My insurance decided I no longer need physical therapy 🎉 for my lifelong disability 🎉 that will never get better 🎉 Because my insurance company 🎉 clearly knows more than me 🎉 the dude with Cerebral Palsy 🎉
As we all celebrate, reminder that we wouldn’t have Senator Warnock now or the last two years if it wasn’t for
@staceyabrams
and the Black women organizers in our state who continue to save this damn country time and again while facing rampant racism, ableism, and misogyny.
I think it’s really important to note that this man joined our Seder/Shabbat service tonight. For the entire thing. I don’t ever want to hear the false narrative that Palestinians hate Jews.
Gaza is a disability justice issue. If you believe in and purport to practice disability justice, you must speak up. There is no excuse.
May his memory be for a blessing.
BREAKING| Israel kills, Hashem Ghazal, a prominent figure in the deaf community in Gaza, along with his wife in a strike on their house.
Other family members, who are deaf as well, have been reportedly wounded.
Tonight my wife said as a kid she had a Barbie with a wheelchair but it was discontinued because the chair didn’t fit in the Barbie house door.
Her: “So instead of making the doorways wider they just got rid of the doll!!”
Me: “Welcome to being a disabled person!”
The number of people immediately talking about the impact of this on business and not the devastating loss of human life just really goes to show that capitalism is a fucking disease.
The CDC is no longer recommending Americans to stay home after testing positive for COVID-19, a major shift in policy that comes as much of the country has moved on from the height of the pandemic.
Definitely didn’t expect this to do numbers. It’s okay, y’all, and thanks for the support. A lot of people have it a lot worse than me. I can be ok doing home stretches. And I’ll figure out how to appeal it. But remember, insurance is a joke and healthcare is a human right!
I think it’s quite telling that Birthright groups are sending kids to Israel while Gaza is being decimated. I’m embarrassed to say that, like a lot of young Jews, I ignorantly went on Birthright. It was 12 years ago this week actually, and I want to share my experience. 🧵
After a perfect date today just the two of us, my wife and I got in an elevator right before a couple with their baby. They didn’t make eye contact with us at first, but then the lady looked at us, noticed us wearing m*sks, and coughed directly at us before exiting.
The city of Atlanta is now attempting to ban face masks. The ableism alone is astounding, but that’s just a byproduct of their ongoing attempt to suppress democracy.
And to be clear, the sponsors and co-sponsors are Dems.
CM Lewis introduces ELMS 34324, an ordinance to prohibit the wearing of ski masks, masks, barrier face coverings, hoods or any other device that conceals the identify of the wearer.
26 years ago today, we woke up to find that my triplet brother Paul had suddenly and unexpectedly died in his sleep. We were 6. There truly has not been a day since where I haven’t thought about him. He was my best friend and more—a literal third of me. A soulmate.
When we’re kids
They tell us we’re “special”
And “inspiring”
That we can “overcome”
When we’re grown
We demand the right
To not live in poverty
To have healthcare
To exist
Instead they say
Our deaths are “encouraging”
Remind me
What age does “special”
Become “disposable”?
Y’all. My doctor retired end of last year, and I finally established care with a new PCP. I just had my first appointment and I was nervous. Well, my new doc walks in the room in an N95. I thanked her for m*sking & she said “You’ll never catch me without one.” 🥹
It’s so fucking exhausting. I truly don’t give a shit if you and your husband choose to raw dog the air with your child. Truly, I don’t. I’m not saying shit about your decisions. Why the hell do you care about ours?
My Jewish values will not allow me sit by quietly while a genocide is under way. I am wrecked by what happened in Israel and I am gutted over what is happening to Palestinians.
My loyalty as a Jew is to no nation state - it is to humanity.
It’s Disability Pride Month and I’m so proud to be disabled, but right now our people are suffering and being attacked in ways we haven’t seen in a long time, and I refuse to spend July pretending like it’s all sunshine and roses and “Yay ADA!” while our people are dying.
A 🧵:
We have a 1 year old at home. We make our decisions to protect ourselves and those around us of course, but honestly, everything we do is to protect her even more. And to be so disrespectful toward people you don’t know - it’s so fucked man. Humans suck.
I am thrilled to share
@staceyabrams
’ full Disability Rights policy platform. Here is a thread outlining some of the significant investments she will make in our community as the next governor of Georgia.
A 🧵:
i knew on our first date that i was going to marry catie. no lie, i had a panic attack in the bathroom at the coffee shop where we met up because i was so freaked out by how i felt. and all these years later, i have not lost that feeling - in fact, it’s grown and keeps growing…
There are so many layers to the Selma Blair stuff, but a couple of things I’m thinking about as a disabled Jew:
1. I’ve always felt weird about celebrities being labeled “disability activists” especially when they are just coming into their disabled identities…
Everyone here is super awesome and supportive, thank you ❤️I muted this because the notifications were a lot, but know that a) I’m set on finding a new PT who understands CP & my needs and 2) I will appeal whatever I have to with my insurance so they can authorize more PT for me
I’m not sure how to put into words the amount of love and gratitude I have for
@staceyabrams
. She is truly one of the kindest, most caring, most honest, and most authentic people I’ve ever known. Working for her these past few years has truly been the greatest honor of my life.
Some of y’all would be shocked to know how many orgs/companies you think are great are paying disabled employees subminimum wage - which is sometimes pennies per hour.
Good news! It’s all public information.
Do with it what you will🫡
Today is Cerebral Palsy Awareness Day, and I truly hate awareness days. But here are four things I’ve learned as an adult with CP that I’d like for people, particularly parents of kids with CP, to know:
My Uber driver pulled up in a mask and I thanked him for masking. He said he’s never had COVID and had people in his family die of it and he takes it really seriously. I tipped him well.
So back to Birthright trips happening right now. It’s telling to me that young diaspora Jews are flying over there and yet people keep saying how Israelis are “unsafe.” Palestinian bloodlines in Gaza are being wiped off the map and yet people in Israel are operating as normal.
I have some ✨personal news✨
We’ve long needed a regional disability organizing strategy, and building off our work in Georgia, I’m bringing it to the South.
I’m so pumped to launch my own org New Disabled South and work full time as President & CEO.
Follow —>
@DisabledSouth
Nothing like being with a bunch of activists about to take a group photo and someone turning to me to say, “You’re wearing a m*sk in a picture??”
Like yes, airborne disease doesn’t take a quick 5 while we pose for our perfect shot.
Fully agree here. I pulled my mask down to my chin for this photo and I regret it, not just now but I regretted it the moment I did it. I very much appreciate the rightful critique and accountability from the community on this one, no excuses.
As someone with Cerebral Palsy, survivor’s guilt, PTSD, and 11 years in recovery, I am certain that this country is not prepared for the post-COVID surge in both physical & mental health disabilities that will occur when the dust settles.
#DisabilityTwitter
#CripTheVote
One of my roles on the
@staceyabrams
campaign is Director of Disability Engagement & Accessibility, and I'm excited that we are hiring a full time ASL Interpreter! Please check out the job listing and help spread the word.
#CripTheVote
#DisabilityTwitter
My CC mother-in-law is a teacher and has thankfully avoided COVID all this time by masking. She just found out the district gave every classroom giant industrial HEPA air purifiers 👏🏼 With barely anyone else there masking, at least they’ll be cleaning the air and doing something.
We have been working so, so hard the past two months and we’re just getting started. Thank you to every one of the over 100,000 supporters who joined our movement. My boss
@staceyabrams
is going to be the next Governor of Georgia.
#GaPol
#CripTheVote
Just in: Stacey Abrams has raised more than $9.2M since entering the race for Georgia governor in December, setting a blistering fundraising pace that eclipsed Republican Gov. Brian Kemp.
#gapol
I love when progressive conferences have a section for COVID-19 protocols and it just says “We will follow public health guidelines” like there are any actual public health guidelines 🙃
I’ve been in awe watching young Jews organize protests of Birthright trips. I wish I had that education when I was 20, but I was so ignorant. I do think the tides are turning, and I hope Birthright trips become a thing of the past sooner rather than later.
I wish disability rights groups would stop focusing on things like corporate “inclusion” efforts and instead fight back against this mainstream wave of eugenics. We are fully losing on disability rights because we are continuing to die en masse.
I know this is not a unique story. This is how orgs like
@IfNotNowOrg
came to be - young folks realizing they were lied to about Israel and seeing the occupation with their own eyes. But it’s something I think about often, and it’s why I’m so committed to Palestinian liberation.
I saw the apartheid. I saw and heard the dehumanization of Palestinians. I learned about the reality of the West Bank and the illegal settlements. It changed me. I remember coming back and saying something to my grandparents about apartheid, and they didn’t speak to me for weeks.
When I posted this back in March, I got shit from a bunch of trolls on my posts, including one person who said “Oh look, he’s a r****d too.” I think my tweet got screenshotted on a shitty Reddit thread or something. Anyway, it’s just very nice to see all the
#YallMasking
posts 🫶🏼
Beyoncé covering “Blackbird,” a song not only written as a love letter to Black women but by a band who notably ripped off Black music, and then singing it with incredible Black women in country music just has so many layers to it. Phenomenal and brilliant choice.
Our daughter Mahalia Eve Kelly entered the world on May 16th at 2:21pm. My heart has completely cracked wide open in a way I never knew was possible. Mahalia is everything. She and her mother are the loves of my life. We are so very blessed.
Shapiro can’t be VP for all the reasons everyone’s named, but I’d like to add that his support of private school vouchers is extremely anti-disability. Private schools can legally discriminate against disabled students.
Don’t take disabled people for granted. You need us.
Today I took an Uber for the first time in over a year to get to PT because my car battery died, and the driver told me I was “lucky” to be married because not many people would marry a disabled person. And then said I was “twice as lucky” that my wife isn’t disabled. 🙃
today is international day of persons with disabilities, but i prefer to call myself disabled. my disability is a part of who i am. it’s a part of my identity. i want you to see it, acknowledge it, and say the damn word disability, not some fluffy euphemism.
I’m so glad Tracy is having her moment so I can share my favorite live performance of all time. 1988. She was 24 years old. A 63k capacity arena. Just her and a guitar, and a completely silent audience. I watch this all the time.
Folks are shocked by the salary, WFH, 4-day work week, fully covered health insurance, etc., and it just infuriating that so many disabled people have suffered under ableism and capitalism that these things are so rare. Our people should not be forced to live in fucking poverty.
We're hiring!
Have a passion for disability justice? Experience with research, advocacy, and community organizing? Want to create change across the South?
Apply to be our Research and Coalition Organizing Manager!
Details 👇🏾
Hey, I’ve decided that even though I don’t menstruate, I’m going to write about how tampons are better than pads. And I won’t interview a single menstruating person, only non-menstruating people who work in CVS. Oh and don’t challenge me, my spouse menstruates so I’m an expert.
My latest about disability accommodations in higher ed for
@chronicle
@ChronicleReview
.
It's a very controversial topic, to say the least, and inspires strong opinions. I hope this will help shift the conversation in a productive direction:
I’m tired of being told that I should accept that there are some things that will just always be inaccessible to me. (This was just said to me today.) Why should I accept this? Why shouldn’t the world be accessible to me?
Interesting to see Biden say taking over buildings is “wrong” when just last year he praised The Rehabilitation Act & Section 504 on the 50th anniversary — legislation that was passed only because disabled people took over a government building for 28 days
NEW: White House statement via
@AndrewJBates46
on
@Columbia
U students taking over a building:
“President Biden has stood against repugnant, Antisemitic smears and violent rhetoric his entire life. He condemns the use of the term “intifada,” as he has the other tragic and
2. Mobility aids are freedom. As my pain and fatigue has increased and my mobility has declined, I’ve started wearing leg braces again, walking with crutches, and using a wheelchair. This is not sad — it’s freeing. I don’t feel bad that I need these aids. I feel empowered.
Hi! Disability rights activist and very very Jewish person here. Alice has shown time and time again that she advocates for everyone. So you’re very loud and very wrong and you should take Alice’s name out of your mouth. Oh and speaking as a Jew, Free Palestine.
@abesilbe
@macfound
A disability rights activist who can say those things while the very rights and lives of Israelis were under genocidal assault from Iran clearly doesn't care about the value of life for all people and is extremely unworthy of
@macfound
prize.
Reminder that this is what Cop City will be training militarized police to do here in Atlanta and at all the cop cities across the country. Cop City is not a “public safety training facility.” It’s an avenue to repression of the first amendment and to thwart democracy.
As
@Ruwa4Georgia
is getting so much deserved attention, I think it has to be underscored that she has been extremely diplomatic as her people have been slaughtered before her eyes. She has been steadfastly pro-voting while outspoken about the what’s happening in Gaza.
I think everyone who scoffs at
@uncommittedmvmt
delegates for trying to engage the Dems at all should hear this from Georgia State Rep.
@Ruwa4Georgia
, our sole Palestinian legislator, speaking at the sit-in after DNC’s refusal to allow a Palestinian on the main stage.
We recently updated our parental leave policy to give a full year of leave, with 6 months fully off and another 6 months transition back working part time hours - all full time pay.
Why did we do that? A 🧵 on how this is mission critical for us.
👩👩👧👦Parental Leave: 6 months FT paid and another 6 months part time hours, FT paid
🛌🏽2 month paid sabbatical after 4 years of service
🏢Over 3 weeks in office closures, including a 2 week winter break and 1 week summer break
💪🏾Discounts and perks on gym memberships -- and more!
It’s also why I have never liked being called a twin, because I’m not. I’m a triplet—always. And this is always how I’ll remember him. He was the goofball in the middle of Sean and me, always making us laugh.
I miss my brother every day, but a little bit more today.
Y’all have never given a single shit about disabled people in your entire lives, so it’s no surprise you don’t know what a visual description for blind people is. Embarrassing L tbh.
They get propped up and centered and they’re almost always white and typically have zero political education. I’m not saying that someone new to disability identity and culture can’t be an activist, but there has to be humility and learning and staying quiet for a while.
Truly blowing my mind to be seated at an airport gate next to two dudes talking about how the easiest place to get Covid is the airport, how high the death rate is, how it’s still here and people are still dying, while people all around are hacking, but neither are wearing m*sks.
I started to educate myself some more, and a couple of years later, I went back on my own - not on a structured trip, just on an independently planned trip. That was really when my political education started because I saw things with my own eyes.
In her closing remarks tonight,
@staceyabrams
committed to ending the HCBS waiting list that has kept 7,000 disabled Georgians in institutions instead of in their homes & communities. I’m proud to work for a candidate that will truly create a Georgia for all of us.
#CripTheVote
I was exactly who they want on this trip. The trip itself was exactly like you hear about. Get a bunch of mostly single and horny young Jews together and show them a good time. We learned about the “history” but not the real history. It was definitely indoctrination.
The Americans with Disabilities Act was signed 34 years ago today.
While we’ve made progress since then, people with disabilities still face discrimination every day. New York will never stop fighting until every person can pursue their dreams and live a life of dignity.
4. Talk to adults with CP. It’s not a childhood disability — kids become adults and as adults, we don’t have specialized care. I’ve had to teach providers about CP because they knew nothing. Parents, find adults with CP for your kids to talk to. Prepare them for what’s to come.
just a reminder that you can just be a white supremacist and terrorist without being “mentally ill.” there are plenty of people with mental health disabilities that aren’t terrorists. just call a white supremacist a white supremacist.
I see so many people attacking Lauren Boebert for getting a GED, and can we just not? Let’s focus on the fact that she’s a literal evil fascist and not stigmatize people with GEDs. Please.
Not once did we meet a Palestinian. We met some Muslim and Arab folks and spent a night in a huge tent with Bedouins, but we never went near Gaza, and in the West Bank we were told we couldn’t go to certain parts because it was “unsafe” for Jews.
1. It’s okay to not walk. It’s also okay to walk with mobility aids. Kids with CP are pressured to walk “normally” and it can be so damaging. CP can get worse as people age. One study found that 40% of adults who could walk when they were younger lost their ability to walk.
As Jews, how can we expect people to join us in the fight against actual antisemitism when we do nothing to call out or fight against Islamophobia, esp from the most prominent voices? Some of the folks I’ve seen claim to fight for social justice have said the most heinous shit.
People: “Wow you’ve really overcome a lot for someone who’s disabled, you’re an inspiration, wow.”
Me: “Thanks, so I actually will need X accommodation so that I can...”
People:
Remember that Gov. Kemp made it legal for people to carry concealed weapons without a permit or background check even when 70% of Georgians were opposed to it.
I left the trip having made some really strong friendships and having been exposed to, unbeknownst to me, a totally false story of the history of how Israel came to be. I certainly didn’t leave a Zionist - tbh, I really was so ignorant that I didn’t know what Zionism was.
I think at 20 I was desperate for friendship and loved the idea of a free trip to anywhere, so I applied. My political education was severely lacking - I was involved in some social justice spaces but I had virtually no clue about the history of Palestine and the occupation.
I continue to do this work, advocating for disabled people, not simply because I have cerebral palsy, but because it was a shared experience with him. This work is his legacy. It’s a way for me to make sure others know who he was.
I was 20 going on 21, and I had grown up in an interfaith family - Jewish mom and Catholic dad. My grandparents (who I was very close with) were atheists but very culturally Jewish and very staunch Zionists. They pressured me for years to go on Birthright.
Georgia is about to execute a man with an intellectual disability. We’re the only state in the country where the standard of proof for intellectual disability is “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Let’s be clear: The state is killing a disabled Black man in the name of Georgians.
#BREAKING
: Georgia’s Board of Pardons and Paroles on Tuesday declined to grant clemency to Willie James Pye, who is now scheduled for execution at 7 p.m. Wednesday.
My ancestors were killed by Nazis and wouldn’t ya know it, here’s a pic of me, a big ol Jew, and
@SFdirewolf
just yesterday. Never seen a Nazi kikiing with a Jew before! I know you wish you were a Genius like Alice but you’re not. Go back to reveling in the slaughter of children.
Reminder that City of Atlanta reached a settlement agreement with the DOJ in 2009 requiring them to improve accessibility and they’ve basically done nothing they said they would in the 15 years since. But they got the money for Cop City 🤡
And it’s pretty much always been perpetuating inspiration porn. Like let’s be for real about the “inspiring” narrative she’s upheld within and outside of Hollywood and, from my view, has done nothing to stop.
But I did leave feeling very positive that I wanted to be a practicing Jew. So I spent a year studying Judaism and learning about why we did the traditions and other things we did growing up. It kind of felt connected to Israel, but only because of that trip.
Disappointed but not surprised that the Biden campaign never did this and we’re now 90 days out and just hiring for this role, but I hope the right person gets this and ramps up quickly. If folks need advice from someone who’s done it, HMU.
My wife and I called out our synagogue for their silence and complicity. I had it out with my liberal grandma who said some horrible things. I’ve ended friendships over some terrible racist remarks made under the guise of caring about Jewish safety and solidarity.
The
#ADA
could not be passed today. Electeds don’t care about disability issues. I met with a GA Republican legislator to ask for less than 0.5% of the $16B surplus (taxpayer $) to deinstitutionalize disabled folks. His answer:
“You can’t expect manna to rain down from heaven.”
I think that’s a problem. We’ve got to pay attention to the loudest voices who claim to represent us. We’ve got to call them out, first & foremost. I wish I’d been paying more attention. But let’s stop propping up celebs to represent us (disabled people or Jewish people or both).
@juliairzyk
As a disabled Jew, this is wrong on so many levels, but you’re making all Jews unsafe by insinuating that masks are somehow a threat to Jewish safety. Just say you don’t like the Palestinian liberation movement and are pro-police state instead of doing all this.
2. The things that she’s said and co-signed on social media have been blatantly Islamophobic and racist, but unfortunately I have seen and directly heard similar rhetoric from many Jewish family and friends the past few months.
As a disabled and Jewish native New Yorker, a hearty fuck you to the legislators that passed this ban in the name of Jewish safety. This policy is deadly and will put multiply marginalized immunocompromised and disabled people in the crosshairs.
It's official: Mask ban in Nassau County, New York passes along party lines, 12-0 (7 abstentions). It makes wearing a mask a misdemeanor (with unclear health and religious exceptions) and gives police the power to fine people wearing a mask $1,000 and sentence them to jail time.