Today is a good day to stand before the mirror
Today (December 3) is International Day of Disabled Persons. December
3 has been set apart by the United Nations to bring attention to the
entire gamut of issues pertaining to disabled persons and disabilities.
I have written previously about this issue, focusing on
misconceptions about the meaning of ‘disability’ and the limited
understanding of related conditions including a manifest insensitivity
in numerous spheres. When we hear the term we immediately conjure the
image of a person in crutches or with a white cane. We forget that old
people, pregnant women and those who are sick or not exactly fully-fit,
‘able’ individuals. They require assistance of one form or another and
one of the key areas where there is a woeful lack of sensitivity is that
of access. There is something lacking in the architectural gaze as well
as policy initiatives so necessary for such people to live productive
lives, and be and feel safe in a wide array of environments.
There is a serious need to create awareness about such issues and to
be pro-active in ensuring dignity and justice for all disabled persons.
Today there is relevant legislation. Implementation, as is the case in
many things, remains slow.
Today, ladies and gentlemen, on this ‘International Day of Disabled
Persons’, I want to talk about another aspect of the terms ‘disabled’
and ‘disabilities’. I want to write about being visually handicapped,
about having hearting disabilities, speech difficulty, cognitive
handicaps and mental sloth.
I believe that all of us are visually handicapped one way or another.
Our eyes gloss over, sweep past or miss certain things. We find it hard
to read between the lines. We don’t see wrong and wrong-doing,
perpetrator and victim. We mis-name. For convenience. We have failing
and failed eyesight.
Think about it, we are also hard of hearing, aren’t we? Isn’t it true
that we are oblivious to certain cries and that we turn up the volume of
songs and conversations so that things uncomfortable are drowned in the
cacophony of preferred music? Don’t we hear certain things like we hear
the plaintive cry of an unidentified bird from a far away we don’t have
the legs to visit? We have hearing disabilities, this is true.
It can’t be that we’ve lost our sense of smell, but we consistently
whiff fashionable fragrances. The less favoured aromas trouble us, don’t
they? Isn’t this why we often turn our noses up to avoid such blasts of
flavoured-wind?
We are a dumb species, I have concluded. We have flawed tongues.
Twisted ones. We are partial certain flavours and puke if by chance we
tossed in something our tongues are not used to or find too bitter and
therefore unpalatable. Our twisted and disabled tongues bend to say
certain things and not others: have you wondered why? It is not that we
are necessarily inarticulate. We have vocabulary and are skilled at
word-play. We nevertheless choose silence or mumble feigned incoherence
hoping that we will not be called upon to give life to voice and tongue.
We raise our hands high to get someone’s attention, but we put it
down when called upon to clench fist and protest certain tyrannies.
Sometimes our feet are like clay, they refuse to budge even when it is
imperative that we take the first step of the necessary journey. Sloth
and preference persuade us to stay put and if possible drag everyone
down the proverbial garden path. For such things we do have hands and
legs. We run when we ought to stand and fight. We cross our arms and
shrug our shoulders when we could extend a hand of friendship or give
help to those who need it. We prefer hand to ‘take’ and not ‘give’. Yes,
we are a crippled species.
Sometimes we are utterly incapable of understanding why things happen
in the way they do. Well, we can but we don’t try. The reason is simple.
If we employ our minds it is not difficult to figure out what’s what,
what the real deal is and what the misleading, what’s wrong and what’s
right, just and unjust etc. The problem is that once understood the
natural next step is to do something about what we’ve understood.
Choosing not to understand allows us to sleep well at night. We are a
lazy species, aren’t we?
We have short memory spans and tend to forget; especially the names
of those who helped us come to where we are right now. We remember
instead the names of those who can help us, those who have utility
value. We don’t bother to remember the faces of those who are
‘inconsequential’. Alzheimer’s is the defining affliction of our
species. And we are its willing victims.
Do we have minds? Yes we do. We are experts at sorting things out,
separating things into piles, the ‘in’ and ‘out’ trays of convenience
and inconvenience. We know how to insert and delete, edit out and edit
in. We have this incredible capacity to pluck the rose and bad-mouth the
thorn, to distill comfort from discomfort and pretend that the dregs
don’t exist. We never ask ourselves, do we, if rose is really rose and
thorn really thorn, whether the naming was actually a mis-naming for
deceiving and self-deception? We have crippled minds, us humans do.
Today is International Day of Disabled Persons. An appropriate day I
believe to self-indulge in a different way, to reflect on our
disabilities, revisit the choices we’ve made, cast our gaze at that
which our eyes avoided, listen to things we don’t really like to hear,
speak the inconvenient truths that might cost us something, walk in
directions we’ve dared not walk, raise our hands to the right thing and
not that which is profitable. Appropriate too, to employ our minds to
understand who we really are as an ungainly composite of ability and
disability.
I believe that we would be lesser mortals than we can be when we are
in denial, especially about our disabilities. If we do not, on the other
hand, deny to ourselves the truth about who we are then alone do we
acquire membership to civilization. Are we brave enough? Are we humble
enough? Arrogance is the badge of the human race and when it comes to
humility we are quite deficient, aren’t we?
Yes, today is International Day of Disabled Persons. There’s
something simple we can do today. Look in the mirror. That’s what I plan
to do. [email protected] |