The Fine Line Between Disabled and Abled
Author: Keystone Human Services - Contact: khs.org
Published: 2016/06/27 - Updated: 2025/02/07
Publication Type: Opinion Piece, Editorial
Topic: Disability Information - Publications List
Page Content: Synopsis - Introduction - Main
Synopsis: Article examines the fine line between abled and the reality of the ease of becoming disabled.
Why it matters: This article examines the fluid boundary between being "abled" and "disabled," emphasizing that disability is a natural part of the human experience. It challenges the traditional medical model, which views disability solely as an individual's defect to be corrected, and instead promotes understanding disability as a continuum that all individuals may experience at different life stages. This perspective encourages a more inclusive view, recognizing that societal structures often create arbitrary distinctions between "abled" and "disabled." Such insights are valuable for everyone, including people with disabilities and seniors, fostering a more nuanced appreciation of human diversity - Disabled World (DW).
Introduction
One of the challenges the disability rights movement has put before us all is to see disability in the context of how society has created a somewhat arbitrary "line" between 'disabled' and 'abled.'
Main Item
We have been urged to see disability as a natural part of the human condition, with all people falling along with that continuum at different places throughout life. For example, we enter the world almost completely disabled, and many of us will become so again in our later years - (Tips for the Newly Disabled).
In between, we all experience varying degrees of ability and disability, which enters into a simple discussion of how much support we need to negotiate the world at a given time.
To me, this gives a more satisfying way to think about disability and ability and also helps undo some medical model formation that trains professionals (and everyone) that there are two distinct types of people - 'us' (the helpers and so-called non-disabled people) and 'them' (the disabled people themselves).
It was an uncomfortable way to structure my thinking initially, but over time I have come to appreciate it a great deal. It is much more nuanced and real to me.
Fitting this into our practice as professionals are very hard, though, because much of the traditional thinking around disability is at odds with this in significant ways. It seems many professionals find it threatening.
Medical model thinking is a strongly embedded notion that is just now being challenged by those fighting for the cause of disability rights. As has happened in many other places, this strong advocacy is led by people with physical disabilities and informed by historical civil rights movements worldwide.
There is a long way to travel for people with developmental and psycho-social disabilities, as there is for many other groups of marginalized and oppressed people. Mindsets run deep, but the conversation is moving, and the lines that separate people are a little less clear.