Webcast archive: People with disabilities as commodities

This week, we discuss the ways in which disability services and institutions treat people with disabilities like products.

In this episode of Euthanasia & Disability, Amy Hasbrouck and Christian Debray discuss:

  • People with disabilities as commodities

Please note that this text is only a script and that our webcast contains additional commentary.

PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES AS COMMODITIES

  • The job of disability studies scholars is to think about the way society relates to people with disabilities.
  • Some of the “models” they use for thinking about disability include:
    • The “religious model” sees disability as either a curse or blessing from God.
      • Most disabled people are cared for by their families, and are given work they can do.
      • Those who can’t live in the community are taken care of by the church.
    • The “Medical Model” sees disability as a problem with the person that should be cured or improved by medical science.
      • In industrial societies, state-run institutions took over from the church to care for people who couldn’t work in the urban factories
      • The medical model is changing with new technology.  Genetic defects, disabled foetuses, and “lifestyle” issues like smoking and obesity are creating new groups of people who face discrimination on medical grounds.
    • The “rehabilitation model” sees disability as a problem with the person that can be compensated for with skills and adaptive equipment.
  • All of the above models have two things in common:
    • The “fault” is with the disabled person, it’s up to the person to change.
    • Disabled people don’t have a voice of their own.
  • The “social model” sees disability as a problem where the person’s impairment interacts with physical barriers, attitudes and public policies that limit the ability to function.
  • The social model is the basis of the disability rights movement, a civil rights struggle similar to that of people of colour, women, LGBT, and other groups.
  • But ordinary civil rights don’t go far enough to enable people with disabilities to gain true equality.
    • A restaurant owner can say he doesn’t discriminate, but if there are steps, or the menu is only in small print, or service dogs are excluded, it’s still discrimination.
    • People need medications, supplies, equipment, wheelchairs, glasses, and adaptive technology to function on a daily basis.
    • People need services, like help with activities of daily living and/or job training in order to work.
    • People need homes, businesses, transportation and communication options that are accessible to be active in their communities.
  • Whether these goods and services are provided by the state or private companies, the cost adds up to a lot of money
    • According to one report, the cost of institutional care in Canada totalled 22 billion as of 2014.
    • Canada has an estimated $6.4 billion medical device market as of 2012.
  • The people who receive the goods and services become not only a class of consumers, they become commodities themselves.
    • The person who “occupies a bed” in a nursing facility or a group home brings in money for that institution.
    • The person who needs training or help finding a job counts as a client for the rehabilitation agency.
    • Even the person receiving home-care services through an agency brings in money for administrative overhead.
  • To serve all these people, large bureaucracies have been built up, and sometimes the goal of the service gets lost in keeping the agency afloat.
    • People never seem to find or stay in a job because the agency doesn’t want to lose a client.
    • People often find it hard to move out of institutions because the government won’t pay them to hire their own attendants.
  • So what does this have to do with assisted suicide and euthanasia?  It has to do with quality of life, and the choices people have.
  • As long as we are treated like objects of medical or nursing care, commodities to be traded between agencies that provide us services, passive recipients of benefits, we will never achieve a good quality of life.
  • If we don’t take leadership in the organizations and systems that are supposed to help us, our needs will be pushed aside in favour of the needs of non-disabled life-long bureaucrats whose first priority is to keep their jobs.
  • How can we do this?
    • Require any agency that provides services to or represents disabled people to have a majority of disabled people on its board of directors.
    • Teach each other how to be active and effective members of these boards.
    • Seek out information about bills that concern disabled people and take advantage of the opportunity to give feedback to our legislators.
    • Email and call Members of Parliament to let them know how public services are, or are not, working for you.
    • Remember that you are the expert on what works best for you.  No one can speak for you better than you can.
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