Electricity is an Accessibility issue

[sasha_feather]

Real Social Skills for Autonomous People (a Tumblr)
Electricity is an Accessibility Issue

from Jan 13 2015

tl;dr Electricity is an accessibility issue. Having an event (and especially a conference) in a venue without reliable electricity excludes people with disabilities whose adaptive equipment requires electrical power.

Comments

[davidgillon]

Really good, non-obvious point. Can probably say the same for cell phones for comms, not much use if your battery is flat, or there's no signal, and that's a point that doesn't just affect disabled people themselves, but also anyone in an intermittent caregiver role (which includes parents) who may need to be contacted urgently.

[sasha_feather]

This and another few things I've read and heard lately have really got me thinking about how "green" initiatives are often ableist, because they encourage people not to use electricity.

[davidgillon]

Oh, yes. And related ones are often wrapped up in value judgements about how walking or cycling are the healthy or greener options. Not if they leave me curled up in pain on the floor they're not! (And I've now got scope for the 'and my chair does so well on stairs' replies as well). Or ditto on using public transport as the greener, responsible option - not if I can't sit on it comfortably and it doesn't drop me close enough to my destination to be within my constrained walking/wheeling distance.

I got caught up in an online discussion a few years ago about some green transport scheme being proposed for a city somewhere (either the States or Canada) and had to point out it completely failed to address the access needs of disabled people. And the reaction from all the green activists was 'Oh, we never thought about them.'

[jazzyjj]

Definitely good points raised here. I am all for going green, but only if access issues are taken into account. There's an advocacy organization here in the Chicago area called Access Living, and back in 2007 they relocated to a state-of-the-art building. I'll relate an incident that happened not long after they moved in. The volunteer organization that I work for was invited to a ribbon-cutting ceremony in the new building, followed by a tour for those who could spare the time. I accompanied a few co-workers and our founder to this ceremony and tour. I was trailing the walls with one hand and my cane was in the other. All of a sudden my trailing hand felt a big button which was labeled in Braille and large print. The Braille indicated that this was one of those automatic door openers, so I pressed it in hopes of letting our group through. However, that is not what happened. Instead, the fire alarm sounded. The security guards on duty immediately came running, and we all started cracking up. It was then that my trailing hand found "Fire Alarm" written in Braille. Seems if they had only moved that label a short distance, we'd have been good. I apologized to everyone, and they took it with a grain of salt. I may have partially forgotten the exact sequence of events by now, but I think you get my point. But this building has energy-efficient lighting, and other environmentally-friendly features. Plus it is totally accessible for wheelchair users, and it has a lot of other great accessibility features.