"Disability" [View all]

[unrepentant progress]

Last edited Sun Apr 7, 2013, 08:24 PM - Edit history (2)

Had dinner the Thursday night before last with a group of disability scholars, educators, advocates, and writer and poet-activists with disabilities. Talk around the table touched on many things, but kept coming back around to this story on NPR's This American Life, Unfit for Work: The Startling Rise in Disability in America, by Chana Joffe-Walt. What's “startling” to Joffe-Walt isn't that there's been a rise in the number of disabled Americans, but that there's been a rise in the number of people with "disabilities" collecting disability benefits instead of going out and earning a paycheck.

It's an exasperating piece, exemplifying much of what's wrong with elite journalism and for that reason will probably earn Joffe-Walt all kinds of awards, rewards, and plaudits from her peers. The consensus among my dinner companions was that it ought to earn her a place in hell or at least some remedial time in their classrooms.

Naturally, considering their conditions, situations, experiences, and interests, they were furious at the many ways they felt Joffe-Walt had failed to address real and serious issues regarding disabilities and had implicitly maligned all people with disabilities as cheats and layabouts.

They were in agreement that Joffe-Walt is a complete ignoramus on the subject of disability and they had lots of recommendations for books and articles she should have read and scholars and activists she should have spoken with. But most of them were academics and academics live on the belief that a little reading and a little education can do wonders.

http://lancemannion.typepad.com/lance_mannion/2013/04/disability.html

After reading Lance's post, read this open letter from former commissioners of the Social Security Administration:

As former Commissioners of the Social Security Administration (SSA), we write to express our significant concerns regarding a series recently aired on This American Life, All Things Considered, and National Public Radio stations across the U.S. ("Unfit for Work: The Startling Rise of Disability in America&quot . Our nation’s Social Security system serves as a vital lifeline for millions of individuals with severe disabilities. We feel compelled to share our unique insight into the Social Security system because we know firsthand the dangers of mischaracterizing the disability programs via sensational,anecdote-based media accounts, leaving vulnerable beneficiaries to pick up the pieces....
http://socsecnews.blogspot.com/search/label/Campaign%20Against%20Social%20Security%20Disability