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> I find this to be a common for people who don’t think of themselves as disabled but are made disabled by bad interfaces A lot of disabled people today subscr

> I find this to be a common for people who don’t think of themselves as disabled but are made disabled by bad interfaces A lot of disabled people today subscribe to the "social model of disability" [0] rather than the "medical model". Under the social model, the obstacle is not some property of the individual experiencing an access issue, but are created by a system made by other people who didn't provide alternative access methods. Society and its inventions disable, rather than the individual's condition. Clearly, disabled people have mental or physiological conditions that produce non-mainstream access needs. None of them deny that... but the social model invites us to take a society-wide ownership of this, and to better support a wider range of access needs by default. In contrast, the medical model tends to situate the disability within the individual, based on their physiological condition. This tends to put the ownership on the individual (or their immediate carers), which in turn tends to perpetuate exclusion and access challenges. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_model_of_disability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_model_of_disability [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_model_of_disability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_model_of_disability

carlosjobim 2y ago
[flagged]
- tpxl 2y ago
  Disagree. Mandatory access ramps exists because we have decided it's a problem to be fixed by society, not the individual. The result is far greater access for people with wheelchairs. It's not about who's at fault, it's who has to provide a solution. Society has far more means to provide a solution than each individual.
  - rolph 2y ago
    when you[society] create the problem in the first place, its on you to fix it. major problem that needs fixing is leave things alone when there is no problem. forcing new tech, standards and spec, into place so even more money,influence,control can be attained is not a solution to any problem, its a source.
    - oblio 2y ago
      How does your comment relate in any way to the wheelchair ramp comment you're replying to?
  - carlosjobim 2y ago
    Individuals exist, "society" has never existed and will never exist. It's only individuals who can take actions. "Society" does not have any means at all, because it's just a mirage within the imagination of some people. It's individuals mandating the building of wheelchair ramps, it is individuals who build them, and individuals who use them. You don't need to give your nephew or niece a high paying job to make some weird theories about "society". You can instead just state the truth that some people can't walk and if you have the power you can mandate that business owners need to make their places accessible for these people.
    - afarviral 2y ago
      Oh right. Yes, I agree that motivated individuals get the work done for themselves and others. It's just that some people don't acknowledge that we collectively own problems/solutions because they are structural (inherent to the structures of our systems /"society") and tend to blame individuals for their own problems. Of course individuals can be wholey responsible for things, e.g. a corrupt politician. But getting rid of corruption is up to other individuals (I.e. society). It's idealist to imagine that a corrupt politician should just stop being corrupt, it's realistic to overthrow them collectively with other individuals (society).
    - fwip 2y ago
      Atoms exist, "molecules" have never existed and will never exist.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - astrocat 2y ago
      Your argument is essentially that emergent properties don't exist. It's like saying "there are no such things as waves in water, just individual water molecules." Individuals are the water molecules, and "society" is the blanket term for the emergent properties that happen when a lot of people are together. The phenomena are real and have real effects and impacts. Intrinsic and environmental factors affect the system: hydrogen bonds between water molecules (intrinsic) creates the emergent phenomenon we call "surface tension" and wind (environmental) creates waves. So too in people: intrinsic attributes of individuals and connections between them as well as environmental factors affecting entire populations create emergent effects that can be observed and studied. I suspect you mean to appeal to the recognition that, unlike water molecules, individual humans have free will and agency and the ability to make choices completely independently. I suspect you abhor the notion of 'groupthink' and excuses for behavior that are underpinned by concepts of culture and social constructs. And there is truth to these ideas, but as with most things, they are helpful as part of a broader model, and not as a totalitarian view of human behavior. We are complex creatures, in complex systems; to ignore the tendencies of our emergent behaviors is as risky as turning your back to a rough shorebreak, believing all the individual water molecules will simply be rational and choose not to hit you, only to be engulfed in a wave that really does exist.
  - bigstrat2003 2y ago
    > Mandatory access ramps exists because we have decided it's a problem to be fixed by society, not the individual. The result is far greater access for people with wheelchairs. I think that was a bad call. Society should not shape itself for the sake of a minority of people. That's just silly.
    - ifokiedoke 2y ago
      I forget where I read it, but this isn't a very thought-out view. _Especially_ with the example of access ramps -- yes, the ramps were originally put in after activism for better wheelchair accessibility. But who ended up using them a whole lot and benefiting from them? Parents with strollers. Would we say that the needs of parents of young children, or young children are a minority? Do we not care about their experience even when we're having a population crisis? In hindsight, this is a pretty obvious conclusion if we would have taken a bit of extra time to consider why we might want accessibility ramps, but instead we get sidetracked by exactly the kind of thinking displayed by your comment. When people say "accessibility is good for everyone" it's not a naive feel-good comment. It's an acknowledgement that at some point all of us could use help with accessibility (e.g. when you become a parent, when you get old, etc)
    - Gibbon1 2y ago
      Everyone is or will be a minority at some point.
      - carlosjobim 2y ago
        Wise comment.
    - Mawr 2y ago
      https://www.reddit.com/r/MadeMeSmile/comments/1gdzr3a/i_think_people_forget_accessibility_is_for/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MadeMeSmile/comments/1gdzr3a/i_thin...
    - oblio 2y ago
      I hope I'm missing some sarcasm here.
- afarviral 2y ago
  No. Everyone, instead of the affected person being blamed. Of course there are those in ivory towers doing a lot of waffling but the structural/societal view is always more productive than an individualist one which is ignoring the networked nature if reality in favour of optmistic idealism (bootstraps!).
  - carlosjobim 2y ago
    > Everyone, instead of the affected person being blamed. Who would ever blame a disabled person for their condition? Blaming people who have nothing to do with it is exactly the modern ideology that twists people into evil.
    - DiggyJohnson 2y ago
      Just a small correction to your question, it’s more like “who would ever say a disabled person is solely responsible for providing their own accommodations?”
      - carlosjobim 2y ago
        Good correction. In my experience, some people will say "It's society who is responsible to help the disabled person", and some people will say "It's I who am responsible to help the disabled person".
  - bigstrat2003 2y ago
    > ignoring the networked nature if reality in favour of optmistic idealism (bootstraps!) From my perspective, bootstrapping is reality. It is the people who deny that who are ignoring reality in favor of idealistic but false paradigms.
- dimal 2y ago
  That sounds like a typically glib and dismissive comment made without really trying to understand the situation. Until relatively recently, I never thought of myself as disabled, but in the past year I found this model helpful in understanding how I’m excluded from many parts of society because I’m autistic, and autistic needs are never considered. In reality, there’s nothing wrong with me, but many aspects of society are incompatible with me. Lucky you, that you don’t have this problem!
  - carlosjobim 2y ago
    This is what I'm trying to explain. Society doesn't exist anywhere besides in your head. When you're somewhere being "confronted with society", it's just other people. Each one an individual like you. So what you're saying is that some other people are never considering your needs. Dividing the world into "me" and "society" is a simplistic perspective that is far from the truth. The same for "us" and "society". It's always people, and each bears an individual responsibility as to their behaviour.
    - planckscnst 2y ago
      > Society doesn't exist anywhere besides in your head. How do you differentiate between what exists only in your head vs what exists elsewhere? Societies make choices that have physical and pragmatic realities associated with them. Those choices impact our everyday lives.
      - carlosjobim 2y ago
        > Societies make choices.... No, only people can make choices. Societies can never make choices, because they do not exist in the real world. One of the greatest mind prisons of this age is believing "societies" have any agency. It's always people, always was, always will be. We can also give up an offering to "luck" and pray for our luck to change, since luck "makes choices" all the time. Choices which impact your everyday life much more than "society". Or we can accept that these things don't have agency. How to differentiate between what exists in your head and elsewhere? Good question. Metaphysical. Society is an idea, an abstraction. It is only useful for us as long as we understand it doesn't really exist. Man should never be enslaved by man-made ideas. Other abstract ideas are more powerful and more beneficial. These are better to treat as real than "society".
- SalmonSnarker 2y ago
  I've snarked at your silliness down-thread, but there is a lot of good history that gives credibility to the notion of the social model of disability. You may enjoy "Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language: Hereditary Deafness on Martha’s Vineyard" (Groce '85) In communities where many individuals share a common sign language, deafness doesn't function as a disability in the same way it does when few individuals speak sign language.
  - carlosjobim 2y ago
    > In communities where many individuals share a common sign language, deafness doesn't function as a disability in the same way it does when few individuals speak sign language. Isn't that somewhat obvious? If you only speak Greek, it's a disability if you're not in Greece, but an advantage if you're there. I think it's a pity that sign language is almost never taught outside of for hearing impaired kids. Every person could have great use of sign language being commonly spoken. It lets you communicate silently and at long distances.
AlgorithmicTime 2y ago
[dead]
dvdkon 2y ago
This sounds like a good way to think about some disabilities (specific recognised ways of "not being normal") and very misleading and unproductive for other disabilities. A blind person can't participate in society to the same degree that a sighted person could, but the same is true of the entire world. We can (and arguably should) make their life easier by changing society, but unless you fix the root problem, they'll forever lack visual experiences. From another angle, life without a human society still has its challenges. Adding a society removes some and adds new ones. Some people only have problems with these new challenges, some struggle with the old as well. These two scenarios should be distinguished, perhaps by applying the "social" and "medical" models appropriately.
- Sophira 2y ago
  > We can (and arguably should) make their life easier by changing society, but unless you fix the root problem, they'll forever lack visual experiences. But not everybody wants to gain the experiences that would come from not having their condition. (This is especially true in the Deaf community[0], but can be seen in other communities as well.) And honestly? I feel that's a very valid viewpoint to have. The reason they "can't participate in society" to the same extent is because society doesn't let them! Thankfully, people are starting to realise that. [0] https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/08/understanding-deafness-not-everyone-wants-to-be-fixed/278527/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/08/understan...
  - dvdkon 2y ago
    I know about these tendencies, but I can't be sympathetic to them. (Re)gaining hearing is a physiological improvement; those with implants can even "turn off" noise. What these deaf people may lose is a specific deaf culture, held together by current necessity. But then the sides are flipped, and they are the ones perpetuating a non-inclusive (sub-)society.
    - the_other 2y ago
      A wider society that supports Deaf culture (or even just deaf ppl) would do things like provide email or SMS support for access to essential services instead of only providing telephone support and expecting the d/Deaf ppl to bring their own translators .
NavinF 2y ago
> social model of disability Scott Alexander convincingly argues against that model and provides a better one: https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/contra-the-social-model-of-disability https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/contra-the-social-model-of-...
- dahauns 2y ago
  Not that I disagree with Alexander here, but sometimes it feels like I'm taking crazy pills - this kind of integrated model has been WHO standard for over twenty years.
  - NavinF 2y ago
    As he noted, many people claim to use an integrated model. It's a motte and bailey. >I’ve never heard anyone willing to defend the actual Social Model the way it’s taught in every course, written on every website, and defined by every government agency. Everyone says they mean the Interactionist Model. Yet somehow, the official descriptions still say that disability is only social and not related to disease, and that you may only treat it with accommodations and not with medical care. > the topic is taught in a way that only occasionally nods to such a compromise; more often the Medical Model is condemned as outdated and bigoted, and the Social Model introduced as the new, acceptable version that people should use He quotes many sources that take the social model literally even in the 2020s
    - dahauns 2y ago
      Yeah...I actually didn't want to get all, well, "geographical", but I can't help wonder if that's a US thing? At least here in Austria, the biopsychosocial model has been standard in teaching for a long time, and while it will still take some time for the generational shift in practice to conclude, monofactorial models have generally been accepted as being obsolete. And regarding the BPS model: I stand corrected about my agreement - the point he makes about it I very much disagree with: >This isn’t an exact match for a model of disability; the Biopsychosocial Model is most often used to explain the causes of illness, not how it impairs people. Still, I think there is a close enough analogy that it could be easily extended to disability. He really shoud at least have read the Beginners Guide to the WHO ICF (which is deeply rooted in the BPSM) https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/icf-beginner-s-guide-towards-a-common-language-for-functioning-disability-and-health https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/icf-beginner-s-guide... Both the model as a model of disability and a focus on impairment can be found front and center.

carlosjobim 2y ago

[flagged]

tpxl 2y ago
Disagree. Mandatory access ramps exists because we have decided it's a problem to be fixed by society, not the individual. The result is far greater access for people with wheelchairs. It's not about who's at fault, it's who has to provide a solution. Society has far more means to provide a solution than each individual.
- rolph 2y ago
  when you[society] create the problem in the first place, its on you to fix it. major problem that needs fixing is leave things alone when there is no problem. forcing new tech, standards and spec, into place so even more money,influence,control can be attained is not a solution to any problem, its a source.
  - oblio 2y ago
    How does your comment relate in any way to the wheelchair ramp comment you're replying to?
- carlosjobim 2y ago
  Individuals exist, "society" has never existed and will never exist. It's only individuals who can take actions. "Society" does not have any means at all, because it's just a mirage within the imagination of some people. It's individuals mandating the building of wheelchair ramps, it is individuals who build them, and individuals who use them. You don't need to give your nephew or niece a high paying job to make some weird theories about "society". You can instead just state the truth that some people can't walk and if you have the power you can mandate that business owners need to make their places accessible for these people.
  - afarviral 2y ago
    Oh right. Yes, I agree that motivated individuals get the work done for themselves and others. It's just that some people don't acknowledge that we collectively own problems/solutions because they are structural (inherent to the structures of our systems /"society") and tend to blame individuals for their own problems. Of course individuals can be wholey responsible for things, e.g. a corrupt politician. But getting rid of corruption is up to other individuals (I.e. society). It's idealist to imagine that a corrupt politician should just stop being corrupt, it's realistic to overthrow them collectively with other individuals (society).
  - fwip 2y ago
    Atoms exist, "molecules" have never existed and will never exist.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - astrocat 2y ago
    Your argument is essentially that emergent properties don't exist. It's like saying "there are no such things as waves in water, just individual water molecules." Individuals are the water molecules, and "society" is the blanket term for the emergent properties that happen when a lot of people are together. The phenomena are real and have real effects and impacts. Intrinsic and environmental factors affect the system: hydrogen bonds between water molecules (intrinsic) creates the emergent phenomenon we call "surface tension" and wind (environmental) creates waves. So too in people: intrinsic attributes of individuals and connections between them as well as environmental factors affecting entire populations create emergent effects that can be observed and studied. I suspect you mean to appeal to the recognition that, unlike water molecules, individual humans have free will and agency and the ability to make choices completely independently. I suspect you abhor the notion of 'groupthink' and excuses for behavior that are underpinned by concepts of culture and social constructs. And there is truth to these ideas, but as with most things, they are helpful as part of a broader model, and not as a totalitarian view of human behavior. We are complex creatures, in complex systems; to ignore the tendencies of our emergent behaviors is as risky as turning your back to a rough shorebreak, believing all the individual water molecules will simply be rational and choose not to hit you, only to be engulfed in a wave that really does exist.
- bigstrat2003 2y ago
  > Mandatory access ramps exists because we have decided it's a problem to be fixed by society, not the individual. The result is far greater access for people with wheelchairs. I think that was a bad call. Society should not shape itself for the sake of a minority of people. That's just silly.
  - ifokiedoke 2y ago
    I forget where I read it, but this isn't a very thought-out view. _Especially_ with the example of access ramps -- yes, the ramps were originally put in after activism for better wheelchair accessibility. But who ended up using them a whole lot and benefiting from them? Parents with strollers. Would we say that the needs of parents of young children, or young children are a minority? Do we not care about their experience even when we're having a population crisis? In hindsight, this is a pretty obvious conclusion if we would have taken a bit of extra time to consider why we might want accessibility ramps, but instead we get sidetracked by exactly the kind of thinking displayed by your comment. When people say "accessibility is good for everyone" it's not a naive feel-good comment. It's an acknowledgement that at some point all of us could use help with accessibility (e.g. when you become a parent, when you get old, etc)
  - Gibbon1 2y ago
    Everyone is or will be a minority at some point.
    - carlosjobim 2y ago
      Wise comment.
  - Mawr 2y ago
    https://www.reddit.com/r/MadeMeSmile/comments/1gdzr3a/i_think_people_forget_accessibility_is_for/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MadeMeSmile/comments/1gdzr3a/i_thin...
  - oblio 2y ago
    I hope I'm missing some sarcasm here.
afarviral 2y ago
No. Everyone, instead of the affected person being blamed. Of course there are those in ivory towers doing a lot of waffling but the structural/societal view is always more productive than an individualist one which is ignoring the networked nature if reality in favour of optmistic idealism (bootstraps!).
- carlosjobim 2y ago
  > Everyone, instead of the affected person being blamed. Who would ever blame a disabled person for their condition? Blaming people who have nothing to do with it is exactly the modern ideology that twists people into evil.
  - DiggyJohnson 2y ago
    Just a small correction to your question, it’s more like “who would ever say a disabled person is solely responsible for providing their own accommodations?”
    - carlosjobim 2y ago
      Good correction. In my experience, some people will say "It's society who is responsible to help the disabled person", and some people will say "It's I who am responsible to help the disabled person".
- bigstrat2003 2y ago
  > ignoring the networked nature if reality in favour of optmistic idealism (bootstraps!) From my perspective, bootstrapping is reality. It is the people who deny that who are ignoring reality in favor of idealistic but false paradigms.
dimal 2y ago
That sounds like a typically glib and dismissive comment made without really trying to understand the situation. Until relatively recently, I never thought of myself as disabled, but in the past year I found this model helpful in understanding how I’m excluded from many parts of society because I’m autistic, and autistic needs are never considered. In reality, there’s nothing wrong with me, but many aspects of society are incompatible with me. Lucky you, that you don’t have this problem!
- carlosjobim 2y ago
  This is what I'm trying to explain. Society doesn't exist anywhere besides in your head. When you're somewhere being "confronted with society", it's just other people. Each one an individual like you. So what you're saying is that some other people are never considering your needs. Dividing the world into "me" and "society" is a simplistic perspective that is far from the truth. The same for "us" and "society". It's always people, and each bears an individual responsibility as to their behaviour.
  - planckscnst 2y ago
    > Society doesn't exist anywhere besides in your head. How do you differentiate between what exists only in your head vs what exists elsewhere? Societies make choices that have physical and pragmatic realities associated with them. Those choices impact our everyday lives.
    - carlosjobim 2y ago
      > Societies make choices.... No, only people can make choices. Societies can never make choices, because they do not exist in the real world. One of the greatest mind prisons of this age is believing "societies" have any agency. It's always people, always was, always will be. We can also give up an offering to "luck" and pray for our luck to change, since luck "makes choices" all the time. Choices which impact your everyday life much more than "society". Or we can accept that these things don't have agency. How to differentiate between what exists in your head and elsewhere? Good question. Metaphysical. Society is an idea, an abstraction. It is only useful for us as long as we understand it doesn't really exist. Man should never be enslaved by man-made ideas. Other abstract ideas are more powerful and more beneficial. These are better to treat as real than "society".
SalmonSnarker 2y ago
I've snarked at your silliness down-thread, but there is a lot of good history that gives credibility to the notion of the social model of disability. You may enjoy "Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language: Hereditary Deafness on Martha’s Vineyard" (Groce '85) In communities where many individuals share a common sign language, deafness doesn't function as a disability in the same way it does when few individuals speak sign language.
- carlosjobim 2y ago
  > In communities where many individuals share a common sign language, deafness doesn't function as a disability in the same way it does when few individuals speak sign language. Isn't that somewhat obvious? If you only speak Greek, it's a disability if you're not in Greece, but an advantage if you're there. I think it's a pity that sign language is almost never taught outside of for hearing impaired kids. Every person could have great use of sign language being commonly spoken. It lets you communicate silently and at long distances.

AlgorithmicTime 2y ago

[dead]

dvdkon 2y ago

This sounds like a good way to think about some disabilities (specific recognised ways of "not being normal") and very misleading and unproductive for other disabilities. A blind person can't participate in society to the same degree that a sighted person could, but the same is true of the entire world. We can (and arguably should) make their life easier by changing society, but unless you fix the root problem, they'll forever lack visual experiences. From another angle, life without a human society still has its challenges. Adding a society removes some and adds new ones. Some people only have problems with these new challenges, some struggle with the old as well. These two scenarios should be distinguished, perhaps by applying the "social" and "medical" models appropriately.

Sophira 2y ago
> We can (and arguably should) make their life easier by changing society, but unless you fix the root problem, they'll forever lack visual experiences. But not everybody wants to gain the experiences that would come from not having their condition. (This is especially true in the Deaf community[0], but can be seen in other communities as well.) And honestly? I feel that's a very valid viewpoint to have. The reason they "can't participate in society" to the same extent is because society doesn't let them! Thankfully, people are starting to realise that. [0] https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/08/understanding-deafness-not-everyone-wants-to-be-fixed/278527/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/08/understan...
- dvdkon 2y ago
  I know about these tendencies, but I can't be sympathetic to them. (Re)gaining hearing is a physiological improvement; those with implants can even "turn off" noise. What these deaf people may lose is a specific deaf culture, held together by current necessity. But then the sides are flipped, and they are the ones perpetuating a non-inclusive (sub-)society.
  - the_other 2y ago
    A wider society that supports Deaf culture (or even just deaf ppl) would do things like provide email or SMS support for access to essential services instead of only providing telephone support and expecting the d/Deaf ppl to bring their own translators .

NavinF 2y ago

> social model of disability Scott Alexander convincingly argues against that model and provides a better one: https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/contra-the-social-model-of-disability https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/contra-the-social-model-of-...

dahauns 2y ago
Not that I disagree with Alexander here, but sometimes it feels like I'm taking crazy pills - this kind of integrated model has been WHO standard for over twenty years.
- NavinF 2y ago
  As he noted, many people claim to use an integrated model. It's a motte and bailey. >I’ve never heard anyone willing to defend the actual Social Model the way it’s taught in every course, written on every website, and defined by every government agency. Everyone says they mean the Interactionist Model. Yet somehow, the official descriptions still say that disability is only social and not related to disease, and that you may only treat it with accommodations and not with medical care. > the topic is taught in a way that only occasionally nods to such a compromise; more often the Medical Model is condemned as outdated and bigoted, and the Social Model introduced as the new, acceptable version that people should use He quotes many sources that take the social model literally even in the 2020s
  - dahauns 2y ago
    Yeah...I actually didn't want to get all, well, "geographical", but I can't help wonder if that's a US thing? At least here in Austria, the biopsychosocial model has been standard in teaching for a long time, and while it will still take some time for the generational shift in practice to conclude, monofactorial models have generally been accepted as being obsolete. And regarding the BPS model: I stand corrected about my agreement - the point he makes about it I very much disagree with: >This isn’t an exact match for a model of disability; the Biopsychosocial Model is most often used to explain the causes of illness, not how it impairs people. Still, I think there is a close enough analogy that it could be easily extended to disability. He really shoud at least have read the Beginners Guide to the WHO ICF (which is deeply rooted in the BPSM) https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/icf-beginner-s-guide-towards-a-common-language-for-functioning-disability-and-health https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/icf-beginner-s-guide... Both the model as a model of disability and a focus on impairment can be found front and center.