Ew, how 101

if you are nondisabled and working in the disability community…if you are white and working with people of color…if you are an adult working with youth…or, quite often, if you are a nondisabled white adult working with disabled youth, many who have been abandoned by our education system because of racism/classism/ableism…basically if you are a person who has authority and privilege and are working with people who traditionally have not…

think hard as hell before you leverage “professionalism.”

Antidepressants and Talk Radio

Now, you or I might speculate that for a woman to press charges against her husband and the father of her children, she has to be quite upset with him. Therefore we should 1) presume that this was a really scary or upsetting experience for her, and 2) acknowledge the likelihood that this is not the only disturbing, upsetting, controlling, or frightening thing her husband has done.

But at least one of these radio hosts, and the callers, wers less inclined to that view. Oh yes. One of the radio hosts did indeed say that it was not okay to drug someone without their consent, but I also got to hear people talking about how it’s okay to drug someone if you mean well by it. I also heard that it was okay to do if he wanted to watch the Superbowl and she wouldn’t calm down. I also heard that it was okay because it was just such a tiny little pill. I also heard that it was okay to do if he just really wanted her to stop fighting and relax.

School Using Lap Dances to Treat ADD closed

Are lap dances an effective therapy for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder or drug addiction? It doesn’t seem like a question that should require a serious answer—but a state investigation of Oregon’s Mount Bachelor Academy (MBA) has substantiated allegations made by students and staff that such “therapy” was part of the school’s “emotional growth” curriculum and forced an emergency shutdown of the campus.

But Mrs Lincon, What about the play?!

Today the VA sent me a letter, with my name and address and social on it, detailing the reasons why the special transportation they have been providing to me was being terminated. They offered a generic list of alternative options, which included ‘asking for help from family and friends’ and ‘taking public transportation.’ In order to send this letter, of course, they would have to collect this information from me, from a file which might have detailed that my family is dead, and that the reason I do not take public transportation is because I have such bad panic attacks that I black out. Nevertheless, they forged on, much like the cheerful nurse I dealt with on the phone who commented on my tone of voice, “You sure don’t seem too happy about it!”

“I’m being treated for suicidal thoughts and depression after several suicide attempts.”

She transferred me without comment after that. Again, a moment’s notice would have provided her with that information. She didn’t bother.

In the news:

Bank challenges disability ruling [UK]

David Allen, who has muscular dystrophy, took action after Royal Bank of Scotland failed to put in wheelchair access at its branch in Sheffield.

The company was ordered to pay £6,500 in damages and given until the end of September this year to install a lift.

Richard Lissack QC, for RBS, told the Court of Appeal that the judge in the earlier ruling had got it wrong.

At a hearing at Sheffield County Court in January, Judge John Dowse ruled the bank had breached the Disability Discrimination Act.

Picture Post: Organs of Pills – pills carved up to look like the organs they’re supposed to help. No descriptions.