Hello lovely people!
Thank you so much for your wonderful comments on my last video. Look I’m actually sitting
up by myself! This is very special and new. I’m dedicating all of my content in the
month of June to Pride because… well, every parade got rained on by the coronavirus and
we need to bring the sun out.
- that’s a rainbow pun. [wink]
If this is your first time on the channel, hi, I’m Jessica, yes I do make cheesy jokes
often, but I also make content about life as a disabled and chronically ill person who
just happens to also be a lesbian.
- And yes, I look like this all the time.
Subscribe if you enjoy not only vintage style but also discussing why it’s so great we
don’t live vintage lives anymore.
I would be dead for sure.
In today’s video: Does Pride Exclude Disabled People?
- Yes.
[End Screen Music]
Ok, ok, there is more to it than that. Promise.
LGBTQ+ Pride- or ‘gay pride’ as I have an unfortunate habit of calling it, and yes,
I’m calling myself out for that- as we know it, is about celebrating differences, shouting
out for everyone to be proud of their body, sexuality and physical appearance. It’s
also a time to remember and reflect on the resilience, perseverance and unity of the
LGBTQ+ community and how hard we have had to fight towards equality.
I mean but mainly it’s about drinking. And while I have nothing against throwing a huge
party just to celebrate existing… Thanks to my disabilities, I can’t actually attend
a lot of them.
Apparently I’m bitter.
Diversity and Inclusion are touted as the main pillars of Pride but people with disabilities
are still often left out when it comes to the discussion and celebration of sexual and
gender diversity. It was only in 2018 that the iconic Stonewall Inn bar denied
entrance to a blind queer person because they didn’t provide paperwork for their service
dog — which is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, which states no paperwork
is needed for the entrance of a service animal.
And that event is purely notable because the person involved actually TRIED to get in.
Most disabled people don’t say anything about inaccessible venues because we’re
just so bloody used to it!
Just to put a pin in ‘impossible to enter venues’, we also have to deal with the desexualisation
of disabled people in general- the widely held belief that we can’t have “alternative”
sexualities because we can’t be sexual in the first place.
- which, by the way, is really fun to experience juxtaposed with the hypersexualisation of
my lesbianism.
No one has ever yelled at my wife and I to kiss from a crowd when I’m in my wheelchair
but once I’m out of it… beware!
The funny thing is that there are many parallels between the experiences of people with disabilities
or chronic illnesses, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people:
both groups face discrimination
and prejudice, and are represented as ‘other’ in society. YET, part of this ‘othering’
is about suppressing variation within the communities and viewing us as homogenous.
I made a joke about it in my last video but I think we’re all pretty much aware of the
poster look for Pride: he’s white, he’s cis, he’s male, he spends way too much time
at the gym and his clothes fall off him in ways that would be completely unacceptable
at any other time.
Where are the gender-non-conforming party-goers? Where are the people from ethnic minorities?
Where are visibly religious queer people?
- and can we just talk about how it’s always the pretty gays or the people who ‘pass’?
Equally, disabled people do not all look like this:
The good old blue plack that tells me where a very skinny version of me is welcome(!)
But I’m an ambulatory wheelchair user, meaning I only use my wheelchair some of the time...
For both groups, there is a level of exclusion and isolation that we face from the mainstream.
The need for a safe, supportive space is therefore paramount for each community: a place of acceptance
and understanding: Pride.
So what makes Pride inaccessible in the first place?
Well, I made a video from Pride last year, when I was using a borrowed mobility scooter.
You can click the card in the top left corner to see that. As you can see, the parade is
pretty darn crowded and drunk people aren’t the most self-aware, rather they tend to step
in front of you, talk over the top of your head or get annoyed when they can’t just
walk OVER you. It's great (!)
The ground is generally littered with cans, bottles, food cartons and a thousand
rainbow trinkets that worked for five seconds and then got thrown away. You might be able
to step over it, but try getting a wheel over it!
The parade route of most Prides includes areas that are uneven and they’re all incredibly
long, involving very narrow spaces and even if there is a designated wheelchair path,
oftentimes the parade coordinators underestimate the amount of space needed, or the path becomes
overcrowded with onlookers... who think that it’s fine to take up the disabled space
because it won’t really be used right? There aren’t that many disabled, queer people!
Um… a third actually. One third of LGBTQ+ people generally have some form of physical
or mental disability. Which, considering the under-reporting of non-cishet feelings in
surveys is probably actually higher!
So that’s the route, but then we come to the event. Does it have a sign language interpreter?
Do film screenings have captions? Are there spaces for participants with noise or light
sensitivity or who are on the autism spectrum? Is there a designated space for wheelchairs?
Even when events try really, really, hard there can still be issues. Brighton Pride
last year had a special inclusion tent, sign language interpreters on stage and a designated
platform for wheelchairs but… they still vastly underestimated how many wheelchair
users would want to watch the stage at one time, meaning that throughout the biggest
acts, a large number of people had to sit in the inclusion tent, with no view of the
stage, just waiting for someone to leave the platform so they could join.
I actually just gave up with that queue after sitting in it for a while!
Didn’t need that.
Those of us who use wheelchairs for big events are left at the mercy of crowds inside Pride
events. Not even Moses could part those crowds! People are screaming. People are crying. People
are laughing. People are fighting. People are… doing things in a corner that you don’t
want to tell your mother about. And most of them are riotously drunk!
- because wow does Pride seem to be based around drinking!
Why do we need to ‘celebrate’ things with alcohol anyway?
Don’t answer that. I know I’m in a tiny minority of non-drinkers.
This is something that applies to LGBTQ+ spaces all year round: they’re generally upstairs
or down steps, they’re crowded and smoky and noisy, there are never signers or accessible
toilet facilities. And largely that isn’t the fault of the owners, it’s a knock on
effect of how stigmatized our community has been in the past. Worried your lesbian bar
was going to get raided by the police? Put it in a basement.
Want to get your collective
friends of Dorothy together? Have a party in the attic!
And what’s the excuse in the modern, more inclusive,
every-big-brand-goes-rainbow-for-a-month era?
- capitalist imperatives.
Promoters and owners clearly feel that they don’t need to cater to the small (and impoverished)
disabled market. That it would cost too much to be accessible and that it’s just too
difficult- but really isn't it just
ostensible concerns about safety perhaps concealing prejudice. In general the
more commercial side of the LGBTQ+ scene tends to be dominated by people with disposable
income, highly focussed on physical appearance and status.
Still.
Which is weird, because I feel like the online gay space is so much MORE inclusive and diverse,
to the extent that perhaps this year’s Pride celebrations, being as they are online, will
be better than any other when it comes to including as much of the community as possible.
But meeting up with other like-minded people in person is a really valuable experience.
And look, I’m not just complaining about how inaccessible nightclubbing is as a whole-
although it is. If this were just that then… you know… kind of understandable… you
can tell me to sush... it hurts but I guess we have to deal with it…
No.
We don’t.
Because this isn’t just going to any old nightclub just because you fancy.
This is taking part in a community
that you are a part of and when ALL Pride events are centered around drinking and partying
and ALL LGBTQ+ venues or meet-ups are centered around drinking and dancing, well that’s
when it becomes a real issue. Because it’s no longer just that you’re being excluded
from something you WANT to do, you’re being excluded from your own identity.
More than entertainment venues, these are spaces where people make friends, meet partners
and find kinship and belonging. As a result, disabled queer people can end up doubly excluded,
and deprived of a place where they can be fully out, and fully accepted, with both sexuality
and disability taken for granted and celebrated.
When I first moved to Brighton for university,
- and yes, I moved here purely because it was the ‘gay capital of the UK’ and I
was a disabled teenager who had zero romance.
I looked up groups that welcomed lesbians but weren’t based around the nightclubs
and I found… a hiking group. And a wine tasting group. And that was it. Not hugely
helpful when my legs don’t go far and my stomach riots at just the idea of alcohol!
And I’m deaf so I can’t understand what’s going on in a dark room. Oh, and I find drunk
people really boring.
But still, like the extroverted loner I was, I signed up for the wine tasting group and
went along to find… a lot of women over the age of 55. Which... is cool. But we didn’t
have huge amounts in common.
10 years later and I have a group of not-very-straight friends but I semi collected them in roundabout
ways like we just happened to work together on something or they once went on a date with
my wife or they were dating a girl who was once the object of obsession for a girl that
I was friends with for five minutes. Honestly, if I didn’t have the very-queer profession
of being a YouTuber I have no idea how I would make new lesbian friends. Popular lesbian
social activities now all stress physical performance - fellwalking, football and Fast5.
- the version of netball, not the fifth episode in the Fast and Furious franchise, which I
would DEFINITELY get involved in!
I just… I can be a lesbian without having to prove I’m superwoman, thanks.
You know what else I don’t have to prove about myself?
Anything.
Physical barriers and obstacles for disabled people at Pride can have a more significant
implication. People with disabilities have been viewed as asexual beings, or incapable
of having other identities other than being disabled.
People are shocked all the time that I'm more than one thing.
“Oh my gosh you are just so pretty for someone who is disabled!?”
I get it, people are a bit squeamish about someone who might need help going to the bathroom,
also having a sex life.
As someone who has not gone to the bathroom by herself in a month now.
I understand.
You can end up feeling like you’re in two communities that don’t fit together and
that could be a very isolating experience.
It’s important to include disabled people in Pride for not only our own good- yay, representation!
You’re not alone!- but to broaden the minds of others. Disabled LGBTQ+ people: we exist.
The visible queer community should reflect the diversity of queer people.
A lot of people assume that the LGBTQ+ community is super accessible and welcoming to disabled
people because we’re both marginalised communities but, as we’ve talked about, that isn’t
necessarily so! I’m sure you have your own thoughts on how to make that happen but my
suggestion is pretty simple: hire disabled people.
Many disabled members of the LGBTQ+ community want to be invited into a much more welcoming
space, both literally and metaphorically. This can be achieved by just listening to
disabled members. It would be great to see more people within the top management who
have disabilities and disabled speakers and performers on stage at Pride.
Although we talk a lot about how the online space is just a series of echo chambers, it
can also provide a lot of security within that. You’ll always be able to find people
on the internet who identify as you do or share your feelings.
Maybe you identify with me.
In which case: cool, let’s both NOT go fell-walking together.
Inclusion is more than blue handicap plaques slapped on every corner. Disability accommodations
should not be an afterthought, but rather a priority when planning LGBTQ+ events and
celebrations. Pride should strive to honor and recognize the lives of all people who
identify as LGBTQ+, and clearly... that includes people with disabilities.
Share your tales of Pride and accessibility in the comments below: are they horror stories
or ‘actually, my local pride is amazing’... because this video is also super subjective
and just my experience and I’m massively privileged to be able to complain that Pride
is inclusive but not quite inclusive enough when around the world simply sharing my same
identity is enough to get someone beaten up or put in prison.
So let’s take a moment to hold in our hearts all of the good things about pride and how
great it is that we get to paint the town rainbow… one weekend out of 52.
Just saying.
Thanks so much for watching, subscribe if you haven't already and I will see you in
my next video!
Oh my God my back is killing me… [laughs nervously]
I need to lay down.