9 Realities of being on Disability

Every election cycle, every time disability comes up in the news, there will be at least one mention of the lazy people who live on government assistance. It seems at least every year, some new bill adding barriers to receiving disability or attacking so-called fraud in the system will be put forth.

There seems to be this mistaken perceptions that disability is filled with abled people who are lying about being sick in order to lead the “easy life” of living on disability. This idea that fraud is rampant and that people are living in the lap of luxury.

This idea is so ludicrous compared to the realities of what it is really like living on Disability. So here are 9 and one bonus, realities of living on disability.

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9 Realities of being on Disability
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Is There Something Wrong With Your Eye?

At Mandesty, we not only discuss immodest dress but also behavior. We’ve tried to talk to PM Slutty McSinful but he just keeps going on with his immodest self.

Anyway, we’ll continue to talk about ways in which behavior can be immodest.

Today we will focus on winking. Yes, winking aka the Devil’s eye tick.

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Being Modest is very Hardy for this boy.

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(Dis)honorable Mentions

Not winks but slutty eyes nonetheless

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The Devil probably made him an offer he couldn’t refuse
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This was added to this post for…reasons
Is There Something Wrong With Your Eye?

Making Peace with my Body

CN: This Post includes mentions of assault, drug use, and body image issues

On May 14th, I finally managed to get my first tattoo. Ever since I was a kid, I had an obsession with drawing pictures on myself. Whenever I was able, I would get henna tattoos of various sorts. I loved the idea of wearing art on my own skin.

Growing up, my parents would appreciate the art, but still disapprove of the whole concept of tattoos. They believed them to be irresponsible, silly, and a waste of money. They made the jokes that have become a social trope, about the hilarity of aged skin and what those tattoos would look like on a senior. It’s not uncommon to hear boomers of all sorts complaining about them and about the people who get them.

Until I was diagnosed with Psoriatic Arthritis and lost major functionality in my legs, I expected to grow up to be a doctor. If not that, I at least expected to be a professional of some sort. I knew that I would be doing myself if I got a tattoo somewhere visible, and so I made myself a deal: I wouldn’t get a tattoo until I turned 25. If I still wanted it by that point, then it was something I truly wanted and could find a way to make it happen.

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Making Peace with my Body

Dismissed By People like You

CN Spoilers for Grace and Frankie, NSFW, Discussions of Sex, Consent, Mentions of Rape

Note: The bottom quote does not include some of the text, but has been edited down to contain the relevant parts of the discussion.

Grace: What are we doing? I’ll tell you what we’re doing. We’re We’re making vibrators for women with arthritis.

Frankie: Yes! Vibrators! Brilliant!

Grace: Oh, grow up. Older women masturbate too.

Frankie: And we have vaginas.

Brianna:  I highly doubt there’s a vibrator market for geriatric women with arthritis.

Grace: There is. I’m in agony.

Frankie: It takes a lot longer for us to get off, Sol.

Grace: She’s right. Our blood doesn’t flow as easily – and our genital tissue is more delicate. I did some reading. The more effort it takes to orgasm, the more you irritate it, and the more it inflames your arthritis. And I mean shouldn’t older women have it better than that?

Mallory: How do I explain to my children that their grandma makes sex toys for other grandmas?

Grace: I’ll tell you what you can tell them, honey. We’re making things for people like us, because we are sick and tired of being dismissed by people like you.

So ends the second season of Grace and Frankie. The line “We’re making things for people like us, because we are sick and tired of being dismissed by people like you.” Seems to me like a perfect summary of the first two seasons of Grace and Frankie. Nominally the show is about two older women relearning how to live on their own after their husbands leave them for each other.

More than that, the show is about two older women realizing the extent to which they have been taken for granted, and the extent to which women past a certain age get treated as invisible and irrelevant. The level to which women’s identities are subsumed into that of their families and especially their husbands.

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Dismissed By People like You

Intersections within Intersections Part 2 of 2

Part One Here … 

This is a fairly long post, so I split it into two parts. I ask however, that you not respond to either of them unless you have read both. There are nuances to both parts that I think are pretty essential to one another. Because this is dealing with some heavy and possibly delicate areas of theory, I’m pretty terrified of some of it being lost. 

I’ve run into similar arguments before at different times, being told that black people cannot be ableist. At the time I believed, and still do, that the statement is completely false. Not only is claiming that black people are not influenced in the same way by social prejudice as everyone else seems to me like a form of benevolent racism which is still harmful, but it is especially damaging to disabled black people. By that logic, a disabled black person who has to struggle with ableism in her community and in her family would be told that her experiences are not real.

It can be tempting to excuse a black person’s ableism towards a white person given the history of racism, but even with the racial power dynamics at play, ableism hurts black people too. A person who feels comfortable insulting someone on the basis of disability because they are white, is unlikely to treat disabled people of their own race any better. The ableism will inform their actions towards other disabled people, and even when it doesn’t, the ableism they display at disabled white people, will cause splash damaged to disabled black people.

However, in having the discussion, it is important for me to be aware of my own privilege.

I commented to a friend recently, that in these discussions the framing is always a white woman talking to a black woman, but why can’t it ever be framed as a disabled woman talking to an abled woman. This was, after all, a discussion about ableism and I was speaking as someone affected by it.

The answer of course is because it is always both.

Continue reading “Intersections within Intersections Part 2 of 2”

Intersections within Intersections Part 2 of 2

Intersections Within Intersections Part 1 of 2

This is a fairly long post, so I split it into two parts. I ask however, that you not respond to either of them unless you have read both. There are nuances to both parts that I think are pretty essential to one another. Because this is dealing with some heavy and possibly delicate areas of theory, I’m pretty terrified of some of it being lost. 

Earlier, I participated in a bait thread on a friend’s wall that made the statement: All men who do not stop street harassment, are complicit in it. Many of us came onto the thread to agree with this statement, until someone jumped in to accuse all of us of being racist. The argument was that it is not always safe for certain men to speak up in certain circumstances. I agreed that this was true, but argues that that didn’t change their complicity. The responder then accused me of having said that all men are culpable always.

I will concede that perhaps a clarification could have been added specifying that this was referring specifically to gendered street harassment, and not other forms of hate speech that may get thrown about on the streets. While all forms of harassment on the street are bad and should be talked about, there is something unique about gendered harassment in that many people are not convinced it is a bad thing. Many respond to concerns about it saying that “It’s meant as a compliment. I wish people would yell nice things at me walking down the street.” (For the purposes of this post, when I refer to street harassment, I am specifically taking about this gendered type and not all forms of hate speech spoken on the street. )

Continue reading “Intersections Within Intersections Part 1 of 2”

Intersections Within Intersections Part 1 of 2

Modesty is Knowing when to Shut Up

At Mandesty, we feature men who are inmodest in dress. But as discussed in a previous post, immodest behavior can also be displayed by the way you carry yourself.

So, today I will not write about clothing but about behavior.

 

Every day is a new opportunity to tell women what I think

Men, I know it’s hard to break old habits. Otherwise MRA forums wouldn’t exist and those men would actually get lives.

I know it’s especially hard because you’ve been told that everything you say is important and no one else matters. Just look at the King of Immodest Behavior, Donald Trump.

Speaking of 45, I know you like to hear yourself talk, and like to be the center of attention. But did you know that you can grab people’s attention and also not be an insufferable walnut? Did you know that sometimes, you won’t get attention and that’s OK? Did you know that most toddlers can grasp this concept?

So, start practicing some self-restraint and learn when to sit down, shut up and listen.

Modesty is Knowing when to Shut Up