ONE MILLION BLOG READERS

NEVER BACKING DOWN

This week, my blog received its one millionth unique visitor.

I have been blogging daily for more than a decade.

Sometimes I have posted beautiful photos from exotic travel.

Certainly this space has served as a bully pulpit to scold lousy government services and terrible companies.

A few times, I have shared photos of my cats – or tragically, a tribute to one who went over the Rainbow Bridge.

But more than 90 percent of my posts are related to disability advocacy.

Most of those point out flaws in the built environment.

With all due respect, our planners, architects, engineers, builders and municipalities that regulate them have had more than a third of a century under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to get it right.

But the vast majority continue to push back, resist and even go to court to try to get out of the responsibility of observing federal civil rights legislation that guarantees equal access for people with disabilities.

Hundreds of local governments – and related transit, redevelopment and similar agencies – still design sidewalks, parks, buildings, transit systems, airports and much of the built environment in ways that isolate and dehumanized people with disabilities.

Sadly, with a plethora of lawsuits against the ADA and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, a stacked Supreme Court may strip away basic dignity and independence of people with disabilities.

In case you are wondering, the CDC has documented that one in four people experience disability in their lifetime. That is more than 85 million Americans. Globally, the WHO has recognized that there are far more than 1 billion people with disabilities.

Not only is a level playing field a basic human right. But it also makes economic sense.

In addition to the staggering loss of dignity and quality of life, it costs trillions to warehouse people instead of mainstreaming them.

It costs dimes on the dollar to create inclusive spaces and places.

Once that is done, the rampant under- and unemployment of people with disabilities can become a thing of the past.

Catastrophically, our White House, Senate and Congress and far too many governors and state legislators  -- seem hellbent on reducing the inclusion gained under nearly 35 years of the ADA.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is the very definition of a Democracy – it is the core fiber of what it means to be in the United States. But the savage right wing would like to reframe DEI as something as loathsome as fascism.

This blog will never back down from championing DEI, especially in the lens of disability.

Not even if it costs me clients and work.

Not even if it places me in the crosshairs of an authoritarian government goose stepping its way toward a Nazi police state.

I will risk my nest egg, career and freedom – defending my right to underscore ableism and other treacherous acts of hatred toward the disability community.

Give me the liberty to be an ally, or give me death.