“heterosexual men can’t be oppressed” -> trans men
“cis-het men can’t be oppressed” -> intersex men
“perisex men can’t be oppressed” -> disabled men
“able-bodied men can’t be oppressed” -> neurodivergent men
“cis-het perisex white able-bodied neurotypical men can’t be oppressed” -> buddy let me tell you about wealth and class and homelessness and immigrants and minority languages and cultures and being a child and being an elderly person and and and
we can keep doing this all day but the reality of the world is that very few people don’t face any kind of oppression at all and everyone exists in a complicated, intersecting web where they have privileges over some people in some contexts and some others are have privilege over them in other contexts. no one individual is incapable of enacting oppression and if you think that about yourself you need to go away and interrogate that belief.
So this might be opening up a CAN OF WORMS but as a physically disabled person I just wanna throw out a clarification that I personally think is useful to have explicitly articulated. These two words are DIFFERENT:
Crip: a reference to crip theory and its friends. Refers to ALL disabilities (not just mobility/physical). Similar to queer, it's a way of seeing the world: disability is socially constructed, fuck eugenics, fuck capitalism, fuck colonialism, being disabled means you HAVE to be creative to navigate a world not built for you, disabled people are the OG makers/hackers, and so on. "Crip" is used as a verb to apply to this way of seeing the world to analyse different facets of society (e.g. cripping the arts, crip technoscience). Seen in academic terms like cripistemology and eco-crip theory but also nonacademic contexts like krip-hop and crip time.
Cripple: refers to physically disabled people ONLY. Seen in terms like cripplepunk, which is exclusive to physical disabilities. (Punks with other disabilities are encouraged to use other terms like dyspunktional.)
Yes, "crip" was coined as a shortening of "cripple". Yes, they are both reclamations of the same slur. But I think it is productive for us to understand these two words as distinct, and to be mindful of the difference.
Crip at this point has a very well established usage that is pan-disability, while at the same time we physically disabled we need space to talk about cripple-specific stuff.
I hope this clarification is helpful! I know the two words sound similar and share a root but I think it's a nuance that matters. <3
Sometimes the best tool you can provide people with are resources. These are from my FWA 2024 panel, and are free to send to anyone you think may need them! This should cover the basics in easy-process terminology.
(Screen readers: image descriptions cover the graphics. Transcript is under the cut!)
Slide 1: Furodiversity: Discussing Disability. Presented by EggsFennedict. Edited by Starmouse.
Slide 2: Disability
A physical or mental condition that limits a person's movements, senses, or activities.
Slide 3: Not all disabilities are apparent. What are some examples of hidden disabilities?
Psychiatric disorders such as ADHD, autism, anxiety, PTSD, etc
Autoimmune disorders like fibromyalgia & hemophilia
Visual & auditory disabilities (blindness, deafness, hard of hearing, etc)
Learning disabilities & disorders
Chronic fatigue
If someone couldn’t look at you and immediately identify it, chances are it qualifies.
Lacking Tactile Paving on sidewalks (visual impairment risk)
Lack of disability friendly parking
Lack of working Elevators
Untrained service animals
Slide 9: Abusing The System
Many times, the use or overuse of items used for people with disabilities can cause them to be unavailable to us. Depending on the severity, it can also increase risk to the individual as well.
Ex:
Fidget Spinner Ban (from neurotypical neglect of their function)
Faux Service Animals = danger to other service animals or people
ADHD Med & Xanax Abuse
Faking Disabilities for Accommodations
Accommodations level the playing field, and are NOT meant to give people a leg up who don’t need them.
Slide 10: Confronting Ableism / Being An Ally
Don’t:
Shove past disabled people.
Pet or crowd service dogs.
Crowd hallways, paths, and entryways.
Touch people without consent. Always ask!
Do!
Give disabled people the right of way
Avoid using heavy special effects in public spaces
Try to use colors which can be read by color blind individuals
Point out adverse architecture when you see it
Make sure to include disabled people in your conversations
Talk to, not at disabled individuals
Don’t be afraid to ask questions (within reason)!
Write letters to your representatives regarding ableist legislature
Make sure to research if you’re writing a book or drawing a character with a disability.
Talk to your local educators and activists! It’s what we’re here for.
Destroy the idea that you have to be constantly working or grinding in order to be successful. Embrace the concept that rest, recovery and reflection are essential parts of the progress towards a successful and happy life.
Hi! I just found your blog from the leather and judaism post and...say, do you perhaps have more to read about this? This really struck a nerve with me (in the good way!!!) because I really like leather and am coming to terms with it atm + I would like to convert one day, so reading about judaism is always great.
first of all, my dms and asks are always open! second, i haven't found a lot about judaism and leather specifically, but people have been talking quite a bit about judaism and kink. i'll link some sources that might be helpful and list them by category! i added tbr to the ones i haven't had time to read/explore in depth yet. also i just started weinberg and am in the middle of townsend. also i've heard talks that actually the leather dykes were discussing leather spirituality before the gay men were, but i haven't had the time to search for that atp
judaism and kink
fridman, leora. bound up: on kink, power, and belonging. wayne state university press, september 2024. x (tbr)
frishberg, hannah. "inside the world of brooklyn dominatrixes and their orthodox jewish clients." buzzfeed, july 27, 2018. x
hoffman-wade, deborah. "tradition: on being a religious jewish kinkster." leatherati online, medium, may 22, 2017. x
jewrotica.org (link is to the last capture on the wayback machine) x (tbr)
kayelle, eliana. "i'm a queer rabbinical student. here's how i connect judaism and kink." hey alma, june 15, 2021. x
kinkyjews.com (link is to a capture on the wayback machine) x (a kinky seder!) (tbr)
nathan-kazis, josh. "ties that bind." new voices, january 17, 2005. x
shteir, rachel. "what's so kinky about judaism?" dame magazine, december 11, 2015. x
kink and spirituality
a grateful slave and guy baldwin. slavecraft: roadmaps for erotic servitude: principles, skills and tools. daedalus publishing country, 2002.
baldwin, guy. ties that bind: the sm/leather/fetish erotic style: issues, commentaries and advice. edited by joseph bean. daedalus publishing company, 1993.
master jackson. sir! more sir!: the joy of s&m. bookazine co., 1992. (tbr)
prezwalski, jim. the kiss of the whip: explorations in sm. leyland publications, 1994. (tbr)
rinella, jack. philosophy in the dungeon: the magic of sex & spirit. rinella editorial services, 2006. (tbr)
robertson, alison. play, pain, and religion: creating gestalt through kink encounter. equinox publishing, 2021.
weinberg, thomas s., editor. s&m: studies in dominance and submission. prometheus books, 1995.
also important to this discussion (at least for me)
contributors. "chills down my spinal degeneration: why we need black queer disabled kink." the black youth project, 2019. x
lthr edge. full cow: edge talks leather and kink. podcast. started 2022. x
moss, alan, roe, and riley. "queercrip tznius: on modesty, camp, and radical obscurity." mixmoss, neocities, june 16, 2022. x
townsend, larry. the leatherman's handbook ii. carlyle communications, 1989. x
It is with this appreciation for the way negativity holds open crip, trauma, and mad time that I find myself unable to part with Edelman, even as I acknowledge the flaws in his thinking. The antisocial thesis allows me to indulge my negativity without demanding justification or immediate political application. Sometimes I just want to be sad! I just want to be mad! I just want to be disappointed. My intention is not to reclaim the antisocial thesis so much as it is to expand it, to turn its negativity back on itself—that is, to add queer theory’s embedded racism and ableism to the list of reasons I’m grieving. In some ways, I am parroting Muñoz’s own methodological reasoning in Cruising Utopia, where he chooses to cite Martin Heidegger, a philosopher with debated Nazi sympathies, over other thinkers who are more frequently cited in queer studies. Muñoz writes, “Although I too have a great disdain for what Heidegger’s writing became, I nonetheless look on it as a failure worth knowing, a potential that faltered but can be nonetheless reworked in the service of a different politics and understanding of the world”. No Future and the antisocial thesis are, for me, failures worth knowing. They offer errors to learn from, certainly, but they also offer a temporal structure in which that learning can occur.
i'm an experienced disabled person (EDS, CFS, POTS, chronic pain). here are some of the things that help me get by as a college student (note: i use a wheelchair and a cane most days. i also am fortunate enough to have decent medical care, meds, and my aforementioned mobility aids)
shower chair. i can't stand for long enough to shower, and especially not if it's a hot shower. i got a cheap one off of amazon that has three legs and a plastic seat. that plastic seat makes it super easy to keep clean. i know there's a weird sort of embarrassment about sitting in the shower, but PLEASE, it is so much better than sitting on the floor in the shower or falling. in my dorms, there are two (2) showers with fold-down seats. i put a small towel down on the seat so i'm not bare-ass on this dorm bathroom surface, then i wash it down after.
normal wheelchair gloves are fingerless, which suck for winter. BUT, winter cycling gloves have the same cushioning on the palms and grip material and fingers. they're not super warm, but throw on a pair of thin gloves underneath (or, if you're like me, propelling keeps your hands super hot anyways).
an ice pack on the back of your neck can help with migraines and dizziness. i keep a small one in my freezer at all times. i tuck it into a hairband so it can be hands-free.
PLEASE adjust your cane/crutch/crutches to the right height. it helps so much with shoulder/elbow pain and balance. if it doesn't feel right, it probably isn't. the handle of my cane hits around the height of my wrist if my arm is just hanging down.
if you have hyper mobility, try high-rise shoes. i wear only high-rise converse and doc martens, which i can lace tightly around my ankles to keep them from rolling or sliding out of place.
(MENTIONS FOOD AND CALORIES) keep an easy, high-in-calorie food around. for me, eating on high pain days is essentially impossible. so, i need something that i can get myself to eat (like ice cream or canned soup or chips) that won't take any effort. ice cream is a great one for me, since it's sweet and cold and dense. even if it's not healthy, nothing is more unhealthy than not eating.
please, please, please find a community of disabled people. most of my close friends are able-bodied and, as much as i love them, they just can't understand it like other disabled people do. i found two great communities on my college campus, but i've also heard that support groups are a great way to meet people within the community
if you have any other tips, reblog with them. i remember the beginning days of my illness and how daunting all of this was. this is how we support our community.
Can I get a flag for crip? Like crip theory crip. In a pan-disability sense. I don't have any particular iconography in mind, only that it shouldn't give a vibe that this is exclusive to physical disabilities. If you can link it in some way to the Mad & Deaf pride flags that'd be nice.
Thank you!
Crip Pride Flag
This is a flag for crips and those who feel represented by/part of crip theory, crip pride, and/or general cripness. [SVG version on WC]
Crip is a term that is open to people with ALL disabilities (physical or otherwise) and also to groups who share the crip mindset. (Note different spelling from cripple.)
For folks who like details: I'm gonna explain what crip is for those who may be new to the term! Then I'll talk about the flag design how the different stripes represent different models of disability. 💜
What is even is crip?
Like how "queer" is to LGBT+, "crip" is to disabled. It's an umbrella term, a way of seeing the world. Activist reclamation of "crip" goes back to the 1970s, with disabled performance artists popularizing the term in the 1990s.
Crip theory began in the early 2000s by building on queer theory. Expanding on your [QCI's] recent post, its characteristics are:
Understanding disability as socially constructed.
Fuck capitalism: the social construction of disability as we understand it was a result of the development of capitalism.
Fuck eugenics: Ableism and racism have been entwined for hundreds of years and cannot be understood in isolation.
Fuck colonialism: which is itself debilitating. Violence disables people, and Global South activists have been clear it's important to talk about how war, landmines, etc are disabling.
Disabled people are creative. Where queer-ing refers to a way of being critical of categories, cripping tends to focus on subverting ideas of ability. Disabled people ARE the original makers/hackers.
Disabled people are experts: we know shit. It is *us* who should be the epistemic authorities on disability, *not* physicians.
Crip as a term is open to anybody experiencing the violence of eugenic thought, regardless of identification as "disabled".
Fat studies scholars have been locating themselves as within crip theory since day one. Similarly, reading Cripping Intersex by Orr has made clear to me that intersex has always been crip.
Again, drawing a parallel to queer & LGBT: kink and polyamory may not be LGBT but they are Queer. 🌈
Flag details
The design is based on @capricorn-0mnikorn's Disability Pride Flag. In line with newer meanings for the Disability Pride flag, the stripes represent different models of disability associated with crip theory:
Purple represents the social construction of disability and the influence of queer theory. #82609b is from the Mad Pride flag.
Red represents postcolonial understandings of disability such as debility. Understanding that which chronic illnesses receive care and research is *political*. The choice of #CF7280 is a nod to the AIDS flag. I took the red from the disability pride flag and shifted the hue (but not chroma & lightness) to that of the AIDS flag.
Yellow represents the affirmative and identity models of disability. The opposite of the tragedy model. Many disabilities can actually be beneficial! The choice of #f4db75 is a nod to the intersex flag.
White represents how crip pride and crip theory are pan-disability. It stands for models of disabilities not otherwise represented here. The #E8E8E8 white is also a nod to the neurodiversity flag.
Blue represents the social model of disability, the intellectual progenitor of the social construction model (and crip theory in turn). The choice of #83bfe5 is a nod to the Deaf flag.
Green represents eco-crip theory, the eco-social model of disability, and other crip engagements with environmentalism. The choice of #48af75 is a nod to the nonhuman flag. Because being a cyborg (alterhuman) is a proud tradition of crip theory.
The repetition of purple serves to show crip pride & theory exist within a social construction framework. Also it widens the amount of the flag which is stripes, reflecting how crip includes groups not consistently understood as disabled (e.g. fat, intersex).
As with the disability pride flag, the dark grey (#595959) represents the lives lost to ableism and our collective grief.
Tagging @radiomogai @mad-pride @liom-archive for archival. And I wanna acknowledge @scifimagpie for giving me feedback on dozens of prototypes. 💛
Finally: I release this flag design as public domain! 💜
