Why does everyone suddenly seem to think it’s ok to say the R word again? I feel like I hadn’t heard it in years and suddenly everyone around me is using it, and I see it on Reddit all the time. Am I imagining it? Is anyone seeing this? I don’t even know what to say when it’s suddenly just everyone in a group and everyone acts like it’s normal.
Those are some awesome resources, yoinking those for sure.
Ableism and fatmisia are some the last bastions of acceptable and casual bigotry, so they are for sure the hardest to get rid of. Usually when you bring up the eugenics origin, at least for people around me, folks tend to take a step back. Often I lead with that.
The more the merrier!
Yup, the other day I had to really quickly back out of some comments sections on articles related to fast food because the comments were so full of fat shaming it made me rage. People don’t think twice about either.
In my experience they get even more defensive, because eugenics is something they recognise as bad, but not their casual ableism, or the existence of a relationship between the two… But then these are randoms on the internet I’m talking about, not people actually close to me, they’d probably be much more reasonable if it ever came to it lol
You have inspired an infodump, some links specifically go in to the eugenics connection, others are a bit more broad (I also have a bunch about the relationship between capitalism, “productivity”, and ableism, and some on the myth of independence, which I wasn’t sure were closely related enough, but am more than happy to share as well!) if you want more articles to yoink:
https://www.drakemusic.org/blog/nim-ralph/understanding-disability/
https://www.yorku.ca/edu/unleading/ableism/ (the entire project is worth a look)
https://liminalnest.wordpress.com/2018/06/23/intelligence-is-a-myth-on-deconstructing-the-roots-of-cognitive-ableism/
https://www.northwestern.edu/onebook/the-reluctant-mr-darwin/essays/darwin-morality.html
https://www.theguardian.com/science/occams-corner/2013/may/09/evolutionary-theory-gone-wrong-darwin
https://web.archive.org/web/20230605065733/https://ollibean.com/intelligence-is-an-ableist-concept/
https://disabledfeminists.com/2009/10/23/ableist-word-profile-intelligence/ (the entire blog is worth a look)
https://gracelapointe.medium.com/some-thoughts-on-online-ableism-424e26f1bb2a
https://everydayfeminism.com/2015/09/symptoms-executive-dysfunction/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewpulrang/2019/12/27/ableist-narratives-that-poison-disability-policy-and-disabled-peoples-lives/
Hell yes, thanks for the resources!
Sure thing, I’m always happy to share useful info!
Also, was the “hell yes” to more links or just in general? You’re good either way, don’t worry… 😂
To more links!
Fat shaming is likely to be the most difficult to combat, because it’s based on an unhealthy condition anyone can slip into, so it has a warning component similar to drunk-driving shaming, the Darwin awards, various “fails”, etc. where people suffer the consequences of their own choices.
I am not saying this is what you believe, but you’re right that people for sure over simplify it into that, and say things like “just eat less and exercise more.” The truth is much more complicated. There are a ton of factors involved and often people have unrelated conditions they can’t get help with because doctors will just say “you just need to lose weight.”
https://www.npr.org/2022/06/23/1107166691/medical-bias-against-obesity-is-preventing-patients-from-receiving-proper-care
That and a lot of “overweight” people are not unhealthy.
https://www.science.org/content/article/obesity-doesn-t-always-mean-ill-health-here-s-what-scientists-are-learning
As usual, the truth is far less cut and dry as people think, and should just stop shaming people for it.
When I say “based on”, I mean that there are some cases where overweight is actually unhealthy, and some otherwise healthy people can, for a series of reasons, become unhealthy.
The problem about shaming above-average BMI people, is that it has two extremes:
What I believe, is that the shaming itself is a bigoted take on a warning against the latter. My point was that it’s going to take extra effort to remove the bigoted behavior, when there is a valid reason to have a warning.
Ideally, we should get to a point where the root cause of unhealthy behaviors could be addressed directly, but we’re like two or three layers away from that.