Fat people deserve mobility aids, too. No matter if it's connected to their fatness or not, because having a mobility issue that is connected to one's fatness won't change that they're still fat and still have the issue at hand. Fat people don't deserve to "tough it out" because fatness should be this divine punishment doled out to those who "deserve" it. Fat disabled people deserve to have the peace of mind that they can exist in whatever way is most comfortable and accessible to them
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Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".
Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"
And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".
Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.
At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.
So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!
Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!
Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!
Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.
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people seriously pretending EEAAO is overrated suddenly bc it swept awards? it swept awards largely because it is very very very good. I cried like someone who's just had a religious revelation BOTH times I watched it bc it touched something raw and real and beautiful but it was also just very, very funny. everyone's performance kills and the concept is creative and interesting and doesn't distract from the emotional core. you guys are just contrarian.
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the Literacy Duo, as i like to call them
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society if anyone on here looked up the meaning of terms
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See, you start reading The Locked Tomb because everyone is like wow, lesbian necromancers in space, fun but watch out it's a little sad! And then Tasmyn Muir says my entire magic system is based on the fact that you cannot know someone without being changed by their existence. You cannot lose someone, grieve for someone without them becoming a part of you forever. Grief is transformative because love is transformative. It's also a consumption, because love is a consumption - souls merge when they spend enough time near each other. You will never be the person you were before you met them.
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posting stuff like "we're already fucked" in regards to kosa is extremely discouraging and counterproductive to the cause btw. we want people to remain hopeful. we've defeated it in the past and we can again. i get that its scary but it isn't over yet and acting like everything is already fucked just discourages people from speaking out
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there's something to be said about how public unawareness about aspec identities contributes to the infighting within the aspec communities.
for example, I've seen a lot of "don't say ace people don't have sex because that's harmful to the sex favourable aces" and the opposite: "don't say ace people can have sex because what about the sex repulsed/averse?"
and they're both valid points, but because of it, aspec posts have to cater to the entire spectrum or risk starting arguments over this. Ideally, people could look at an aspec post and accept that it's for a different part of the aro/ace spectrum to where they are, but that's where the public unawareness comes in
because outside of the aspec communities, there's so little understanding of what the terms mean, that people within the community have to make every post generic so that the unaware won't see one post and make an assumption for the entire community based on it.
I see where every side is coming from, but infighting doesn't really solve any of the issues. The only thing that can start to solve it is more expansive aspec media representation, and spreading the "aro/ace identities are a spectrum" posts as much as possible to reach outside of the community, rather than trying to make specific posts fit that generic message.
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