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What Happened to
Equality?
by L.C. D. Marco
Image and Representation
I can't remember a time when I wasn't aware that I was different from most
other people, and that my differentness was a judgment against me. By the dawn
of adolescence I had absorbed enough innuendoes to suspect that, no matter what
social graces I managed to cultivate, no matter how I dressed or wore my hair,
I would never be the kind of girl boys wanted to flirt with or to ask on dates.
My reading heightened my apprehensions about the future. In books, it seemed,
the only way a woman could be fulfilled was through. the love of a man; and the
only women worthy of that love were lithe and lovely, unblemished, physically
perfect. The smallest flaw-an uneven gait, a malformed hand-was enough to
disqualify a woman from romance, from ail hope for happiness. If even a
trifling imperfection could loom as such an insurmountable obstacle to
fulfillment, what chance was there for a girl who was totally blind, as I
was?
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It is a daunting task to live in a society that
insists it is impossible to be functional if we are women, let alone
disabled. |
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It is a daunting task to live in a society that insists it is
impossible to be functional if we are women, let alone disabled.
Self-representation and the body are areas that have become much emphasized by
those campaigning for the. rights of disabled people. Material in The New
Our Bodies, Ourselves, for example, states "Magazine covers, films, TV
shows, billboards surround us with images which fail to reflect the tremendous
diversity among us. Never before have there been hundreds of profitable
businesses set up to convince us we don't look good enough. Whole industries
depend on selling us products through slick ads depicting 'beautiful' women,
playing on our insecurities and fears of imperfection. ... If we are passably
close to the current media images of beauty we may not be aware of the intense
pressures working on us. But if we are: more obviously 'different'-fat, old,
women of color or physically disabled, for instance-we encounter the pressures
more openly and every day. ... As one woman said, 'we are not disabled: it is
society which disables us by being so unsupportive'2.
In the general media, however, people with disabilities continue
to be invisible or marginalized by stereotyping constructions. "Disabled women
are not only subjected to the generalized stereotypes that define people with
disabilities as helpless victims and inadequate individuals, but are also
defined in gendered terms, as deviations from particular sets of feminine
norms."3 It makes no difference what television program or
commercial one observes: women's bodies are portrayed in an objectified
manner.
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Qu'est-il arrivé à
l'équité?
par L. C. Di Marco
Il est peut-être extrêmement intimidant de
vivre dans une société qui insiste sur l'impossibilité des
femmes, sans parler des personnes handicapées, d'être
fonctionnelles. Bien entendu, les hommes ne sont pas les seuls responsables de
la situation. Des femmes, souvent féministes, sont tout autant coupables
de ne pas prêter attention à certaines questions qui ne les
concerne pas personnellement.
Les femmes handicapées se heurtent à une
double discrimination, et que dire si elles sont en plus de couleur,
lesbiennes, mères célibataires ou pauvres. Les femmes
handicapées sont victimes de l'attitude de femmes et d'hommes robustes
qui .les considèrent comme ne formant pas un tout. Grâce à
l'éducation, les femmes handicapées sont quelque peu en mesure de
garder quelque dignité et indépendance, mais la
société semble constamment ignorer que tout. Le monde
détient juridiquement .le droit de recevoir une éducation. Nulle
part dans la Charte des droits et libertés ou dans la
Déclaration des droits de la personne un membre de la
société est exclu du processus éducatif, comme il n'y est
jamais mentionné non plus les carrières que les individus doivent
poursuivre. Pourquoi donc ces droits et libertés ne s'appliquent-ils pas
aux femmes handicapées?
Les femmes handicapées, toutefois, innovent dans
certains domaines, en particulier dans les arts où elles font une
percée entant qu'écrivains, artistes de spectacle, musiciennes ou
visualistes. Mais, si nous voulons atteindre à l'égalité
dans tous les secteurs, nous devons rappeler la communauté
d'éléments de nos divers féminismes. Nous devons mettre en
oeuvre une théorie féministe pour formuler des changements
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