My Last Word on the Subject for the Time Being

I'll post links to my eligible CSI:NY fic tomorrow so that anyone who wants to can nominate it for the csifanficwards 2008. Right now, I'm too exhausted with the effort of trying to explain the realities of this gimp's life to an outsider to care. Like I said in a previous entry, you cannot presume to tell any disabled person how they should feel unless you've been there, any more than a white person can tell a person of color how it is or a straight person could dictate the Whole Truth to a gay or transperson. It's presumptuous, officious, and aggravating as hell, and even two sorties into their able-centric world is enough to sap a Rolling Warrior of their will to fight. It's like felling a redwood with your teeth. Unless you're a beaver, it won't work.

I'm not angry that this person challenged me; debate is healthy. But I am tired and frustrated because I can't seem to articulate the source of my angst effectively. Each time I try, I'm met with an organized barrage of Google Fu.

I think the miscommunication stems from the fact that my opponent in the jousting match is operating with an entirely different experience set then I am. She's been a biped from birth, and as such, she can relate to the disabled experiences only as a secondary observer. She's never experienced the First(and maybe only) Universal Truth of Crippledom: The carer/limper relationship is inherently unequal. Forever. And ever. No amount of sensitivity training and government funding will change that. You could give every limper a carer and pay that carer a million dollars a year, and the inequality would remain.

Not because carers are evil, power-mad asswads, but because the able person will always assume a dominant role over the disabled person. The disabled person needs the able one; the reverse is seldom true. If the carer doesn't like the client, they can leave, but if the client is unhappy, they're faced with the daunting proposition of finding a second(or third or fourth) person on the face of the earth willing to wipe their ass or insert their tampons. Good luck with that. As a result, many disabled folks think long and hard before raising a stink, and most don't because they're afraid The Authorities will "step in" and force them into a group home, thereby stripping them of their scant independence.

When your whole life is lived in such deeply-rooted inequality, it is nigh impossible to function as an equal in society. How can you when your toileting schedule is determined by the availability and willingness of someone else to help you? And words will never describe the depth of that humiliation, even if it is your mother.

So, while it's wonderful that there exists the British Council for Disability(and it is, even if it does me no good as a Yank), it doesn't do squat to address the deeper issues of the psychological damage inflicted by a life as a lesser being. I'm thrilled that there are councils to help me get a job rolling pennies for the food bank and groups to keep my carer from drowning me in the tub in a fit of rage, but what I and many others need is a place where we can vent our frustration and get an answer that doesn't boil down to, "Well, what's wrong with you that you can't accept being crippled and all the indignity that entails?"

What I need is a Staples SMITE button that would put this nasty shoe on the abled foot for a week. Then we'd see how much they'd just have to accept.