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This post is for blogging against disablism day. I'm pretty new to thinking about disability in any serious way so this may all be bunk.
I was plotting out a post in my head the other day and the phrase "I am rather tone deaf to the nuances of american cultures" popped into my head. "Hmm" I thought "Is that ablist language? Do tone deaf people really count as disabled? Would they care? Where do you draw the line?"
And I had a bit of an epiphany. To a certain extent it doesn't matter: while one of the major reasons for avoiding ablist language is to avoid contributing to social bias and discrimination against those disabled people who suffer them, the very idea of using a real illness as a metaphor for a negative trait is indicative of deep problems with the way our society views illness.
Unfortunately, I am low on spoons, so I can't quite articulate my point, but I'll take a punt and try to flesh it out another day.
I think a good example which illustrates my point is "colourblind racism". Briefly: This is when someone "doesn't see" the race of the people they interact with, and so ends up supporting the status quo ie racism and not making allowances for the different experiences people have because of their race.
The reason this term is unfair to colourblind people is that they don't go around saying "I don't see colour! We should all act like colour doesn't exist! You people insisting that red and green traffic-lights mean different things are the real problem!". In my experience they aware of and acknowledge that their vision is flawed, and learn to work around it.
Ablist language works on the assumption that people who have lack certain abilities (whether this makes them disabled or not) are inherently less worthy, and incapable of being as good as anyone else at things involving that ability.
Aaaand that's about the end of my spoons. If you're interested in the topic, have a look at Feminists are fine with being bigots if it’s just ableism which has links which lead to more links... and then I ran out of link clicking spoons :)
I was plotting out a post in my head the other day and the phrase "I am rather tone deaf to the nuances of american cultures" popped into my head. "Hmm" I thought "Is that ablist language? Do tone deaf people really count as disabled? Would they care? Where do you draw the line?"
And I had a bit of an epiphany. To a certain extent it doesn't matter: while one of the major reasons for avoiding ablist language is to avoid contributing to social bias and discrimination against those disabled people who suffer them, the very idea of using a real illness as a metaphor for a negative trait is indicative of deep problems with the way our society views illness.
Unfortunately, I am low on spoons, so I can't quite articulate my point, but I'll take a punt and try to flesh it out another day.
I think a good example which illustrates my point is "colourblind racism". Briefly: This is when someone "doesn't see" the race of the people they interact with, and so ends up supporting the status quo ie racism and not making allowances for the different experiences people have because of their race.
The reason this term is unfair to colourblind people is that they don't go around saying "I don't see colour! We should all act like colour doesn't exist! You people insisting that red and green traffic-lights mean different things are the real problem!". In my experience they aware of and acknowledge that their vision is flawed, and learn to work around it.
Ablist language works on the assumption that people who have lack certain abilities (whether this makes them disabled or not) are inherently less worthy, and incapable of being as good as anyone else at things involving that ability.
Aaaand that's about the end of my spoons. If you're interested in the topic, have a look at Feminists are fine with being bigots if it’s just ableism which has links which lead to more links... and then I ran out of link clicking spoons :)
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As you point out capability is neither defined by the human sorting baskets that delimit prejudicial thinking, nor is it intrinsic to the individual, instead it's a derivative of the person and their environment Since their environment includes their sociopolitical environment, we have a situation in which the capability of the individual is, in part, imposed by society.
The intersection between capability and prejudice is extremely interesting because of the way false dogma about capability is used to justify unequal power structures. "The Bell Curve".
That link between notional capability and social status is why there is a frisson of transgressive excitement around transhumanism: think of the controversy around Oscar Pistorius ...
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Anyway, agreed with what you have to say in this comment, see further replies below. (I started reading the article, but my brain protested that it's done enough thinking for the morning)
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It's a shame I am feeling the need to arm myself for battle as far as these issues are concerned but, there you have it. There's something in the discourse that rubs me the wrong way, and I've convinced myself it's not just the mildly unpleasant sensation of my social privileges being equalised.
transhumanism
But I don't think I understand transhumanism at all. From my perspective, it has arisen out of a faulty definition of what being human is, and this article, or what I've read of it so far, isn't changing my impression at all.
If I were you, I'd be very very suspicious of your conviction (and of you having managed to convince yourself) that your sensation is not just your social privileges being pointed out. I've been there, done that. I've watched other people go there, do that. Honestly, becoming aware of your privileges need not feel remotely like you're becoming aware of your privileges, and it can feel at times like you're the only reasonable person left. (That one is practically diagnostic.)
Re: transhumanism
That said, I do have an interest in the way that the communities of discussion to which I'm exposed by my association with sqbr and others operate, and it's fair enough that they can be, are, and should be subject to critical perspectives both from insiders and outsiders, delivered appropriately.
Of course that means trying to avoid derailing - I have a bad instinct to try to turn every discussion about prejudice into a discussion of the practices of discussions about prejudice, and I'm doing it again here. Sorry.
Continuing to derail re transhumanism at your prompting:
I would've thought the article's reference to a definition of it as "the idea that humans can use reason to transcend the limitation of the human condition" was clearly stated, if not straightforward.
From a transhumanist perspective (under this definition) all levels of ableness (or dually, all "limitations of the human condition) are changeable, and not as intrinsic to the individual as they are typically thought to be. Therefore this perspective can catalyse new ways of thinking for and about people with "disabilities".
Transhumanism is strongly associated (though perhaps unfairly) with utopian thinking in which issues like physical disability fall by the wayside and we all become "luminous beings". A nice but unconvincing dream.
But it's clear that as far as technology does change capability (see innovations in prosthesis, bionic eyes and ears, laser corrective surgery, developmental surgery etc.) it has a huge impact on the factors underlying ablist prejudice. As you mentioned previously, your spectacles provide you with equal access.
Re: transhumanism
That definition doesn't help me at all. What is "the human condition"? How could anyone possibly begin to even think about defining "the human condition" without including our ability to reason and our ability to change our circumstances? Aren't those things pretty close to the core of what it means to be human? And what does "transcend" mean, apart from being a word with a high "warm fuzzy impressiveness" factor? Is this a sales pitch?
(I hope this doesn't feel like a personal attack; it's an attempt at a fairly close to realistic impression of the sorts of things that went through my head when I read that bit, slowed down enough to be written out.)
Also, don't know if you know, but might be relevant: I'm an evolutionary biologist and partly as a side effect of my training, partly as a deliberate exercise because I liked the effects, I've to some extent re-wired my brain to look at the world from an evolutionary perspective and that does mean there are things that are "perfectly obvious" to "normal" people that make no sense to me.
Re: transhumanism
I think it's pretty clear. There are various mental models of what a "human" is that include a range of capabilities and distinctive traits. Typical ideas delineating between humans and animals include use of language, ability to reason, ability to build and use tools, etc. As someone with related training you already know that all of those are actually rather blurrier than they might seem at first bluff.
The models are often implied rather than defined because of the difficulty of defining them. "What is it to be human?" is still one of those Big Not Properly Answered Questions.
These models, often implied, also include limits on our traits and capabilities: we can't breathe underwater, live forever, stop aging, remember endless facts, do arithmetic as fast as our personal computers, render multiple layers of geographical data into a coherent map image in our heads and then "think" it over to the person standing next to us.
So under the definition cited transhumanists look at limits like these (not these exact limits) -- limits that are implied in prevailing models of humanity -- and propose that they can be overcome by the application of the tools we have to hand, summarised by "reason". In overcoming them we would become "transhuman" in the sense that we "cross" some boundary of present humanity as perceived by consensus, but remain "human" in some other more profound sense that, I presume, is even more difficult to define.
Still clear as mud? Sorry about that :-)
Re: transhumanism
(I'm still playing around with how strict I'm going to be, but if I don't make an effort to enforce the rules now I'm going to fall to bits when I encounter narky defensive people who refuse to admit they even are derailing)
But if you drop a link saying where the conversation is going I may pop in once I've had a chance to read the article :)
Re: transhumanism
Of course, if I start to talk about the intersection of actual capability with ablist prejudice from a transhumanist perspective, or if I do my whole problematising dialogue bit, I'll probably end up composing something seriously offensive. Maybe you should just let me fizz out here where fewer people are going to be affected. *sigh*
Re: transhumanism
That's not exactly what I had in mind when I tried to set this up as a safe space :P
You could always talk with aquaeri via instant message, I've done that with conversations that might offend passers by.
EDIT: And thinking about it some more, I really am rather annoyed that you hold yourself to a higher standard on your lj, where it's your subscribers who may be hurt and the comments are your responsibility, than you do on my dw, where it's my subscribers who may get hurt and the comments are my responsibility. One of the primary reasons I started this journal was because people told me privately that the thoughtless comments others made on my lj meant they weren't comfortable speaking up, you can't assume that the people speaking are the only ones paying attention.
Re: transhumanism
As I see it, I haven't made thoughtless comments on this post, I've given my views in good faith and in a temperate way.
Re: transhumanism
That said, while my comments are definitely much more slapdash and unstructured than my posts, I do hold myself to a higher standard of not-being-offensive in conversations like this than I do on my lj eg if I was a white person coming into a conversation about race on the journal of a POC.
Re: transhumanism
Re: transhumanism
Well I can hardly argue with that sort of self justification :D
I guess you have to figure out for yourself the best way to control your behaviour and experience. I found I had to blanket ban myself from any discussion forum without comment threading since otherwise I got drawn into Every Single Argument.
I'd hate for you to stop commenting on all my posts altogether, since you often have really interesting things to say, but that's one of the points of me having two journals.