Disability Justice: A Topic That Impacts Everyone, Even If You Don’t Expect It

 

Wheelchair User Icon Courtesy from Wikipedia Commons

Who do you believe comprises the largest minority group in the world? It may not be who you expect. The largest minority group on planet Earth is people with disabilities, making up one billion of the over eight billion people that span the globe. With roughly one-eighth of the world’s population living with a disability, it would be natural to expect then that the world would move to accommodate such a massive portion of its people. Not only are people with disabilities a huge part of the population, but anyone can acquire a disability at any moment, at any instant. It then becomes important to keep accessibility in mind to ensure that others around us with disabilities, or if we ourselves acquire one due to life events, we would be able to access life’s luxuries and natural pursuits like everyone else.

While we continue to make progress in making the world a more accessible place, barriers still exist. This is due in part to disability being more heterogeneous than homogeneous; there is no one set guideline for how to manage and accommodate the needs of a disabled person. The definition of disability is complex and amorphous, changing from person to person; the needs of each person, while shared for some, will often change too from person to person, disability to disability. The ADA defines a disabled person “as a person who has a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities”, while Merriam-Webster provides several definitions of what it means to be disabled at once, reflecting the various ways disability can manifest. Someone who is blind may rely on sound to locate a lost phone or ask friends to call it to listen for their ringer. Someone who is deaf may be more reliant on the eyes, visibly looking for their phone or feeling for the vibration of notifications. There are times when accessibility needs for one person can directly contrast those for another, but that doesn't make either of those needs less important. Someone who has light sensitivity and may be easily overstimulated might prefer low light in a room, while someone who can only see under bright, clear light may prefer strong lighting in the same space. 

Further, disabled people have become the most impacted by issues of poverty, often facing homelessness. Lack of resources and lack of accessible care and environment can become a trap to many disabled people, leaving them in what feels like an endless cycle of burden because they cannot get their needs met. This is something that I am aware of firsthand whenI was working as a legal and policy intern with the Delaware Community Legal Aid Society and the Legal Clinic for the Disabled. Our clients, who regularly struggled through issues regarding the benefits, their housing, and other civil disputes, oftentimes simultaneously navigated living with disabilities. This is not a coincidence—it reflects a system that tends to leave disabled people on the margins rather than fully accommodating their needs.

Fighting for the rights of people with disabilities is not just an issue for people with disabilities alone, but a fully intersectional issue. Fighting for people with disabilities means fighting for any person who could fall into any group. It also means advocating for the rights of disabled people who face homelessness and are disproportionately affected by poverty. The unemployment rate for disabled people is double what it is for able-bodied people, and over a quarter of disabled people use SNAP (formerly food stamps) to make sure they have enough to eat. Further, half of homeless people in the United States experience some kind of disability. [1] These statistics demonstrate clearly that to fight for disability rights also means inherently working to create housing equity, food access justice, and accessible, accommodating work environments so that people universally have higher chances of stable employment, and moreover, stable living conditions. Of course, these issues are complex, but they show that working toward a more accessible world also inherently advances other social justice causes.

In order to adequately address issues of homelessness and housing insecurity, it is key to address the intersectional nature of these complex problems. By informing ourselves and others of the surrounding circumstances of homelessness and housing insecurity, we work to reduce it and to eventually eradicate it. At Mentor a Promise, we do our part by helping the children of homeless and housing-insecure people succeed in school and prepare for successful lives as adults. This means addressing and assisting in all aspects of a person’s experience with homelessness, including if they experience disability.

Through youth education, Mentor A Promise strives to positively impact and assist students in facing housing insecurity. Parents can take comfort knowing their children can stay on track academically and not lose ground because of their housing situations. To find out more about our work or join the conversation, follow us on social media at @mentorapromise or visit https://mentorapromise.org.