To begin with, there is the social model of disability. People are not disabled by diseases or conditions, but by society and how it is set up. People are disabled by a lack of accessible facilities, by the fast pace of life, by refusals for accommodation, by language, by discrimination.

i'm going to bare myself to possible embarrassment and admit that until i read this it hadn't quite struck me how TRUE and ACTUAL this is. (and i've heard this idea a lot! it just didn't click until just now.) i mean, it seems self-evident, right? but the inculturation (and that's just what it is) is so deep and so pervasive that i really *hadn't* noticed how simple (perhaps deceptively) it is -- "disability" is at least as constructed as anything else. wow.

thank you.