Skip to main content

'Conversations About Activism and Change: Independent Living Movement Ireland and Thirty Years of Disability Rights' edited by Sarah Fitzgerald

This compelling anthology of interviews features individuals who have devoted their lives to activism. It has been brought together by Sarah Fitzgerald and the Independent Living Movement Ireland (ILMI) and commemorates 30 years of that organisation's existence. These are the stories of the disabled activists in their own words and illustrate not just their dedication to their cause, but also the very human aspect of their struggle, underscoring the importance of friendship in sustaining their activism.


It is tragic to witness, the creeping prevalence of anti-science rhetoric within the dialogue of Ireland's Disabled Persons' Organisations (DPOs), particularly when it concerns autistic people. Empirical evidence can shine a light on our way forward, outlining the steps to progress. However, it is crucial to remember that it is the individuals - the ones who are meant to benefit from this evidence - who must ultimately decide the path to follow. Science should serve humanity, not merely exist as an end in itself, devoid of guiding values. Much to their credit, these contributors diligently evade this pitfall. Often the contributors reflect on the alliances and the intersectional work that can not only claim rights for disabled people but also progress other social issues, including the rights of women, children, workers and the travelling community. It is the courage and commitment of communities like these that progress our entire society forward, in so many instances we are led from the margins. Issues that were once on the fringes have been brought into the mainstream by the sustained work of these people. But progress is not linear and the pendulum can swing the other way.

The prevalence of pseudo-scientific thinking will slow our progress, divide our communities and harm those subjected to its many forms of quackery. These are the stories of our leaders, and we owe them, but the journey is far from over; there is a long road left to travel.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Half of a Yellow Sun a novel by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

I was inspired to pick up this book after listening to Chimamanda's 2022 Reith Lectures on the Freedom of Speech. Chimamanda, argues that it feels like freedom of speech is under attack. She names cancel culture, arguments about “wokeness" (I am old enough to remember when we called this political correctness) and the stabbing of Salman Rushdie as producing this atmosphere. Meanwhile, autocrats, populists and an anti-science identity culture have undermined the very notion of an accepted fact-based truth which lives above politics. So how do we calibrate freedom in this context? 'Half of a Yellow Sun,' is as profoundly human, as it is unsettling. The terror and the domestic are cheek by jowl. They live side by side, in the same spaces. I have heard it said that Iris Murdoch's contribution to ethics is that she (along with other feminist philosophers) reframed ethics from the public to the intimate. Similarly, Adichie's narrative highlights that ethics canno...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

In her poignant account, Rebecca Skloot sheds light on how the biopharma industry has trampled on bodily autonomy, building their empires on the backs of individuals without their consent. Skloot's book tells the stories of unsung heroes in medical science and exposes the atrocities committed against marginalised communities. Skloot sensitively records the tragic loss of Henrietta Lacks, whose fundamental right to bodily integrity was ignored by society. It is a story of incomprehensible oppression and ignorance, where doctors watched patients die, solely to study the disease prognosis. This was evident in the Tuskegee experiments on untreated syphilis, which took place in the United States between 1932 and 1972. The biopharma industry made incalculable sums of money by taking Henrietta's cells without her knowledge or consent. The ongoing ethical and legal battle raises the question of how to balance scientific advancement with individual freedom. Sadly, commercial interests...
Post a Comment
Read more

Republic of Shame by Caelainn Hogan

Caelainn Hogan's Republic of Shame tells us what we all knew. Everyone knew.  Everybody knew and either denied that knowledge or explained away their actions as they took part in it.  Everybody knew but determined that it was a inescapable act of nature, like the rain.  And when we say everyone knew, not only did everyone know women where being unlawfully imprisoned in mother and baby homes and Magdalen Laundries, everyone knew (including the state) that the rates of death in these mother and baby homes far exceeded that of babies and children in any other place in Irish society at the time.  Church, State and public knew they were dying of neglect.  But when circumstances changes and when children could be sold, they stopped dying, then they had a value and could be sold to 'good' families.  As one survivor ruefully observes,   'When we illegitimate Irish Bastards were suddenly worth more than the cows on the farms, we stopped dying by the thousa...
Post a Comment
Read more