Classism and Ableism – (originally posted on Twitter)

My eczema gets inflamed and itchy when I wear masks.  Open skin has led to & will lead to an infection.  My Dr. told me to wear a mask as little as possible.  So I spend most of my time outdoors.  I don’t ask others to wear masks because of my situation.  I wear one if I need to.

I’m not immunocompromised.  I’m relatively healthy.  But can still succumb to COVID. I refuse to put my health in the hands of millions of motherfuckers. I think COVID is the first of many pandemics, according to Sleepy Creepy Joe, & we will all need to adjust how we live.

We live in an individualistic society as evidenced by the shit laws in this country.  The most vulnerable are never protected.   Now, the most vulnerable has no class barrier.  People don’t have money for the N95 masks being told to try harder to find free masks 👁️👁️

No one is going to protect you like you will protect yourself. I have said the same thing to family members. The onus is on us to protect ourselves and also to stay away from the most vulnerable, and anyone, if we could have been compromised.  This is the world you  created

There’s no kumbaya moment coming. You people have sat and watched the poor die from a plethora of “preventable” diseases while saying “they should take better care of themselves.” Y’all never say “We should stop allowing junk to be sold as food. It’s killing people.”

And of course there are poor immunocompromised people.  I’m not ignoring them.  But you probably are…. As you always have.  I’m sick of people with money complaining about the fact that they’ve lost access to venues because of selfish people when poor people never had that access.

My ex used to say “nobody ever understands anything until it happens to them.”  And this is what I’m witnessing.  There’s been no real legislation helping the poor for anything.  Most of the legislation either criminalizes poor people or strips them of their dignity.  Y’all did that

Each and every time you let the election cycle go by without the least bit of consideration for poor people, you say you don’t GAF about poor people.  This has been going on for decades.  Now imagine being poor and everyone else not giving AF about you.  This is where you are

When profit is the main driver for medicine, we’ll never have cures.  We’ll never have timely treatments.  How can they have studied a vaccine for decades that works so poorly?  Where are the EFFECTIVE treatments?  For anything? Popping pills for a lifetime hardly seems fair.

COVID has become endemic.  With no cure, effective treatment or effective vaccine that STOPS the spread in sight, we’re in this for the long haul.  People can’t be expected to wear masks in perpetuity.  So it’s a good idea to demand treatment instead of yelling at strangers

America’s COVID death rate is directly related to the state of American’s health and the state of the healthcare system.  While I’m here, shout out to all of the COVID vaccine injured that vaccinated to “protect others” and now those others don’t GAF about you.  You deserve better

End Ableism

There is a weekly Twitter informational tweet-a-thon of sorts called #SaturdaySchool.  Last Saturday, March 11th, the session called to #EndAbleism.  Merriam-Webster defines ableism as:  

discrimination or prejudice against individuals with disabilities

You’ll learn a lot about yourself if you Google the term ableism and read a few articles. And just in case you didn’t know, people with one disability can and often are ableist when it comes to other disabilites.  They don’t think about it. It’s unintentional. Isn’t it all?

I see TONS of ableist language used by activists on-line. I need to do better calling it out. Most times I notice the language & I don’t share those tweets. However, sometimes I share because I don’t notice the ableist language being used. I’m working on it.

It is exhausting to check people because people use ableist language so frequently.  It feels like very other post I read says “stupid” “dumb” “moron” “idiot” “psycho” “mental” …  I did learn that using swear words is waaaay better than using ableist language… So in that respect, it was a relatively easy transition.

I was initially irked when, my now dear Twitter friend, @MxPhoenix  would seemingly CONSTANTLY inform me of my ableist language.  I spoke about it with people offline As I verbally defended my right to use ableist language, I saw how ridiculous I was being.

YOU don’t get to say what’s OK or what’s not ableist.  Just like racists and misogynists don’t get a say on how their language offends us. Once people tell you how it harms people, who are not you, if you mean no harm, why continue the language use?  There are other words to use.  Even if someone is mentally ill, why do you think it’s OK to use that fact as an insult? 

We have to check ourselves. I checked myself many times with @MxPhoenix appearing as a tiny being floating above my shoulder urging me to choose different language.

As I read the #EndAbleism tweets, it just seemed like some people weren’t as empathic or as understanding as I thought they would be. I was shocked. Because while I was irked at my Twitter buddy, I never responded to them or anyone that I had a right to use that language. Some of these people sounded like racists asking why they can’t say N*gg*r.  We have to do better.

But for all of you who can’t grasp that ableist language can be harmful, let me put it into a way you can understand.

Above is the actual title of a recent article in the New York Times.  Now, granted this is an op-ed column.  But let’s change the ableist language to let’s say…. Misogynistic language:

Clinton vs Press: Cunty, bitchy love.

Racist language:

Obama vs Press: Nigger, monkey love

Homophobic language:

Anderson Cooper vs Press: Faggoty, no homo love

Not ok, right?  Now I can write a racist paragraph or homophobic paragraph or misogynistic paragraph to prove my point, but I don’t think that’s necessary. #EndAbleism