity, be pro-humanity without blinders on. You can’t be picky about which ‘ism’ to fight if you truly, actually care about progressing humanity in the right, equitable direction.
To many ‘ableism’ is a new term. To those, ableism is the discrimination of and social prejudice against people with disabilities based upon the belief that typical abilities are superior. This can extend to gender (weaker sex, less physically ‘able’ stereotype, etc.), to race (biases around one race being more ‘able’ to contribute to society in a specific way than another, usually due to judgements about physical capabilities, etc.), and so forth.
Please do not let ableism be the one that’s overlooked when it’s the ideological pillar of most bias-and-inferiority-based complexes known to mankind.