Disability Pride Month Special Edition 🎉
And what an edition we have in store for you...
✨ Reflecting on what motivates us in our advocacy with our Spotlight Series Activists
✨ Bringing Disability Pride to Ireland - Article by trailblazer and founder of Disability Power Ireland, Maryam Madani.
✨ What does Disability Pride Mean To You? - Reader survey responses
✨ A very short news round up
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[Image: a graphic with the Disability Pride Flag colours with images of scrap paper flowers, stars, books, hands, a megaphone and newspaper. Text reads: “Disability Pride Month Special Edition.]
Reflecting on what motivates us in our advocacy
Advocacy is a constant feature in the lives of disabled people.
It takes place through protest, campaigns, meetings, banners and posters, public speaking, social media, and hosting events.
It also takes place quietly in GP appointments, meetings with teachers, voicenotes and check ins with family, friends and neighbours, sharing information in group chats to spread the word, constant form filling for basic supports, art, poetry, emails and phone calls to politicians, writing articles, submissions and grant applications, speaking up when experiencing ableism/disablism or inaccessible workplaces and environments, supporting community who have experienced ableism/disablism.
It takes place through being forced to resort to the legal system to access rights already promised to you and others, supporting disabled artists, educators, creators and performers, donating and supporting interconnected causes and communities, organising meetings, promoting intersectional approaches, and speaking up in rooms to ask for disabled and marginalised voices to be at the decision making table.
Advocacy takes place in so many forms, and this Disability Pride Month we want to acknowledge them all.
It can also take its toll, so we’re highlighting some words from our Spotlight Series activists on what keeps them going.
You can find the full interviews over on our website www.disabilityparticipation.ie.
[Image 1: A graphic with a purple background and images of a disability pride flag, hands, plants and flowers, stars and a megaphone. Text reads: “Spotlight Series: Reflecting on what keeps us motivated in our advocacy”.]
[Image 2: A graphic with a purple background and images of a disability pride flag, hands, plants, flowers and stars. Text above a photo of Emma Ward reads: “Spotlight Series: Reflecting on what keeps us motivated in our advocacy”. Emma’s quote reads: “...my nephew Patrick is what keeps me motivated, he’s the reason I became an activist and as he gets older he reminds me to be motivated to make positive change for him and the younger generation of people with disabilities.”]
[Image 3: A graphic with a purple background and images of a disability pride flag, hands, plants, flowers and stars. Text around a photo of Avril Greham reads: “Spotlight Series: Reflecting on what keeps us motivated in our advocacy”. Avril’s quote reads: “It’s the people. The messages, the conversations, the stories people trust you with. When someone says, “that’s exactly how I feel but I never had the words,” that sticks with you.” “I also think back to my younger self. The moments of being left out, or made feel like a burden, without understanding why. If I can help shift that experience for even one person coming up behind me, then it’s worth it...”]
[Image 5: A graphic with a purple background and images of a disability pride flag, hands, plants, flowers and stars. Text above a photo of Christine O’Mahony reads: ““A lot of my activism is centred around my personal experience – like being disabled, being lgbt, being a person of colour etc. I know I would not like somebody giving up on me, so this is what motivates me in my activism as a lot of the groups I represent are vulnerable and need the support.”]
Bringing Disability Pride to Ireland
Bringing Disability Pride to Ireland
by Maryam Madani
In the summer of 2021, I logged on to a Disability Pride Parade Meeting in Chicago at midnight, six hours ahead in Ireland. I was nervous to share my budding dream to start a Disability Pride Parade with the group who ran the very first one in the world in 2004.
Disability Pride Month originated in the USA to mark the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, but its meaning is universal. Since the original parade in Chicago there are now parades in Senegal, Norway, New York, Rome, Milan, Brighton, Berlin. Each one takes its own approach, but there had been none in Ireland yet.
My wild desire to create a Disability Pride Parade in Ireland came from love and the hope of creating something beautiful for our marginalised, abused community that is at once so overlooked and so over-saturated with talent; to create an uplifting moment of communal joy and affirmation that we are perfect just as we are; to counteract with joy the messages we are constantly bombarded with which claim otherwise.
Disability Pride is necessary because the idea of disabled people having anything to be proud of about our disabled bodies, culture and existence is still a radical concept.
Sarah Triano wrote in her definition of disability pride that it “is a militant act of self-definition, a purposive valuing of that which is socially devalued, and an attempt to untangle ourselves from the complex matrix of negative beliefs, attitudes, and feelings that grow from the dominant group’s assumption that there is something inherently wrong with our disabilities and identity.”
I wanted to make sure that the Irish Disability Pride Parade was not only joyful and artistic but grassroots, led by disabled people themselves and entwined with the disability rights movement. That’s where the “power”, unique to what is now the Irish version of disability pride, comes in- to emphasise people power, to nurture and ignite the disability rights movement and get us out on the streets again so that we can be recognised as a powerful force and voting bloc, and align ourselves with other social movements in keeping with the intersectionality of disability justice, the concept that “none are free unless all are free.”
To my surprise, I was treated on the Chicago call like an honoured guest and welcomed with the biggest smile radiating light from Justin Cooper, the parade’s Grand Marshall. They gave so much genuine encouragement and love to a stranger from the other side of the world, because disabled people always recognise their fellow keepers of the flame.
In the three years that followed, I set up a DPO, Disability Power Ireland, and organised the first Disability Pride Parade and Festivals in Ireland for three years with the support of friends and volunteers from the disabled community. Clare Leader Forum held wonderful sister parades to amplify this work each year.
The parades themselves were bigger than I imagined- it was emotional to see over 200 disabled people and allies uniting together on the streets each year, with over 24 supporting DPOs, disability and intersectional ally organisations taking part.
The atmosphere that participants created was exactly as Disability Pride should be- a combination of protest, celebration and affirmation for the disabled community, and unity and expansion for the disability rights movement.
However, unforeseen challenges abounded, most prominently in barriers to accessing funding and low volunteer capacity, and due to burnout, I made the difficult decision to reduce the pressure, put the wellbeing of myself and any volunteers first and postpone the next parade to 2027 to have more time to recover, gather funding, and run on crip time bi-annually instead.
I am pleased to announce that Lush Cosmetics kindly reached out to us as our first sponsor, and are launching a limited edition “Access All Areas” soap, available in all Irish stores on or before August 11th, with 75% of proceeds going towards the next parade- please keep an eye out to get yours!
In our first festival year, Justin spoke with us on our international Disability Pride panel online. It was one of my dreams to meet him at the Chicago Disability Pride Parade in person.
On July 9, 2024, Justin Cooper passed away at only 41 years of age. Chicago celebrates his legacy and beautiful soul each year.
The dream of liberation for the disabled community is bigger than any of us, bigger than the population in any one country, big enough to take over the world. The flame is passed between us from generation to generation, in country to country, wherever we have the joy and privilege of meeting, no matter how long our moment of connection lasts. We each play our part in trying to make the world better so that younger generations don’t have to suffer to the same extent that we did. We rejoice in seeing reflected in each other how disability is, in the words of our wonderful Dr. Rosaleen McDonagh, Parade Ambassador in 2024, “a beautiful aesthetic.”
Last year I received a message from a vivacious younger disabled activist in Spain who wants to start a Disability Pride Parade there. And on it goes.
[Image: A photo of the Disability Pride Parade in Dublin with people carrying balloons and banners.]
Notes
Maryam Madani is a writer, performer, wheelchair dancer and the founder of Disability Power Ireland, for whom she created Ireland’s first Disability Pride and Power Parade and Festival. She holds a BA in English Studies from Trinity College Dublin and an MA in Journalism from TU Dublin.
Follow more of Maryam’s work here.
@keepitwheelwithmaryam on Instagram or keepitwheel.ie
You can learn more about Disability Power Ireland and previous Disability Pride Parades here.
Be sure to keep an eye on Disability Power Ireland’s social media for updates and more information on its Lush collaboration.
Image description: Image shows the Lush Cosmetics limited edition soap, in yellow with the word “soap” written in braille”, and a red rope and easy-to-grip shape to make it easier to handle.
What does Disability Pride Mean To You?
This month, we asked you to tell us what Disability Pride means to you through our reader survey.
We also asked what you would like to highlight or raise awareness of this month.
Find some of the responses below, and thank you to everyone who took part!
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: What does Disability Pride Mean To You?
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “It's the joy and mutual understanding of disabled kinship! It's in the creativity of disabled artists, the solidarity of disabled communities, and the power we hold when we unite together :-) I love my disabled life! I love my disabled community! We deserve to celebrate our lives and all the things that make us so human! A chance for us to have something curated uniquely by us for us; not pandered and dictated by corporations, not diluted for non-disabled comfort; not forced into a compromise of access barriers; something that truly is for all of us in all of our ordinary, messy, and beautifully disabled lives.” This quote is from the Queer Shed Dún Laoghaire - Rathdown
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “It means not being ashamed of having a disability. It means being seen as having the same value as able-bodied person.”
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “Disability Pride month means a lot because the disabled people community gets to visibly celebrate what makes them who they are, apart from my home I never had that experience growing up so its great to see people being so proud of their differences.” - Emma Ward.
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “It’s not something that’s really been on my radar.” -Paula Geraghty. “Being a full deck of wildcards” - Ezrah
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “Disability Pride is a way to highlight our disabilities as there are a lot of misinformation out there and people seem to think they know what we need. It’s also a way to be proud of who we are as society wants us to be helpless” - Christine O’Mahony
“Disability Pride is something that we have always needed, but we need it especially now as our disabled siblings in the UK, and the US are experiencing a roll back on rights and government support. As well as the ongoing disabling events as a result of colonial violence in Palestine, Sudan, Ukraine and beyond.
Disability Pride is a reminder to us and the world that Disability is not a dirty word - and disabled people deserve the same rights of dignity, respect and freedom as all people.
Disabled people will continue to fight for our rights and the rights of our oppressed siblings.
For me, Disability Pride month is a chance to celebrate the Disabled community and the incredible work that they are doing to try and support all members of the community. There’s so much work still to be done in this area, but I’m proud of the intersectionality that I’m beginning to see within the Disabled community.
Those of us who are more likely to be heard have a responsibility to uplift the voices of those least heard. Especially the non-speaking community, those living in residential settings with little access to mainstream conversations and often overlooked multiply marginalised communities. I hope that this continues to grow and that more and more of these lesser heard voices are given a chance to explain their lived reality.
I’m also proud of the strength that the Disabled community has shown in tackling issues specific to our community such as stigma, prejudice and misinformation and supporting other issues in the wider human rights field. Disabled rights are human rights and viewing them as such is essential in providing support and enacting the change.
Every day, Disabled people offer support and guidance to their peers and supporters to try to create a better future for all those of our Disabled kin coming up behind us. Because we don’t want them to have to go through what we’ve gone through. And I’m proud of us for being able to use our life experience to try and better the life experiences of others.
I’m also proud of the growing community that we have here in Ireland – the comfort, support and help that we have offered to each other. It’s only by banding together that we will facilitate the changes that we need in this country for all Disabled people, young and old. I’m proud of my community using its strong sense of justice to strive for more neuro-affirming and disability-friendly supports and services. And in the wider community, recognising that issues such as the homelessness crisis, cost of living crisis, and the growing attacks on Trans and other LGBTQIA people affect all of us and are part of our community as well.
And, for me, Disabilty pride is a form of resistance – inspired by the words of Audre Lord “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence. It is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare”.
In a world that often tries to tell me that my way of being, and that of those I love, is wrong – that the way we move, communicate, interpret the world is “disordered” and that we should feel shame or stigma, feeling proud is an act of rebellion and pushing back. It is not accepting this tragedy narrative – it is recognising the struggles but also celebrating the joys, it is acknowledging that things can be difficult for disabled and marginalised groups but that we are strong, capable and caring.
The notion of ‘Radical Self Love’ described by Sonya Renee Taylor plays into my understanding of Disability Pride – self acceptance and compassion and extending that acceptance and compassion to my Disabled clann and those who support us.”
-Gillian Kearns, Neuro Pride Ireland and Disabled Women Ireland.
Image: A photo of Gillian standing with a sign at a protest that reads “I don’t exist to “inspire” you”.
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: What would you like to raise awareness of this Disability Pride Month?
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “Hidden disabilities/neurodivergent- just because you can’t see a disability doesn’t mean people aren’t disabled” - Christine O’Mahony
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “There’s no pride in genocide, especially now that so many people in Gaza are now disabled and when rebuilding takes place a lot of accommodation is going to have to considered in the reconstruction.” - Ezrah
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “To start on a more positive part, I would love to highlight the mantra that says nothing about us without us, thats very prevalent when it comes to making our country better, it cannot be done until all disabled people are properly supported also would love to raise more awareness around rare disaeases/lack of funding.” - Emma Ward
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “Independent living! And intersectionality. Being multiply disabled doesn’t mean I can’t pursue higher education, keep a good job, or be a wonderful parent. We’re some of the hardest workers I know! The problem is that I don’t “”look”“ disabled and therefore no employer, landlord or doctor takes me seriously. It also means that when I marry the love of my life, the state will no longer support me. I need large-scale public awareness of the United Nation’s Charter on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, and how many areas Ireland fails to meet! It so clearly states that we have every right and desire to pursue the same lives as everyone else; that we deserve a good quality of life. Living here (even in one of the most accessible areas!) feels dehumanising sometimes. You’ll never meet a warmer, hardworking and sound group of people and I wish more non-disabled people could see that!
Please also highlight the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. It’s been so brill to see so many communities coming together and hosting their own events but I can’t read any of the info!! Our lives are so valuable (and rich in culture at that!) that there’s no reason not to celebrate. I wish more people knew that the population of disabled people across the globe is growing every day and it’s the only minority group you could become a part of at any second. Accessibility is a win for all of us in this life and the next! The only negative thing I have to bring to the discussion is how widely generative artificial intelligence (genAI) is touted on our behalf. It deeply saddens and disappoints me that so many do not think we are capable enough to do things without completely destroying the earth. The climate catastrophe passed its tipping point in February of 2026 - billions of people will face disability because of it. And if not climate-related disasters, it’ll be because of wars. Disability doesn’t absolve me of the responsibility I have to my fellow humans and I’m so tired of people using me as an excuse for their own immoral actions!!” - Queer Shed Dún Laoghaire - Rathdown.
Image: a graphic with the disability pride flag colours. Text reads: “The importance of disabled people in history. Highlighting those who have helped advocate for better disability rights”
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