Solidarity and strategy
March 14, 2024 2:58 AM Subscribe
In 1977 in San Francisco, about 150 disabled radicals occupied the fourth floor of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare for 25 days. “Blind people, deaf people, wheelchair users, disabled veterans, people with developmental and psychiatric disabilities and many others, all came together,” leader Judith Heumann later recalled. “We overcame years of parochialism.” A long read published in The Guardian, adapted from Solidarity: The Past, Present, and Future of a World-Changing Idea by Astra Taylor and Leah Hunt-Hendrix.
The demonstrators held their ground despite great physical discomfort – the space was not meant to be lived in, and certainly not by people with a wide range of functional needs – and demanded that officials clarify and enforce existing rules protecting disabled people from discrimination under certain circumstances. Knowledgable disabled spokespeople sparred with lawmakers about legislative proposals in televised broadcasts, and the organisers sent a delegation to Washington to further lobby officials.
Brad Lomax, a member of the Black Panther Party who had multiple sclerosis, was responsible for the party bringing hot meals to the sit-in each day. The pivotal protest helped strengthen government regulations and provided an example for organisers around the country to follow. In Denver the next year, 19 disabled activists, the Gang of 19, got out of their wheelchairs and lay down to stop traffic, demanding accessible public transportation. That event directly led to the creation of the Americans Disabled for Accessible Public Transit, Adapt, which organised similar protests across the country and brought a further degree of militancy and national visibility to the movement.
The demonstrators held their ground despite great physical discomfort – the space was not meant to be lived in, and certainly not by people with a wide range of functional needs – and demanded that officials clarify and enforce existing rules protecting disabled people from discrimination under certain circumstances. Knowledgable disabled spokespeople sparred with lawmakers about legislative proposals in televised broadcasts, and the organisers sent a delegation to Washington to further lobby officials.
Brad Lomax, a member of the Black Panther Party who had multiple sclerosis, was responsible for the party bringing hot meals to the sit-in each day. The pivotal protest helped strengthen government regulations and provided an example for organisers around the country to follow. In Denver the next year, 19 disabled activists, the Gang of 19, got out of their wheelchairs and lay down to stop traffic, demanding accessible public transportation. That event directly led to the creation of the Americans Disabled for Accessible Public Transit, Adapt, which organised similar protests across the country and brought a further degree of militancy and national visibility to the movement.
I've said this before but it's worth repeating: ADAPT members are masters of protest tactics. If you organize any sort of protests or demonstrations, study what they've done, how they organize, and how they use media. One place to start is their handbook. Also, if there is a chapter near you see how you can join them.
posted by mcduff at 6:49 AM on March 14 [8 favorites]
posted by mcduff at 6:49 AM on March 14 [8 favorites]
For an on-the-ground Disabled perspective, I highly recommend Corbett O'Toole's memoir, Fading Scars: My Queer Disability History. In addition to the 504 sit-ins, Corbett details the crucial “technical assistance trainings” which connected disabled people across the US in preparation for drafting the Americans with Disabilities Act, as well as the Capitol Crawl direct action which rallied support for ADA passage in 1990.
In Disability Histories, Corbett chronicles the 1995 Disabled Women's Symposium in Beijing, PRC and the 2002 Queer Disability Conference in San Francisco and more! When it comes to disability activism in the last 50 years, Corbett was there, always advocating for clear messages accessible to all disabled people. Corbett includes plain-language summaries at the top of her chapters/articles.
posted by Jesse the K at 9:38 AM on March 14 [3 favorites]
In Disability Histories, Corbett chronicles the 1995 Disabled Women's Symposium in Beijing, PRC and the 2002 Queer Disability Conference in San Francisco and more! When it comes to disability activism in the last 50 years, Corbett was there, always advocating for clear messages accessible to all disabled people. Corbett includes plain-language summaries at the top of her chapters/articles.
posted by Jesse the K at 9:38 AM on March 14 [3 favorites]
Wow - what a great, great piece.
It's so helpful and inspiring to look at what actually works - and to name the changes we have as a result of this kind of dedicated, tenacious action.
I especially appreciated this paragraph:
There's some 1977 video at the Bay Area Television Archive: ACCD picket at San Francisco Federal Building (1977) .
And there's also some video at Archive.org of the Gay Pride Parade in 1977: "Footage of the 1977 Pride Parade including the disability rights activists contingent" [and many more].
Thank you so much for posting this, Bella Donna. I have heard of Heumann before (I really loved Crip Camp), but it's great to have a reminder to learn more about her, and about all the things we can learn from the people who have done such amazing, difficult, effective work. Thank you!
posted by kristi at 2:00 PM on March 14 [4 favorites]
It's so helpful and inspiring to look at what actually works - and to name the changes we have as a result of this kind of dedicated, tenacious action.
I especially appreciated this paragraph:
Today, we take dropped kerbs, wheelchair lifts, accessible bathroom stalls and closed captioning for granted, but each of these adaptations was hard-won. During the lead-up to the ADA’s passage, disabled activists secured critical support from key Republican officials, finding common ground with individual politicians who had disabled loved ones whose rights they felt called to protect. At the same time, activists refused to play into attempts to divide and conquer by homophobic conservative politicians who wanted the legislation to deny protections for people with HIV and Aids. Society has been dramatically transformed as a result of strategic organising by disabled people who imagined a world where discrimination wasn’t sanctioned by the state, and where people with a wide range of embodiments would be able to move around not only unimpeded, but actively and creatively assisted.
There's some 1977 video at the Bay Area Television Archive: ACCD picket at San Francisco Federal Building (1977) .
And there's also some video at Archive.org of the Gay Pride Parade in 1977: "Footage of the 1977 Pride Parade including the disability rights activists contingent" [and many more].
Thank you so much for posting this, Bella Donna. I have heard of Heumann before (I really loved Crip Camp), but it's great to have a reminder to learn more about her, and about all the things we can learn from the people who have done such amazing, difficult, effective work. Thank you!
posted by kristi at 2:00 PM on March 14 [4 favorites]
Sunaura Taylor is Astra's sister and a brilliant scholar of animal rights and disability. She was also born with arthrogryposis and uses a wheelchair. I keep an image of one of her Speculative Aquifers paintings on my desktop. While we're on the subject of related recommended reading, here are a few from her.
posted by criticalyeast at 2:09 PM on March 14 [3 favorites]
- Disabled Ecologies - on disability as a force in the more-than-human world
- After the Ugly Laws - on animality, disability, and the line separating those concepts
posted by criticalyeast at 2:09 PM on March 14 [3 favorites]
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