Inside the Little Plastic Castle

"The basic fact is stigma kills; it is not just about calling people names. Stigma and discrimination stop people from getting an early diagnosis, the right treatment at the right time and from being monitored in the same way as other people are. And then after death, there is no standardised reporting mechanism to flag up issues for people with mental health problems who die young."

People with mental health problems and learning disabilities die on average 10 years younger than the rest of the population, according to the Disability Rights Commission. Obesity, diabetes, certain cancers and heart disease are far more common among people taking psychiatric drugs. And those doing so are less likely to receive evidence-based health checks and treatments.

haddayr

Let's say your editor wants you to cover what’s going on in the convention, and you want to go outside ‘cause you see there are thousands of people that are out there, and maybe you could do that and then run in and do the job that they asked you to do, and maybe you could even get some of that into your story.

You’re not going to risk it if you could be arrested [LAUGHS] if you go outside and then you’re not there to do what your editor wanted you to do. It has a chilling effect. It prevents journalists from doing their job but it also really hurts the public. Reporters have to be able to put things on the record without getting a record.

I'd like to suggest that society as a whole has not paid the same kind of attention to disabled people's concerns about language. By not paying attention to the literal value, the very real substantive, physical, psychological, sensory, and emotional experiences that come with these linguistic moves, we have created a negative rhetorical climate. In this world, it is too easy for feminists and people of colour to base their claims on argumentative strategies that depend, as their signature moves, on marginalizing the experience of disabled people and on disparaging their appearance and bodies.

So, say you have a characteristic that society sees as less than. Oh, what is a good example? Say you aren't good at math, for whatever reason. (Many people aren't good at math, but it isn't considered a disability. People just work around it.) Say all the sudden, your deficiency in math (which, I guess isn't as "good as" someone who is good at math) is visible to the naked eye and seen as a disability. Say every where you go, people treat you with pity, and they don't let you handle money because you aren't good at math. And you aren't allowed to drive a car or hold down a job because you aren't good in math, even if a simple calculator or a talking pedometer would accommodate you. And whenever anyone makes a mistake mathmatically, they are teased and said to have Mathitis, like you do. They must just be a mathtard. And the implication is that they are less than and can't do anything for themselves. And perhaps when you went to the doctor, they didn't treat your cancer as aggressively as they would someone without mathitis, because your quality of life isn't as good as others and so you would just be wasting resources. And say people asked you all the time, even on the streets, if you have checked into this cure or that cure for your problem, or if you've ever thought of killing yourself because of your problem.