Bad Language

By Ian Macrae

As disabled people we’ve always been in danger of being defined by language that is born out of a fear or, at best, a lack of under-standing of what we are.

In little more than a generation we have gone from being “invalids” to being mentally, physically or visually “handicapped”. There was a terrible time when we were “challenged”. There have been flirtations with calling us “impaired” (in our hearing, mobility and sight). And there have been and still are those who prefer to have us as “people with disabilities” or the totally obfuscatory “PWDs”.

Meanwhile, many of us are at our happiest when we’re out and proud as disabled people. But now it feels like the whole linguistic roundabout is setting off on yet another circumlocution.

Two non-disabled presenters on a recent radio discussion were keen to explore with my disabled co-contributor their belief that the word “disabled” just wouldn’t do. They argued that it places too much emphasis on our inability. With respect – no, actually with no respect at all – they’ve entirely missed the point, that point being that “disabled” is not a word that describes us: rather it describes what is done to us by society.

At the risk of re-stating the totally bleedin’ obvious, it is society and the barriers it puts in our way that disable us, not our impairments.

In addition, the word “disabled” has added value because it defines us as a group, all disabled by society and not a disparate assortment of people with different impairments who are “differently able” and who face a variety of challenges.

We are not, and can never be, “people with disabilities” because of the inescapable reality that we’re all disabled by the same discriminatory, unequal, disablist set of social barriers, attitudes and values. To call us something different is to further marginalise and ignore us.