Impairment Assimilation,an ablest construct.

Impairment Assimilation, an ablest construct.
“You don’t need a blind fold, to listen to disabled people” I tweet rather grumpily. Loathed as I am to criticize Jenny Jones the Green London Mayoral candidate (@Green Jenny Jones) because I like her and she’s basically a good woman, I’m concerned that inadvertently, she’s walking into a trap set by the charities!
Shared surfaces (where pedestrians and wheeled vehicles use the same space without barriers) has been a controversial transport management concept ever since it was first dreamed up. The problem is that pedestrians and vehicles are not necessarily equal players, especially if the pedestrians happen to be visually impaired.
How wonderful to build a world where wheels and feet move in perfect harmony? The concept behind shared surfaces is about mutual trust, respect and communication – positively Eurovision, I’d say. This is best done by eye contact, advocates tell us. But if you can’t see how can you make eye contact?
Ever since the idea of shared surfaces was dreamed up, organisations representing the views of visually impaired people have been challenging that lovely fluffy egalitarian concept. But this piece is not about the rights and wrongs of shared surfaces, it’s about how the views and experiences of visually impaired people are communicated to those who have the power to influence.
“Dave Kent (Guide Dogs Policy Officer) says he will blindfold me so I can completely understand the problem.” Tweets Jenny Jones.
“Why can’t you believe what blind people say?” I tweet back, wondering what on earth we need to do to get listened to if supportive types like Jenny don’t get it and blind blokes like Dave who I’m quite a fan of, are peddling the assimilation model.

Back in the day when Ken Livingstone last ran London, I was honoured to be a member of the Transport for London Board. One day, I emerged from the lift at Windsor House (TfL headquarters) to be confronted by a noisy group of marauding bus operatives on a training course. They were all blindfolded and charging about the place walloping anything they came up against with lovely tip-tippy symbol canes.
“For F***’s sake,” I growled affronted by their jolly japery. I was sorely tempted to smack them with my long cane. Instead, I stormed back upstairs and went to complain to the Commissioner for Transport.

But why was I so cross? Surely getting firsthand experience of what it is like is a great way to get the point across? No! Being blindfolded puts one in a false state of extreme sensory deprivation. I know participants in impairment assimilating exercises that have found it quite traumatic. More importantly though, such extreme sensory deprivation exercises cannot mirror what it is actually like for most visually impaired people – the vast majority of whom (incidentally, excluding me) have some degree of residual vision. Being visually impaired, even when it’s suddenly inflicted upon one, is a state that we get used to. AS time goes on, we develop other skills that support our engagement with space and people. With the right support, we learn to live independent lives.
So why are assimilation exercises so beloved of charities such as the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association? I’ll tell you why. It is pity that tugs the heart-strings and opens the purses. Every good marketing campaign exploits emotions in order to get the message across. Visually impaired people are presented as sad, needy, helpless and vulnerable people. The charities become saviors rescuing us from our lonely and friendless plight. The money rolls in, the charities grow rich and soon the world at large starts to believe their messages about our miserable existences. Traumatising (however temporarily) sighted people by blindfolding them underlines that notion of vulnerability.
Ok, so I’m a cynic. Possibly, I’m also heartless and maybe ungrateful. Charities do so much to help visually impaired people live better lives, don’t they? Why, the very stick I contemplated using to wack those trainees was supplied at a discounted price by a charity which regularly rattles tins on the streets on my behalf.

Aside from occasional chronic eye pain, the most uncomfortable thing for me about being blind is the discrimination I experience. Society refuses to accept that the barriers I face are “man-made”. Charity marketing messages peddle and image of vulnerability which just adds to the pain. I assert that assimilating impairment exercises panders to the pity model, the marketing strategy used by charities to raise sufficient money for their causes. Ok, so if we don’t use impairment assimilation exercises, how do we get the message across? We do it like this: I want non disabled people to listen to disabled people for once. Hear it from the horse’s mouth! Listen to what we are saying about shared surfaces.
By all means Jenny, go along with Dave Kent and others and instead of donning a blindfold, use your eyes to observe what it is like to use that space. See the interaction between vehicles and people. Talk to visually impaired people about what it is like for us, question us about how it feels. Listen to what we say. Consider if any adjustments could be made to mitigate the inaccessibility of the scheme to visually impaired people. Weigh up the evidence you collect in this way and use it to decide whether shared surfaces are a good or a bad thing.
Oh and one more thing – and I say this to everyone I talk to about impairment assimilation, would you think it appropriate for a white person to put on dark make-up and a wig in order to experience what it is like to be black in Britain today? No, of course not. Can you imagine the storm if anyone did? Black and minority ethnic communities constantly tell the powers that be to listen to them, engage with them, and involve them in making changes. Does it have to be different for disabled people? If you believe in the concept of “nothing about us without us”, then you’ll politely decline the blindfold.

Kirsten Hearn
(18th April, 2012)