Ableism Quotes

“Your abilities lie in the places people usually overlook, so you’ve been convinced you don’t have any at all. But you’re smart, and you’re capable, and if people struggle to see that, it’s their problem, not yours.”
― Talia Hibbert, Act Your Age, Eve Brown

“Crazy. It was the same word María and Tía Rosa flung at Grandpa Lázaro. The same word anyone said when they didn't understand something." Crazy "was a way to shut people up, disregard them entirely.”
― Daniel José Older, Shadowshaper

“There's nothing more debilitating about a disability than the way people treat you over it.”
― Solange nicole

“Now, Woolf calls her fictional bastion of male privilege Oxbridge, so I'll call mine Yarvard. Even though she cannot attend Yarvard because she is a woman, Judith cheerfully applies for admission at, let's call it, Smithcliff, a prestigious women's college. She is denied admission on the grounds that
the dorms and classrooms can't
accommodate wheelchairs, that her speech pattern would interfere with her elocution lessons, and that her presence would upset the other students. There is also the suggestion that she is not good marriage material for the men at the elite college to which Smithcliff is a bride-supplying "sister school." The letter inquires as to why she hasn't been institutionalized.
When she goes to the administration building to protest the decision, she can't get up the flight of marble steps on the Greek Revival building. This edifice was designed to evoke a connection to the Classical world, which practiced infanticide of disabled newborns.”
― Rosemarie Garland Thomson

“The lingerie department is the only one that she can reach in her wheelchair. Nevertheless, she is fired the next day because of complaints that a woman who is so obviously not sexually attractive selling alluring nightgowns makes customers uncomfortable. Daunted by her dismissal, she seeks consolation in the arms of the young manager and soon finds herself pregnant. Upon learning
of this news, he leaves her for a
nondisabled woman with a fuller
bustline and better homemaking skills in his inaccessible kitchen.”
― Rosemarie Garland Thomson

“Would you not call yourself fragile?'

'I am who I am.”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“You’re always dealing with a stereotype. There’s the superhuman trope and the vulnerable trope – the benefit scrounger, someone who takes, doesn’t offer anything to society because they’re so incapable. And if you’re trying to be the superhuman, you don’t want to look as if you’re leaning on anyone, because people will think, which one are you? It’s really hard to embody both. But the gap between the tropes is where we want to live.”
― Sophie L. Morgan

“Of course, when Iris was gone, Mom barely seemed to care until the final hours before evacuation.
Maybe it'll be the same for me:Denise will be fine. Oh, she'll be back.
It makes me want to laugh when I realize how wrong I am. Of course it won't be the same. I'm not Iris. It'll be:Denise? Denise is gone? Oh, god, no. How long for? She can't be out there by herself. She might've gotten lost. She's—then, confidentially, with that look of hers—she's autistic. What if she...”
― Corinne Duyvis, On the Edge of Gone

“When Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling published the piece" TERF Wars "on her blog in the summer of 2020, she specifically mentioned her fear that many transgender men are actually Autistic girls who weren't conventionally feminine, and have been influenced by transactivists on the internet into identifying out of womanhood. In presenting herself as defending disabled" girls, "she argued for restricting young trans Autistic people's ability to self-identity and access necessary services and health care.
Rowling's perspective (which she shares with many gender critical folks) is deeply dehumanising to both the trans and Autistic communities.”
― Devon Price, Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity

“The Genesis declaration carries the central truth that each human person is a precious individual, whether strong or weak, rich or poor, able-bodied or handicapped, intellectually brilliant or limited, beautiful or plain.”
― Os Guinness, The Magna Carta of Humanity: Sinai's Revolutionary Faith and the Future of Freedom

“The last time Els and I spoke, she'd reprimanded me over shouting at Michelle. Now she's all kindness. What changed her mind? My being autistic, or my almost dying?”
― Corinne Duyvis, On the Edge of Gone

“You'd have to ask Leyla if you want to know more. She's a psychologist. One of a dozen on board. We don't just want our passengers to survive—we want them to beOK.We're dealing with a lot of trauma. So if you ever need to talk... "
"I'll pass."
"Bad experiences?"
"Sort of."
"What happened?"
I shrug. "It took a long time to diagnose me."
"From what I understand, autistic girls often don't run into trouble until a later age."
I bark out a laugh. Oh, I ran into trouble, all right. I barely said a word between the ages of four and six. I hit three of my preschool and grade school teachers. In a class photo taken when I was seven, my face is covered in scratches from when I latched onto a particularly bad stim. Therapists and teachers labelled me as bipolar, as psychotic, as having oppositional defiant disorder, as intellectually disabled, and as just straight-up difficult, the same way Els did. One said all I needed was structure and a gluten-free diet.
When I was nine, a therapist suggested I might be autistic, at which point I had already started to learn what set me off and how to mimic people; within two years, I was coping well enough to almost-but-not-quite blend in with my classmates. It's funny when people like Els have no idea anything is off about me, given that my parents spend half my childhood worrying I'd end up institutionalized.
At the time, I thought the diagnosis was delayed because I was bad at being autistic, just like I was bad at everything else; it took me years to realize that since I wasn't only Black, but a Blackgirl,it's like the DSM shrank to a handful of options, and many psychologists were loath to even consider them.”
― Corinne Duyvis, On the Edge of Gone

“Ableism is discrimination against people with disabilities. It is the harboring of beliefs that devalue and limit the potential of people with physical, intellectual, or mental disorders and disabilities. For instance, people might believe that autistic people will never be an asset to society, and that they need to be “fixed” or “cured".”
― Casey "Remrov" Vormer, Connecting With The Autism Spectrum: How To Talk, How To Listen, And Why You Shouldn’t Call It High-Functioning

“The unnatural and increasingly rapid growth of the Feeble-Minded and Insane classes, coupled as it is with a steady restriction among all the thrifty, energetic and superior stocks constitutes a national and race danger which it is impossible to exaggerate.

Winston Churchill in a letter to Prime Minister Asquith, advocating the forced sterilisation of disabled people”
― Winston S. Churchill

“As members of the same species, human beings broadly share notions and precepts of morality, of what is socially regarded as a proper conduct. But again, there is no reason to think that these notions and precepts should fully converge and cohere between different people and different communities, or even in the minds of the individuals themselves.”
― Azar Gat, Ideological Fixation: From the Stone Age to Today's Culture Wars

“Because, let's face it, when sighted people are not accusing us of pretending to be blind, they are making jokes about our blindness.”
― M. Leona Godin, There Plant Eyes: A Personal and Cultural History of Blindness

“it was hard not to imbibe the message that the realities of disability have to stay hidden, even when the disability is the subject.”
― Sophie L. Morgan

“You'll break the first time they put you in the sparring ring, and that's before the dragons sense that you're...' He shakes his head and looks away, his jaw clenching.

'I'm what?' My hackles rise. 'Go ahead and say it. When they sense I'm less than the others. Is that what you mean?'

'Damn it.' He rakes his hand over his close-cropped light-brown curls. 'Stop putting words in my mouth. You know what I mean. Even if you survive the threshing, there's no guarantee a dragon will bond you. As it was, last year we had thirty-four unbonded cadets who have just been sitting around, waiting to restart the year with this class to get a chance at bonding again, and they're all perfectly healthy-'

'Don't be an asshole.' My stomach falls. Just because he might be right doesn't meant I want to hear it... or want to be called unhealthy.

'I'm trying to keep you alive!”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“I'm not a damned liability.' My chest tightens again, because deep down I know, on the physical level, that I am.

'Not to me,' he whispers, a hand rising to cradle my cheek. 'But they don't know you the way I do, Vi.”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“Change your mind.' It's barely a whisper.

'No.' I sound way more confident than I feel.

'Change. Your. Mind.' HIs hand finds mine, concealed by our tight formation as we descend through the passage. 'Please.'

'I can't.' I shake my head. 'Any more than you would leave Cath and run to the scribes yourself.'

'That's different.' His hand squeezes mine, and I can feel the tension in his fingers, in his arm. 'I'm a rider.'

'Well, maybe I am, too.' I whisper as light appears ahead. I didn't believe it before, not when I couldn't leave because my mother wouldn't let me, but now I have a choice. And I choose to stay.

'Don't be-' He cuts himself off and drops my hand. 'I don't want to bury you, Vi.'

'It's inevitable that one of us will have to bury the other.”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“I'm terrified you're not going to make it to graduation, Vi.' His shoulders slump. 'You know exactly how I feel about you, whether or not I can do anything about it, and I'm terrified.'

It's that last line that does me in. Laughter bubbles up through my throat and escapes.

His eyes widen.

'This place cuts away the bullshit and the niceties, revealing whoever you are at your core.' I repeat his words from this summer. 'Isn't that what you said to me? Is this who you really are at your core? Someone so enamoured with rules that he doesn't know when to bend or break them for someone he cares about? Someone so focused on the least I'm capable of doing, he can't believe I can do so much more?'

The warmth drains from his brown eyes.

'Let's get one thing straight, Dain.' I take a step closer, but the distance between us only widens.' The reason we'll never be anything more than friends isn't because of your rules. It's because you have no faith in me. Even now, when I've survived against all odds and bonded not just one dragon but two, you still think I won't make it. So forgive me, but you're about to be some of the bullshit that this place cuts away from me.”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“When you told me that this place strips everything away from you to reveal what's underneath, I was afraid. What if underneath the brittle bones and frail ligaments, there was just more weakness? Only this time, I wouldn't be able to blame my body.'

'You've never been weak to me, Vi-' Dain starts, but I shake my head.

'Don't you get it?' I interrupt. 'It doesn't matter what you think- it only matters what I think. And you were right. But the Riders Quadrant stripped away the fear and even the anger about being thrown into this quadrant, and it revealed who I really am. At my core, Dain, I'm a rider. Tairn knew it. Andarna knew it. It's why they chose me. And until you can stop looking for ways to keep me in a glass cage, we aren't going to get past things no matter how many years of friendship we have between us.”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“Did you know that Helen Keller created her own form of sign language to communicate with her family? (Page 32)”
― Elsa Sjunneson, Being Seen: One Deafblind Woman's Fight to End Ableism

“Most Deaf kids have home signs; they develop their own ways to get what they need. I have my own, too. My colleagues in the science fiction world who sign can get my attention, can communicate with me if they really need to. A lot of the signs we use aren't" real, "but they're the ones I use, and that's why we use them together. (Page 33)”
― Elsa Sjunneson, Being Seen: One Deafblind Woman's Fight to End Ableism

“Ableism is also an entire system of oppression. One big example is the fact that our entire capitalist system is built on the notion that the “best and the brightest” get ahead because they are “smarter” and “work harder”.”
― John Tallent

“Ableism has been defined as “the term used to describe the discrimination against and the exclusion of individuals with physical and mental disabilities from full participation and opportunity within society’s systems and activities.” Ableism is a useful lens through which to examine much of the rhetoric generated by the anti-vaccine movement as it pertains to autism.”
― Jonathan M. Berman, Anti-Vaxxers: How to Challenge a Misinformed Movement

“There's nothing wrong with wanting less pain or a different experience of it. There is nothing wrong with wanting to transform generations of passed down trauma. But, what gets more complicated is when those desires bleed into the ableist model of cure that's the only model most of us have for having more ease and less pain. That model and its harsh binary of successful and fixed or broken and fucked, is part of what contributes to suicidality and struggle in long-term survivors.”
― Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice

“I just can’t picture myself with a cane. Going down the hallways at school. Walking to the subway. Everybody annoyed with me that I’m walking so slowly, then seeing the cane and getting filled with that sympathy they feel like they have to have, and then getting mad at me for making them have it. I know the game well enough already, walking around on two feet.”
― Hannah Moskowitz, Sick Kids in Love

“Trovo sempre sconcertante quando qualcuno mi dice: «Non bisogna credere a tutto ciò che si vede sui social network, perché spesso non corrispondono alla realtà». Il problema dell'autenticità non è capire quanto il mio profilo corrisponda alla realtà, ma quanto la presunta realtà corrisponda davvero a me, a quello che sono.
Se una persona con un handicap crea un'identità digitale che l'handicap non lo ha e stabilisce relazioni, sta producendo una realtà falsata o ne sta ipotizzando una piú autentica rispetto a sé? Se una persona che appartiene a un'etnia razzializzata si inventa un'identità digitale grazie alla quale le diventano possibili legami con persone che altrimenti non si relazionerebbero mai a lei, sta mentendo o sta producendo una distorsione creativa nella società razzista in cui vive? Se una donna nata in un corpo maschile aggira la disforia di genere attraverso un'identità digitale che corrisponde al genere in cui si riconosce, possiamo parlare di inganno oppure siamo davanti a una realtà piú sincera? Dalla risposta a queste domande dipende molta della nostra capacità di restare uman3 negli ambiti sempre piú postumani del tempo che le nostre vite stanno già attraversando.”
― Michela Murgia, God Save the Queer: Catechismo femminista

“Systems of supremacy and domination ultimately imperil even those who, in many crucial respects, benefit from them. Racism, while it elevates whiteness, is weaponized to erode the welfare and wages that would enable white people to lead healthier, less precarious lives. Misogyny hurts men economically and emotionally, as gendered pay gaps suppress overall wages and through the trap of destructive and often violent standards of masculinity. Transphobia impacts everyone by imposing state-sponsored gender norms and curtailing freedom and self-expression. Ableism, by devaluing and dehumanizing the disabled, dissuades people from demanding the social services and public assistance they need as they cope with illness or aging. The inequality and pursuit of endless growth that drive climate change endanger the homes, infrastructure, and supply chains on which the wealthy and working class both rely—not to mention the complex ecosystems in which we are all embedded.
Solidarity, in other words, is not selfless. Siding with others is the only way to rescue ourselves from the catastrophes that will otherwise engulf us.”
― Astra Taylor, Solidarity: The Past, Present, and Future of a World-Changing Idea