Ag is a real job.

It takes real skills, knowledge, & people who gaf about what they're doing.

Stop treating agriculture like society's dumping ground.

@Remittancegirl ok my mind is buzzing here, will you come on a journey with me?

I think the moment of inspiration is not the problem-- in fact it is a moment of empathy, I believe, when we see past categories and assumptions and relate human to human.

What can be problem is how we resolve the cognitive dissonance that follows.

This person is disabled, and yet she has climbed a mountain! I do not have her disability, and yet I have not-- despite feeling on some level that it is a worthy achievement. (Otherwise I would not be inspired by it).

It is common language to report her achievement as "she overcame her disability to climb..."

But she has not in fact overcome anything. She remains disabled, and lack of accessible facilities will continue to hamper her despite having Ben Nevis under her belt. We cannot and should not flatten her into the "abled" category, because this minimises her needs and the barriers we as society make for her.

What if, in this moment of connection, we were inspired to see ourselves as *dis*abled?

(Take a sec, note: how does that sentence feel for you?)

What has disabled us from climbing that mountain, using the broadest interpretation of disability? Is it sexism in the mountain climbing community? A simple lack of money? Burdens of care for others? Incompatibilities with our self-concept due to how we were raised to see ourselves? Our employment not allowing us sufficient free time? Lack of access to fitness facilities, or nourishing food?

Then what changes would we have to make in order to circumvent these disabilities, and are they feasible? If not, what does that say about our society?

I'm not saying that we should actually all start claiming the term "disabled"-- there are more appropriate existing terms in most cases. But I am pointing out that resolving cognitive dissonance by changing how we think about ourselves rather than how we think about disabled people is far more likely to end up with us making necessary changes in our own lives, or being inspired to fight for social justice. With us growing more in understanding of ourselves, and of the society we live in. And it's far less likely to end with us minimising the struggles of disabled people.
@JustinMac84 @aurora

So if you're looking at the US & thinking "This isn't the country I know," you're 100% right. It's not.

We're actually fighting back in real time for once.