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A review by root
Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
2.5
There are a lot of points made in this book that need to exist and need to be talked about, but there are also a lot of just very irritating and reductive takes in this book that just really draw away from it.
The equation of "femmes" = (cis dyadic feminine) womanhood, otherwise the conclusions drawn do not make sense. The idea that all WoC somehow have one collective experience when there are so many factors to it. The idea that there are zero healthcare workers with personal experience (while at the same time repeatedly talking about disabled people are constantly being each others' carers). The idea that disabled people have the same perspective on disability politics and disability justice and that the only way they wouldn't have the same perspective would be if they were struggling with internalized ableism.
The last point also coincides with a specific frustration I have that often the loudest ones talking about disability politics are people who are not severely disabled--we get many takes about how "freeing" it is to stop forcing yourself to work/socialize/etc and while I get that and I am not discounting the experience, there are many disabled people who would kill to be able enough that forcing yourself is even an option. There are many who do not have a choice but to rely on the systems that the author (and many others) talk about is so horrible that they avoid it even though they "should" use it. I am tired of "I didn't go to xyz Dr/use xyz service because they'll be [insert bigotry form] to me because the system is broken and what if I lose my independence." Many of us have already lost it. Many of us have no choice. I am tired of seeing so many peoples' every day realities be considered, very openly and brazenly, someone's worst case nightmare scenario and have them dub this disability justice to talk about how scary it would be. Ultimately it is just very irritating to repeatedly get the same exact perspective of disability from disabled people with low-mid support needs and then have them insist that this experience is the only one if you aren't oppressing yourself or letting other people oppress you or somehow not being radical enough.
Also, it felt really weird to me to have a nonblack author claim that Marsha P Johnson and Audre Lorde are their ancestors. Like I don't know about all that...
The equation of "femmes" = (cis dyadic feminine) womanhood, otherwise the conclusions drawn do not make sense. The idea that all WoC somehow have one collective experience when there are so many factors to it. The idea that there are zero healthcare workers with personal experience (while at the same time repeatedly talking about disabled people are constantly being each others' carers). The idea that disabled people have the same perspective on disability politics and disability justice and that the only way they wouldn't have the same perspective would be if they were struggling with internalized ableism.
The last point also coincides with a specific frustration I have that often the loudest ones talking about disability politics are people who are not severely disabled--we get many takes about how "freeing" it is to stop forcing yourself to work/socialize/etc and while I get that and I am not discounting the experience, there are many disabled people who would kill to be able enough that forcing yourself is even an option. There are many who do not have a choice but to rely on the systems that the author (and many others) talk about is so horrible that they avoid it even though they "should" use it. I am tired of "I didn't go to xyz Dr/use xyz service because they'll be [insert bigotry form] to me because the system is broken and what if I lose my independence." Many of us have already lost it. Many of us have no choice. I am tired of seeing so many peoples' every day realities be considered, very openly and brazenly, someone's worst case nightmare scenario and have them dub this disability justice to talk about how scary it would be. Ultimately it is just very irritating to repeatedly get the same exact perspective of disability from disabled people with low-mid support needs and then have them insist that this experience is the only one if you aren't oppressing yourself or letting other people oppress you or somehow not being radical enough.
Also, it felt really weird to me to have a nonblack author claim that Marsha P Johnson and Audre Lorde are their ancestors. Like I don't know about all that...