Accessibility Fail

Welcome, BADD bloggers!

As someone who has one kid in a wheelchair, and, on occasion, one in a stroller too (I used to have one in the wheelchair and one in a sling!), I have a pretty good eye for accessibility.  Or should I say, the lack thereof.

Local footpath "options"... FAIL

Society's public spaces are just not accessible.  This is not just about the chair, or even just about disability.  It's about people with a disability, carers, children, young people, women, different cultures, different races.  It's about power.  All of our spaces are designed or function to satisfy the powerful, the status quo.  So, in Australia, that's about white, middle class men people who are invested in capitalism.  Our spaces are about celebrating that [or selling it to us].  Other people don't have things designed for them, we have things to "cater to" us, or to "accomodate" us.  We're a second thought.

In Sydney city: "ramp" to cross road - FAIL

I'm sick of it.  So I'm doing my bit, in a bloggy way, to point out Accessibility FAIL from my three main persepectives as a "second thought" in society:

1. As a carer for a child in a wheelchair.  This child is a tall, lanky 12 year old, with athetoid CP, very limited motor control, no independent walking, and who is incontinent.  Oh, and who has epilepsy.  Oh, so much potential here!  [I'm planning a whole post on the awesome that isn't 'the "disabled toilets" of the world, with their built-in assumptions that 1. you're in there alone, and 2. you're using the toilet, and 3. you're without any friggin bags, need for a rubbish bin, or have any kids/trolleys/cane's/dogs/etc with you.  That is, they're usually just a "normal" toilet with a friggin rail and more room.  FAIL.  More on this in future posts.../rant]  Here's the girl:

2. As a mother of a small child.  Who is 3, curious, enjoys running and exploring, and who is sometimes in a stroller (and who was in a sling).  So much of our public world excludes children, and (not by accident) their mothers carers.  Sometimes we are just ignored, rendered invisible, unwanted, excluded, and sometimes we are taken advantage of for the sake of the almighty dollar (lets just take the basics of paying for playgrounds, the display of sweets at checkouts, the goddam kiddie rides at the goddam shops.  Oh and none of those things are accessible for the chair anyway, so there's that). Here's the small girl:

3. As a woman.  Who finds it is just so awesome that she can't go any-friggin-where without being hit over the head with what she isn't, and what she should be, and that the world is set up and catered to the male gaze (trails off into feminist rant inducing much soap boxing and probably spittle...).  Here's me:

Welcome to Accessibility Fail.  I'm blogging the Accessiblity FAIL I see in my life, either in person or online.  Please join me!  Post a comment below, or add your own experiences on your blog and I'll link 'em (See Simply Link doohickey below!).  If I ever see Accessibility Wins, I'll post them too, but we all know those are few and far between!

The upshot of all this is:  Here is my basic bit of advice for all town planners, policy officers, architects, engineers, public officials, politicians, bureaucrats, and anyone having anything to do with public (and private) building, public (and private) space design, and public life in general NEED to do this BEFORE building or 'adapting' a space:

1.  Go there and push someone in a wheelchair.

2.  Go there and push themselves in a wheelchair.

3.  Go there and try any number of mobility "aids," vision "aids," and the innumerable ways and means with which some people with disability might access the world.

4.  Don't assume if you've done 1-4 that you've a) covered everything and everybody, and b) have any idea what it's really like. 

5.  Go there and push a kid in a stroller.

6.  Go there with with a small child who might behave unpredictably, or use the environment in ways adults won't.

7.  Which should really be numbers one to six: ASK.  Consult, converse, listen.  Don't add us on at the end like a PC nod to the outsiders.  We're not outsiders.  We're YOU.

Only then can you go design, fund, build and so on.

Grab a button and post a comment if you'd like to Play Along at Home [Fun for All the Family TM].  If we can't laugh we'll drown in a lake of unicorn tears.  Or something. 




<center><a href="http://memotoselfblogger.blogspot.com/p/accessibility-fail.html"><img border="0" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5224/5671385157_9ef2c3ca91_m.jpg" width="125" height="94" alt="Accessibility FAIL button"/></a></center>

This post is for Blogging Against Disablism Day 2011, from the fabulous Diary of a Goldfish.  My 2009 BADD post is here.  I blog about being a stepmum to a child with a disability (and a teenager!), my 3 year old, Montessori doings, and general parenthood, feminist awesome.  You might also want to check out my living with a wheelchair post here, and my post on being a stepmother here!  A final link, to my post On Epilepsy, here. 


Thanks for stopping by!  Leave me some comment luv!  If you feel like sharing your own experience of Accessibility FAIL, link yourself below, I'm making it a regular feature here.

Blogging Against Disablism - A Photo Essay

It's Blogging Against Disablism day, and here's a photo essay on my gorgeous (step)daughter, Snail.

I've been in Snail's life as her stepmum since she was 4. DinnerDad and I have 50% custody of her, in a week about arrangement. We do Friday to Fridays, she has just gone back to her mother's today. Here is Snail.



Snail has Pacygyria, a congenital brain malformation that causes physical and mental disability, and epilepsy. She is lucky not to need a feeding tube, and has always eaten and swallowed just fine. She's in a wheelchair, but has mobility in a kind of bum shuffle, so that's how she gets around our place! Here she is in her chair on a bushwalk.



Her little sister, Lolly, also bum shuffles, as she learned this from her Snail! Here they are together, off 'sploring

Snail needs our help to feed herself, get dressed, and do most day to day activities. She's in nappies too, though we're starting more toileting with her this year. She has around 200 words, but understands a lot more than that! She uses lots of assistive devices, she has a walker (that stays at school), orthotics, glasses, and a special computer with a touch screen that she can use to play with and communicate. She takes lots of medication for her epilepsy, which is still not well controlled.

Snail is the most happy, beautiful natured child. She's simply delightful. Though don't get me wrong, she can throw a tantrum with the best of 'em! She loves to read books, play with dolls "a baby", and her real baby, Lolly,


play in the water (or the bath - she is a total water girl!),



and she LOVES cars, and "mo mo's" or motorbikes. Sometimes DinnerDad is riding his motorbike somewhere with us in the car, and Snail goes spare with "dadda!! Dadda!! MO MO!!!", it's hilarious. She loves music and Snail-y dancing is a delight to behold.



She also loves the garden.



She can get frustrated with lots of things, as her world can be limited. She hates to be left behind. She doesn't like reverse! She can be jealous of her little sister. She loves her Selene and wants to sit with her ALL THE TIME! She wants to watch Blues Clues and can chuck a fabulous shitty if we all watch something else. Most of her grumps are about her difficulties in keeping up with the rest of us. We do what we can to make this easier for her, but we can never fix it completely, it's just part of our lives.

Snail has taught me a lot (in a completely corny way, [ETA insert unicorns here]) :-). If there's a point to this essay, it's that living with a disability can be hard. Don't make it harder by staring, avoiding, and not getting the fuck out of the way when you see the mother with her one year old in a sling and pushing a kid in a wheelchair! Maybe smile. Don't act shocked if you talk to Snail and she just keeps saying "hello, how are you" and isn't "normal" after all. Listen.