Sunday, July 18, 2021
Your Celebratory Quote
“...[C]are is a universal concern. Everyone cares for someone and, at some point, everyone needs care.” -Premilla Nadasen
A note from the Writer
Hi,
It’s July and that means it’s disability pride month. The disabled community is large and diverse. Some people are born with disabilities and others may have acquired them through an accident or health issue. Either way, it is important that we understand issues of disability through a social equity lens.
-Darein
FEATURED
July is Disability Pride Month
July is unofficially Disability Pride Month. Several local and state governments around the US and the world declare July Disability Pride Month. It is a nebulous concept that the diverse disabled community is still defining. Andrew Pulrang writes in an article for Forbes, “Disability Pride Month observances at their best and most focused can be a counterweight to the tendency of disabled people to hide, de-emphasize, or downplay our conditions. Instead, we are encouraged to embrace our disabilities, both physically and emotionally, as integral parts of who we are. This self-acceptance and deliberate rejection of shame and internalized able-ism may be the most concrete goal of Disability Pride Month.”
For Anthony Rios, “...it's about accepting that his disability makes him different, not worse. ‘When he was 10, he recalls his mother praying and asking God why her son was "cursed" with blindness.’”
Overlapping Inequities of Living with Disabilities
Disability Poverty Gap
People that are both disabled and BIPOC experience greater poverty on top of what are already disproportionately high poverty rates when compared with white families.
Disability Wealth Gap
An extreme wealth gap is also compounded for people who are both BIPOC and have a disability.
Disability Tax
On top of the poor wealth and poverty outcomes shown above, people with disabilities face a disability tax.
In a recent study, The National Disability Institute cited the experience of Edward who became quadriplegic after an accident. “In order to maintain an independent lifestyle, Edward and his family experienced a significant amount of extra costs. These costs come in the form of home nursing, home modifications, dictation tools that help with writing, and car modifications that allow him to drive himself to work.” All of these new tools come with one-time and ongoing costs.
Closing the Disability Equity Gap
Reduce Isolation. The effects of the COVID19 pandemic were exacerbated for people with disabilities. We can all get volunteer or donate to programs that help reduce isolation for those that are shut-in like the one featured in this local news report.
Listen & advocate. There may be local Disability Pride festivities during July in your area so look out for them. Here is a virtual Disability Pride parade if you want to go digital. You can also ask about disability inclusion in your workplace for everything from facilities, to COVID19 policies, to hiring. And before you advocate, get to know a bit about the decades long fight led by disabled people for the landmark ADA legislation and you can also find some policy priorities activists are calling for now.
Voting Rights. Katrina vanden Heuvel wrote a fantastic piece on the disproportionate effects of the Republican attack on voting rights for people with disabilities. She states, “The expansion of mail-in voting in 2020 made it significantly easier for Americans with disabilities to engage in the electoral process. Turnout among these voters increased by six percentage points between 2016 and 2020, amounting to 1.7 million more voters. Since then, however, 17 states have enacted a combined 28 laws limiting voting access. A dozen states have specifically targeted mail-in ballots.”
Scrutinize the care economy. Those with physical disabilities often rely on home health workers (historically called care workers) to ensure their independence. It is important that care workers working conditions, collective bargaining power, and overall health be improved. Because care workers that are worried about paying bills, their own healthcare, and making ends meet doesn’t help care happen.
Check out this fantastic read from Premilla Nadasen on the history and foundations of care work. Here is a preview, “For generations, domestic workers were presumed to be ‘one of the family.’ That did not mean that they ate dinner with the rest of the family or inherited Grandma’s china. What it did mean was that employers could ask them to go above and beyond the call of duty—to stay late, to give up holidays, or listen to their employer’s woes—because they were presumed to love those they worked for. After all, isn’t that what many people do for their families? Without compensation, family members often step in when needed simply out of love.”
ARTICLES
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Rooting Out Systemic Racism in Business
Chief Justice John Roberts has essentially stated that racism in America is over as justification to dismantle the Voting Rights Act. Yet, systemic racism keeps popping up everywhere from voting rights to wage gaps to entire industries.
A new study by the Brookings Institute showed that, in Mobile, Alabama, non-college educated Black manufacturing workers make $25,629 less than their white counterparts median annual wage. Black workers with a college degree make $875 less than white workers without a college degree and $22,376 less than their white counterparts with college degrees. This goes beyond the wage gap and toward theft.
A survey of small businesses found that gentrification is costing minority small business owners. Studies often focus on housing displacement but business displacement also tears at the fabric of historic local communities and business owners are not compensated for increased taxation or allowed any government subsidies to update their businesses to match changing tastes.
Public-Private Partnership
To address issues like those above, the Biden administration set a directive with the Department of Labor to work with the business community, “to help build back the economy in a more inclusive, diverse, and equitable way.” So far it has been difficult to build a cooperative relationship with the business community.
How Business Leaders Should Take Action
A profile of an interesting corporate trainer named George Lee caught our eye this week. The Black Wall Street Times states, “[Lee proves that] Black intellectuals don’t have to play respectability politics to deliver a message that resonates.” Perspectives Media advocates expanding who business leaders see as “professional.” Professor Lee is an academic, TikTok influencer, and “hood dude” but he doesn’t let any of those titles define his worth.
@theconsciouslee Motivation and Education..
A Few Other Resources
Steps small businesses can take to ensure they meet the challenges of building and managing diverse teams.
If you work for a large public company or nonprofit, ask about the diversity of your board of directors.
Here is how Coca Cola is publicly keeping up with their promises on DEI.
Consider hiring a non-traditional marketing firm and building a deeper relationship rather than hiring a one-off marketing agency.
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Radical Activist History
At Perspectives Media, we cover topics that range from the boardroom to on-the-street activism. This next piece is on activism and we recommend it as a long read so bookmark it for when you have a little time.
The authors are a group of university professors from various disciplines (women’s studies, history, sociology) and they give an in-depth look at the development of the modern intersectional women’s movement while taking a look back at all of the ways in which the needs of black were not met by past movements.
If you listen closely, there is a lot to learn about building anti-racist systems. A quote from the article: “...experience and disillusionment within these liberation movements, as well as experience on the periphery of the white male left, that led to the need to develop a politics that was anti-racist, unlike those of white women, and anti-sexist, unlike those of Black and white men.”
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Equity in Film & Television
Artists in all venues continue to lead the way on facing up to the inequities in America and around the world, especially when it comes to their chosen medium.
We did a round up of a few standout articles from the film and television world.
Never Have I Ever is a Netflix TV series that features East Asian and South Asian leads. "We are featured more [AAPI people] and fill more and more roles. [It's] a huge win. But our 'seen time' remains low. ... Character arcs for minorities still feel underdeveloped and stereotypical. As a result, the audience doesn't fully see us. They don't get the three-dimensional version of us, and it's that version that moves the needle. That's the version that can create empathy, understanding and change." Check out more analysis of what makes the show work well on NPR.
John Leguizamo gave a great interview calling for better representation of Latina/x/o in film and art.
And Regina King called out the lack of women and minority representation in Hollywood at the Cannes Film Festival in France.
Lastly, Tracee Ellis Ross is set to release Hair Tales. “'The Hair Tales' explores the lives of modern day Black women alongside historical themes. The series aims to look into the complex culture surrounding Black hair, as well as Black women’s identity, creativity and societal influence.”
SHOUT OUTS
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Unsung Civil Rights Legends Passes at 98
Gloria Richardson was a freedom fighter in the 1960s civil rights movement. She faced down national guardsmen in the northeast. Specifically Cambridge, Md.
Read this profile from the Washington Post. She is quoted in her own words at the end of 2020.
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Organizing Amazon Workers
Manuel Román is one of the coordinators of local efforts to organize Amazon workers into labor unions. Latino Rebels did a great podcast interview about his long career organizing.
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