So where exactly does the end of the Covid-19 pandemic leave disabled folks?
With the new COVID-19 vaccine slowly starting to be distributed across New York State, I’m finally starting to feel a glimmer of hope that this pandemic will slowly start to wean. By the end of the summer, it is very plausible that the vaccine will be distributed widely enough to slowly start quelling the fear…
A Call to Action: Help us stop the DOH from making dramatic changes to home care services in NYS
Disabled people have had to put up with the threat of institutionalization and budget cuts to services that keep us alive since the dawn of time. So when the DOH released new proposed regulations that threaten our quality of life, yet again — we knew this was nothing new. BUT what is new, is the…
Response from an actual disabled person to NYTimes article “Is It OK to Dump Him Because of His Medical Condition?”
In this week’s update on “things I read online that should’ve jolted me but, sadly, did not,” some New York woman on the dating scene wrote to the Times advice column asking if she was a “terrible person” for wanting to dump a guy because of his Crohn’s disease. It elicited a response from NYU philosophy professor Kwame Anthony…
Important Information for Disabled Voters
Primaries in New York are quickly arriving, and now is not the time to let your vote go to waste. Going out to vote in the time of an international crisis is risky to many, especially disabled people and those at-risk for Covid-19. Below you will find important information on how to navigate voting from…
How to be a Good Sick or Disabled Person™
Time & time again we’ve seen people who have never had any serious medical conditions thriving on informing the sick and disabled on what is appropriate ‘illness decorum.’ This ranges from jobs threatening to dismiss an employee because they did not handle their illness to their standards, to being questioned if we really need (insert…
On the intersection of race & disability in discussing police brutality
Our society’s history of racism and ableism is eerily intertwined, ranging from the forced sterilization of disabled & black women during the American eugenics movement, to the Holocaust, to forcing people into segregated spaces, to modern day examples of systemic oppression. Both racism & ableism are forms of discrimination based on one’s body looking different…
Dear other white people: Here’s what we can do to help fight racism
This is a horrifying time in our world. American racism does not stop for a virus. Police murdering black men in broad daylight does not stop for a virus. So those of us that can put on masks and head to the barricades, go protest. Those of us with financial means, go donate. Those of…
The Myth of the Independent, Middle Class, Disabled Adult: How the healthcare system keeps us financially oppressed
There is nothing more ‘American’ than locking minority groups into systems of poverty, expecting them to be grateful to the government for handing out scraps, and then subsequently blaming them for being ‘leeches’ on a system designed to ensure they remain trapped within it. Disabled people are all too familiar with this form of systemic…
One of the many things that Amy Cooper reminds us about racism in America
For anyone that hasn’t yet heard, this past Memorial Day weekend yet another white woman called the police on a black man for merely existing in her vicinity and trying to converse. I am never surprised, just deflated and enraged. Christian Cooper asked a woman in the park to leash her dog (as the rules…
On being both disabled & a woman: living with the fear of abuse
As mentioned in a previous post of mine, the kind of ableism one experiences in America depends on a multitude of factors, including but not limited to race, class, socioeconomic status, gender identity, sexual orientation, immigration status, education level, age, type of disability, how it was acquired, etc. And thus, your marginalized identities combine to…
Living with a physical disability during the COVID-19 Outbreak
As I’m sure you could imagine, part of the reason I even started this blog to begin with was in trying to adjust to a new kind of normal, now quarantined in my apartment. I use a wheelchair and have a lung disease that would greatly affect my chances if I come down with the…
A glimpse at what ableism looks like post-ADA
I wrote this in the summer of 2019 for that year’s anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, and I find it to be a particularly appropriate introduction to my new page. Looking back, I also want to highlight that the kind of ableism one faces depends entirely on class, race, gender, education level, the…
Follow My Blog
Get new content delivered directly to your inbox.
Despina Bakos 