KosAbility is a community diary series posted at 5 PM ET every Sunday and Wednesday by volunteer diarists. This is a gathering place for people who are living with disabilities, who love someone with a disability, or who want to know more about the issues surrounding this topic. There are two parts to each diary. First, a volunteer diarist will offer their specific knowledge and insight about a topic they know intimately. Then, readers are invited to comment on what they've read and or ask general questions about disabilities, share something they've learned, tell bad jokes, post photos, or rage about the unfairness of their situation. Our only rule is to be kind; trolls will be spayed or neutered.
Daily Kos readers may be wondering why I a 32 year old guy from Waterford, NY am posting on KosAbility...well it is because as a Daily Kos reader KosAbility is very relevant to my life.
Today I use a wheelchair as the result of a spinal cord injury at the c4-5 level when I was 17. To say the least, life is unpredictable and can take dramatic turns in an instant. My very much unexpected injury happened when I was using a large backyard trampoline with my older brother and a childhood friend. All seemed normal until my brother accidently fell on my neck as I was in somewhat of a sitting position. Of course I wish my injury happened differently...but sometimes life doesn’t go as you planned. This freak accident forever changed my life, as I went from life as an athletic, active young guy who participated in several sports, going to high school, and was busy dating my first serious girlfriend...to being hospitalized, unable to move, and overwhelmed with thoughts of being permanently paralyzed, (at least until there’s a cure or therapy for spinal cord injuries). I was soon onto Kessler Rehabilitation Center in New Jersey where of all people Superman, a.k.a. Christopher Reeve, was also a patient as he was injured about two weeks before I was. Going through tiring and psychologically trying rehab was made somewhat lighter having Christopher Reeve nearby to occasionally chat with. Sadly Mr. Reeve passed away in 2004, but he was always determined to raise awareness and support for stem cell research through the media, in front of Congress, and through The Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation, which is very active to this day.
This reminds me...we need to support objective, ethical stem cell research, including embryonic stem cells and somatic cell nuclear transfer (therapeutic cloning) while not allowing religious or political ideologues (who seem to control today’s Republican Party) to restrict scientific progress. Thankfully elections have consequences as President Obama removed almost all of George W. Bush’s outrageous, religiously motivate restrictions.
Today I am living life as much as I can, follow politics closely, and am about as liberal as someone can be. Lately I’ve been attempting to date (which is a bit of a challenge), and hope to finishing my teaching certification in the spring. Adjusting to life after any traumatic injury such as a spinal cord injury or diagnosis w/ cancer, mental illness, or conditions like diabetes or epilepsy for that matter...is never easy or simple and often takes a long time and a lot of patience, but it s possible. It’s an old, kinda tired cliché, but it has value...it’s not what happens to us which is most important, but how we deal with it. Some days are tough and I wish there was already a "cure" for spinal cord injuries but as of yet this is not the case. Instead of looking back in anger or regret as to why our lives’ haven't turned out as we hoped...it’s much better to keep moving forward, find a way to laugh at least once a day, and view the glass as half full rather than half empty.
Going through any traumatic situation or injury makes one question many assumptions. Just a few questions are; If God is all knowing, all powerful, and interested in our well-being as we’re told as children, why is the world filled w/ so much misery and pain?; When we have so many needs at home, is it wise to spend shocking amounts of money on our nation’s global military empire?; Will we ever stop sending young men and women to fight in overseas wars for very questionable goals at the expense of shattered bodies and minds? Will the Republican Party ever represent the rights and interests of all Americans, not just the white, the wealthy, the conservatively religious, and corporate plutocrats?
Dealing w/ labels society loves to apply to its members is also a long, complicated process. Words like disabled, handicapped, quadriplegic for the most part aren’t my favorite b/c they're negative or have been stigmatized. The words are much like the terms Native American and "Indian", they’re loaded and are controversial but are important b/c of their unique history and for all those who fought, protested, and organized so those tagged w/ such labels aren’t pushed to society’s shadows and excluded from our Constitution, as they once were or continue to be in some cases.
Using a power wheelchair every day (b/c though I recovered strength in my arms I still have impairment) has caused to me notice and appreciate how our nation has gone from ignoring, shunning, discriminating against people w/ various disabilities, going as far as institutionalizing the disabled and requiring sterilization of those deemed "inferior" to slowly recognizing the rights of those with disabilities and impairments to live their lives as they choose, according to their free will. This entry from Wikipedia gives you an idea how society treated those deemed "different" and unworthy during the Orwellian Eugenics Movement in the early 1900’s: "The principal targets of the American program were the mentally retarded and the mentally ill, but also targeted under many state laws were the deaf, the blind, people with epilepsy, and the physically deformed. According to the activist Angela Davis, Native Americans, as well as African-American women were sterilized against their will in many states, often without their knowledge while they were in a hospital for other reasons (e.g. childbirth)". Things in the U.S. are not perfect, but at least we’ve moved forward and recognized that the Constitution applies to everyone, not just white men as it originally did.
The value of scientific and medical progress uninhibited by religious or political ideologues can be seen in the history of spinal cord injuries. Spinal cord injuries have been studied and written about as far back as Ancient Egypt in the "Edwin Smith papyrus" dating to 3,000 to 2,5000 B.C., by the famous Galen in 2nd century Rome, and in early Renaissance Europe. For centuries there was very little doctors could do those w/ spinal cord injuries especially higher level injuries. Anatomical dissection, which proved to be vital in understanding spinal cord injuries, was adamantly opposed by the early and medieval Catholic Church as sacrilegious. In 1300 Pope Boniface went as far as issuing a letter excommunicating who dissected the dead, but the religiously imposed restrictions were lessened when Pope Sextus permitted dissection for medical purposes in 1482. With knowledge of anatomy and development of anesthesia, treatment of spinal cord injuries made increasing progress, especially at WW II. While freedom of religious is a cherished aspect our society, allowing religion to restrict and inhibit medical progress only holds us back and hinders life saving medical developments. The unrestricted advance of science and research into promising areas like stem cell research is another reason of many why our nation’s constitutionally protected separation of church and state is so important.
All sorts of laws have been passed in Congress and States removing barriers, but one law that recently received a lot of attention is the Americans with Disabilities Act which was passed signed into law by President George H. W. Bush in 1990. With the rise of the oddly libertarian/socially conservative "Tea Party" within the Republican Party, could anyone seriously imagine a future Republican President signing such a far reaching law as the ADA? I doubt it! Evidence of the Republican Party’s sometimes indifference and frequent hostility to the importance of civil rights is clearly seen in the candidacy for Senator by Rand Paul.
Paul has repeatedly stated that the Civil Rights Act and Americans' With Disability Act are "troubling" b/c they supposedly interfere w/ business owners’ private property rights (and the right of racists and bigots to be racists and bigots, which Paul seems to value). Of course Paul fails to appreciate didn't mention that black, minority and disabled Americans may just want Congress to uphold their equal Constitutional rights to not be treated as 2nd class, inferior citizens.
Here is Paul’s basically ignorant statement about the ADA. "I think a lot of things could be handled locally, I think if you have a two-story office and you hire someone who’s handicapped, it might be reasonable to let him have an office on the first floor rather than the government saying you have to have a $100,000 elevator. And I think when you get to the solutions like that, the more local the better, and the more common sense the decisions are, rather than having a federal government make those decisions." Wrong! Note to Mr. Paul...under the ADA’s "reasonable accommodation" clause, if a worker can do their job in an office on the first floor, there is no requirement for the business to install an expense elevator. This a typically Republican attempt to manipulate facts to fit their rigidly conservative ideology.
Paul like other right-wing politicians has suggested the usual red hearing that the market will address this issue. This utopian pro-market fetish assumes somehow a scenario will develop where business A, owned by a racist and anti-disability bigot who wants to exclude blacks and the disabled, will compete for customers w/ business B, owned by the non-racist and non-bigot...or maybe disabled Americans should pay a usage fee of say $50 to $500 when they access a businesses' expensive ramp. Under this scenario where our Constitutional rights don’t exist, a restaurant or business owned by a religious fundamentalist would be free to ban customers w/ disabilities...b/c he believes disability is a sign God’s punishment. Private property rights don’t override our rights as equal citizens to enter and utilize a business as would any other citizen.
A high level of discrimination, legally protected segregation, and very little access to public life for Americans w/ disabilities...as well as a neutered Constitution, would be the result of Paul's dream for us all.
If you’re not a wheelchair user, you may ask what does all of this matter to my life? Well, basically life is unpredictable and you, a family member, or friend may end up in a wheelchair at some point in life...if you do you’ll appreciate advances accumulated over centuries enabling those w/ disabilities to lead full lives and the existence of civil rights laws protecting us all from the worst, soul-crushing discrimination.
The word KosAbility is a great word b/c w/in it the the word ABILITY is emphasized...on that note, instead of focusing on what we can't do w/ the word DISABILITY, lets focus on what we can do w/ the word ABILITY.
Feel free to ask anything!