Category Archives: Disabled Rights & Issues

Helplessness, Vulnerability, Disability

Something odd just happened to me. I have anxiety around the phone. From talking to other people I know, it seems like this isn’t rare. Mine’s gotten worse recently, like a lot of my other anxieties. I *can* make phone … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues | 19 Comments

The "Ransom Notes" Campaign

We have your son.We are destroying his ability for social interaction and driving him into a life of complete isolation. It’s up to you now…Asperger’s Syndrome The NYU Child Study Center has a new public education campaign designed to create … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues, Fat, fat and more fat, Gender and the Body, Media criticism | 56 Comments

Prison suicides and mental illness

Piggybacking on Amp’s report of recent NYT statistics on prisons and prisoners in the U.S. is the news that prisoner suicides in Massachusetts state prisons are nearly triple the rate in other states. From the first part of a three-part … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues, In the news | 2 Comments

Robert Latimer denied parole

Yesterday, a Canadian parole board in a prison near Victoria denied day parole to Robert Latimer. Latimer is the Saskatchewan farmer serving a life sentence for the second-degree murder of his 12-year-old disabled daughter back in 1993. Some facts: Tracy … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues, Whatever | 18 Comments

Disability in China

A Chinese woman by the name of Wang Fang declined a disability pension despite being born with feet that face backwards. This is news in Britain, if only, perhaps, so the intriguing pictures of the 27-year-old waitress and resident of … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues, Media criticism | 8 Comments

Best of 2007

I wasn’t going to offer a Best of 2007 list of my posts this early because I’m an optimist and I like to think genius may strike me in the next three weeks. But for those who may be reading … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues, Links | 7 Comments

Back again, but this time here to stay

Hi all. My name is Kay Olson (known in the past and in the archives here as Blue or Blue Lily) and I write over at The Gimp Parade about disability. I blogged here as a guest last year, but … Continue reading

Posted in About the Bloggers, Disabled Rights & Issues, Feminism, sexism, etc, Links | 21 Comments

If condescension killed, this poem would mass murder the disabled.

From “My Right Wing Dad .net,” an oddly compelling blog of right-wing email forwards, a poem called “When I Whine.” I think Jerry Lewis would find this poem beautiful. Today, upon a bus, I saw a girl with golden hair … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues | 18 Comments

Sexual Abuse Survivor Suspended From Eastern Illinois University For Having Flashback

From Inside Higher Ed: While enrolled at Eastern Illinois, Manges says she saw a private counselor off campus to deal with her diagnosis of PTSD — a result of the sexual abuse she experienced from 1999 through 2000, when someone … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues, Rape, intimate violence, & related issues | 41 Comments

New York Court Approves Electroshock On Unwilling Woman

In a 7/2 decision, the New York Court of Appeals has turned down Simone D., who had sued not to be put through electroshock again. (She’s had electroshock done to her over 200 times in her life). According to the … Continue reading

Posted in Disabled Rights & Issues | 25 Comments