An excellent carnival over at pilgrim girl - on the subject of all kinds of borders and the interplay of disability- living with, in, around disability.
She writes:
"A few months ago I was engaging in an online debate with some TAB friends who argued that the routinized abortion of fetuses with disabilities or genetic abnormalities should be encouraged. As I expressed opposition to their ideas, my well-reasoned arguments were soon abandoned.
"Are you saying that I should have been aborted?" I asked. "That society would be better off without me?"
One of them responded: "Well, not you of course. I never think of you as disabled. You are just Jana."
This response bothered me just as much as the original assertion about aborting babies with disabilities. I found myself simultaneously pleased to know that my friends didn't think of me as disabled even as I was disgusted that they refused to recognize that identity as important to me. Through this I realized just how flexible the borders of disability are--the categories of 'normal' and 'disabled' bending and flexing to both include and exclude. "
Click above to read the rest.
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