LESSONS FROM SELMA

EarthBound tomBOY

BY HEIDI JOHNSON-WRIGHT

A film has just been released about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the 1965 civil rights marches from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama to demand voting rights for African Americans. The film is called Selma.

I haven’t seen it yet, but I plan to. So what am I doing writing about it?

What stirred me is the promo photo that ran with the film’s review in my local newspaper. (Yes, I still read one of those.) It shows the actor portraying Dr. King with actors portraying a Jewish rabbi and a Greek Orthodox clergyman.

What struck me about the photo was the coalition it depicted between people from other groups who –like African Americans -- have also faced bigotry. A united coalition fighting for the rights of a marginalized group of people.

Fifty years has passed since the march on Selma. Like other minorities, people with disabilities are still fighting for equality. For access to jobs. Housing. Attendant care at home rather than in nursing homes. Medical care. Transportation. And on and on.

While the passage of the ADA in 1990 was a landmark of progress, I fear that the disability rights movement is at a stand-still. That we’ve reached a plateau we may be stuck on for quite some time.

Everywhere I look I see steps at the entrances of businesses which have still not undertaken barrier removal. The demand for accessible, affordable housing far exceeds the supply. In many cities, it’s still nearly impossible to get a wheelchair-accessible cab. Even public transit in many locations has barriers. Young people with significant disabilities and few resources end up in nursing homes because community-based attendant care is a pipe dream.

We still have so many barriers to get past. The way to do this is for leaders in the disability community to come forward and form coalitions with other minority groups who have made significant progress in their struggles towards equality.

I look forward to the day a disabled person stands at a podium with leaders from the African-American, Jewish and gay communities and the speakers tell the world that discrimination against one is discrimination against all. That refusing to put up a ramp at an entrance is equivalent to posting a sign that African Americans or Jewish Americans people or Gay Americans will not be allowed to enter. That transit inaccessible to wheelchair users is the same thing as banning women or Asian Americans from riding the trains, buses or taxis.

U.S. Rep. and Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Emanuel Cleaver said, “There is more power in unity than division.”