Saturday 1 November 2014

A WDD with a difference

World Disabulity Day is apparently `observed' on December 3rd every year. This `observation' can be done in one of at least two ways:

(i) you could reserve one particular date on the calendar on which date, every year, you announce to the world that `some of your best friends are freaks' and on which date you will tell the whole world that everybody must be kind to freaks and strive to fill the world with `freak lovers'; or

(ii) you could tell yourself (and the world) that it is idotic to define some specific way somebody is different as `freakishness', realise that everybody is a `freak' in some way, and that the intelligent way to make the world a better place to live in is to revel in the existence of differences between us, and to strive for the ideal of `universal design' whose inclusive nature made no concessions for a design which singles out certain `freaks' for not being able to use that which has been designed in an inconsiderate and unthinking manner. (For instance, having a restaurant which can only be reached by climbing a flight of `only three' steps from road-level is a perfact instance of exclusive design which disallows clients who need to use a wheelchair.)

And there was this e-discussion between some people in my group (calling itself the DRA - short for Disability Rights Alliance) on how to utilise the forthcoming `World Disability Day' to clarify the distinction between the two perceptions/attitudes in (i) and (ii) above, when the following brilliant suggesstion came up: `gherao vehicles parked in such a way as to render pavements inaccessible'. (The freaky non-Indian reader of this piece should seek a `normal' Indian's aid in understanding what `gherao' means.)

(Thanks are due to my former student Madhushree for capturing the essence of my glee at the prospect in this cartoon she whipped up in a couple of days.)

This suggestion was just after my heart. Fortunately, enough members of DRA were happy with the idea of doing `something' about accessible pavements. In addition to several wheelchairs parked - preferably with occupants - encircling a motorcycle  or car parked across a pavement, I have fond hopes of executing one of my pet dreams (born in a freaky disabled mathemtician's mind, naturally) of parking my wheelchair right in the way of people trying to access a flight of steps - leading to a store or the ATM of some bank or any commercial place, with a `simple mathematical problem' (which would be totally incomprehensible to one without some mathematical training, but would be as simple for me as climbing those three steps would be for them) which people would have to solve before I would move my wheelchair out of their way, and pointing out that freaks ill-equipped to solve the problem unfortunately had no place in my world.

I await December 3rd with ghoulish desire - to see people's reaction to this world with roles reversed.

1 comment: