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You and Yours - Transcript Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio 4 |
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TX: 13.08.04 - IS "DISABLISM" A WORD THAT'S WORTH USING? Â PRESENTER: WINIFRED ROBINSON |
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THE ATTACHED TRANSCRIPT WAS TYPED FROM A RECORDING AND NOT COPIED FROM AN ORIGINAL SCRIPT. BECAUSE OF THE RISK OF MISHEARING AND THE DIFFICULTY IN SOME CASES OF IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS, THE Â鶹ԼÅÄ CANNOT VOUCH FOR ITS COMPLETE ACCURACY. ROBINSON Now we've all heard of racism and sexism but there's now another ism to consider - disabilism. The disability charity SCOPE is trying to encourage people to use this word and they recently held, what they called, a Disabilism Summit. They've also commissioned a report from the think tank Demos entitled Disabilism - How to Tackle the Last Prejudice. Tony Manwaring is the chief executive of SCOPE and Ian Macrae is a regular contributor to Radio 4's In Touch programme, he is visually impaired. Tony Manwaring, disabilism - as I said it's a brand new word - what do you mean by it? MANWARING Well when you look at the life chances and the life experience of disabled people in this country you have to take a step back and think about it. Just briefly one quarter of Britain's disabled people have experienced some violence, bullying or intimidation, one third of disabled people have faced the humiliation of being refused entry to pubs, leisure venues and so on and one million want to work but can't. And when you try to understand why that's the case you have to confront the attitudes, the ignorance, the prejudice and the underlying belief really that disabled people are inferior, in order to understand why that is the case. You said it was a new word, it's not a new word - I just need to say - it's a word that's been used within the disability rights movement for many years … ROBINSON I suppose I meant it's a new word for the mainstream. MANWARING Yes and I think actually this very programme right now, today, this second is the first time that a mainstream broadcaster has used it and has started a discussion about it, so that we very much welcome. So it's recognising those attitudes, that ignorance and saying that that is what needs to be tackled in order that all the other practices, legislation, all the other things that need to be dealt with, can be put into effect because people will then really understand the broader context and deal with those specifics with a much greater purpose. ROBINSON Ian Macrae then, does using this word disabilism help people to combat the kind of prejudice that Tony Manwaring was describing there? MACRAE I'm cynical about it Winifred and I'm completely in tune with and in agreement with the social model of disability from where it comes … ROBINSON By which you mean the problem lies not with the person … MACRAE Society rather than the impairment. I mean as a congenitally disabled person raised in a family of blind people it's kind of written through me like the letters in a bar of Whitley Bay rock, is the social model. But I think language is always problematic. My belief is that it's not language that changes society, it's changes in society which modify language. So, for example, back in the eighties I went into the bar at the Newcastle Playhouse with a friend who burst out laughing as we went in, I said: "What is it?" He said: "Well on the blackboard they've got Ploughperson's lunch." Now I've kind of been well in touch with my feminist side I know that one of the central goals of feminism wasn't the renaming of classic lunchtime snacks and I think that's the danger for me really. Over the last 20 years I've been blind, I've been visually handicapped, I've been visually impaired, I'm now sight impaired and you know what it hasn't made a ha'p'orth of difference to my life and the way people regard me. And that's the point for me - I think that the prejudices we face are actually a lot more complex than those relating to race and gender. ROBINSON In what sense more complex? MACRAE Because I think people can be coming from all sorts of angles - they can come from - they can come from the point of view of sympathy for us or our impairment, they can come from the point of view of fear of our impairment and they can come from the point of view of simple misinformation. It's much easier to say that someone is a racist and that is borne out of vileness than it is to say someone who's prejudiced against a disabled person just out of sheer vileness. It's much more complex than that usually. ROBINSON Okay let's put those points to Tony Manwaring. Two points there - that the discrimination anyway is more complex than with racism or sexism and also that these kind of discussions, endless discussions, about language are wasting time that people like yourself could be spending really in trying to improve things for people with disabilities. MANWARING Well the discussion that we're having is part of our time to get equal campaign, which has been endorsed by Nelson Mandela down really. And the success of that campaign, the impact that the advertising is having, which is very much positive images of disabled people talking about their experiences of their lives, which I think very much fits the kind of agenda that Ian's describing, is a focus on that broader message and that broader purpose. But again we wouldn't be having this discussion I suspect if we hadn't used the word disabilism. And for me the acid test of this is that we now live in a society within which institutional racism and sexism are considered out of court by definition, even though there is that practice. ROBINSON Sure but what about the point that Ian's making that prejudice against people with disabilities is more complicated than racism or sexism? MANWARING Well we've been talking a lot, for example, to Trevor Philips and others at the Commission for Racial Equality and one of the conclusions we draw is that to get into a very complex discussion about whose is more complex or deeper or whatever than the other is probably not the way to go - it's about respecting different forms of difference and coming to a common language which enables us to move forward together. Now maybe that doesn't answer the question in the way that you phrase it but actually I think it's the best answer to the question. ROBINSON Tony Manwaring, Ian Macrae we must leave it there, thank you both. Back to the You and Yours homepage The Â鶹ԼÅÄ is not responsible for external websites |
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