Editor's Column
by
Tim Benjamin
The "First Lady of Civil Rights",
Coretta Scott King, died in her sleep on Jan 31, 2006. In the beginning
of the civil rights movement, Mrs. King marched alongside her husband,
but she will be remembered in her own right as an inspiration to
millions as a lifelong political activist.
Muscular
Dystrophy is
our “disability for definition” this
month, and Peter Tacheny wrote us an outstanding piece on living
with Duchenne’s Muscular Dystrophy. Peter’s article shows
that he has a very strong spirit, a strong will, and a love of life.
I'm sure that he will continue to find and be in pursuit of happiness
for a long time to come. As Justin Dart would say, "Lead on,
lead on," Peter!
Justin Dart is in my
mind, especially because Yoshiko Dart has allowed us to print some
more of Justin's
writings. I think it's good for all of us to have
reminders like Peter’s full spirit and Justin’s
love of all humanity to keep us grounded. The word inspiring gets
overused about the disability community, but it’s fair to say
that Justin’s writing, like his life, is always inspiring to
those of us within the community. Don’t miss the opportunity
to read or reread the philosophy of one of our true leaders—remembering
that we must all be leaders.
"Medical Students Develop
Sign Language Skills," by
Erick Posner, is a great
article on an exciting new curriculum
for medical students. We've done articles on medical education
before, but this one describes a new approach to educating physicians
to be more accessible to people with disabilities. I am eager to
see how well ASL will be integrated into physician's practices
and how they will keep current their newly acquired skills. Also,
what will be the next innovative idea to spring-board from this
idea for medical professionals to adapt in the ever changing, health
care field?
Much more research is
being done to discover the amount of sexual
abuse occurring in
the disability community. The numbers are staggering; over 8 million
incidents in the general population and researchers believe that
the numbers per capita are higher in the disability and elderly
community. The abuse is committed by intimate partners as well
as by care-related abusers. Lance Hegland spoke with Dr. Dena Hassouneh-Phillips,
and she offered some "warning
signs" to identify abusers and people who are being abused.
The doctor also offered some suggestions for stopping abuse before
it happens. We all need to keep an eye on this, whether in the disability
community or not: physical, emotional, or sexual abuse of any kind
is unacceptable!
On our front page, Mark Siegel has submitted a very interesting
and well-thought-through article about some of the questions that
continue to arise out of the U.S. Supreme Court decision on Oregon's
death with dignity act. Thanks, Mark.
Continuing our focus
on life-and-death issues, we have an article by Lennard J. Davis,
a professor of English, disability and human development, and medical
education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Davis teaches
and writes about deafness and disability, and is editor of the
Disability Studies Reader and director of Project Biocultures.
Recently he authored the book, Bending Over Backwards: Disability,
Dismodernism, and Other Difficult Positions. He has allowed us
to print a summary of an article, “Life, Death, and Biocultural
Literacy,” that was first published in the Chronicle of Higher
Education http://chronicle.com.The complete
article is on Access
Press’s Web site, and I hope the summary draws you to read
it; Davis tackles many questions that all of us have about end-of-life
questions. Thank you very much, Professor Davis; we all appreciate
your good work and advocacy.
Last month I was able
to test the proposed new accessible voting
equipment. It’s more sophisticated than the voting machine
that we are used to. It has an audio feature; a removable and optional
touch pad that you can set on your leg or chair; it can enlarge the
text; and it will also have an adaptable sip-and-puff component (although
it wasn’t yet available for trial). It also has a paper printout
for checking your votes before you finish. The printout stays with
the equipment for later confirmation if necessary. Even considering
recent voting problems, there is a lot of controversy surrounding
this equipment, not least because of the cost. Stay tuned.
February
brings hearts and flowers, and Black History Month. I just saw a
60 Minutes interview of Morgan Freeman where he told Mike Wallace
that having a month set aside for Black history segregates African-American
history from American history. Does it? Or does it bring attention
to a part of our history that we should acknowledge that we haven’t
integrated well into our awareness? I wonder about all these “set
asides.” Do we need Valentine’s day to recognize those
we love? Do we need months and days designated to highlight specific
disabilities? It’s worth thinking about how we highlight and
study and set aside time for what’s “special”,
but then how we integrate it into our regular calendar, our minds,
our lives. Learn something new this Black History Month, have a Happy
Valentine’s Day, and reflect on Presidents’ Day. And
be aware of muscular dystrophy now, not just in its month, which
isn’t until September.
The front page story
last month was about the Deficit Reduction Act; well it passed!
We will have some updated news on the ramifications of the bill
in next month’s paper.
