Disability Empowerment Now: Hannah Woelke PART2!

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign. Welcome to Disability Empowerment now season four. I'm your host, Keith Mevigi Ginsini. Today I'm talking to Hannah Wilkie for part two of our lunch Hoard, a ongoing series on disability and sexuality. Vincent, part two of the series, in case you missed part one, the only important part thing I have to catch you up on, it's I'm terrible at algebra and therefore I might be terrible in bed. Basic. My producer's gonna love that joke. We'll leave it to him to figure out what to do with that wild edit. Hannah, welcome back to the show. [00:01:28] Speaker B: Thanks, Keith. [00:01:31] Speaker A: So where did we leave off? Seriously. [00:01:39] Speaker B: My recollection is that we left off at the very beginning of a discussion around disability, sexuality and its relationship to self esteem, self advocacy, confidence, that sort of thing. [00:02:06] Speaker A: Well, I should really turn over the hosting duties to you because that's exactly where we left off in at part one. Not my goofball humor, let's say. Although I did find it very ironic that we were talking last time about one of the Mitch Consumptions mis assumptions on basic skill to understand and be able to comprehend sexual expression and sexual identity. And you made that comment that people will assume that people who can't do basic math or complex math, as you said, can't understand sexuality or consent. And I didn't mean to be that. I said, well, I failed algebra three times in high school. That's a true story. So then I must be terrible in the bedroom because those two things absolutely go together and make perfect sense. Cue the sarcastic eye wall that I'm not going to bother doing because what's the point anyway? Sexual identity, particularly in the disability space in terms of self advocate. See, self what? That's a big thing. Self worth. Talk about those concepts because they are very critical to the. I was thinking about this this morning, how the sexual identity is just completely paramount to the human existence. Scratch that. The animal existence. If you really go back far enough, we're all animals. That's so explanatory there. Why do you think that caregivers, parents, AIDS neglect the sexual expression and sexual identity of people with disabilities? And how is that harmful for long term development? [00:06:03] Speaker B: I think the short answer is always ableism. Okay, that's really what we're talking about. But in order to address it in a practical way, we need to break it down a little bit from there. I think most families, family caregivers are scared because there is such a high rate of abuse and exploitation and they don't know how to make their children safe. But yet also educate them about sexuality. So while it is related to bias, I don't think that's usually what's motivating families. Now paid providers. I, in my anecdotal experience, provider organizations have a really difficult time not infantilizing their clients. [00:07:18] Speaker A: Could you please divine the term infantilizing and infantilization? Because I believe that term will come up quite a lot during the discussion. [00:07:40] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a pretty common thing to witness, really. It just means treating somebody like they're a child, you know, an infant when they're an adult. And you see it in a lot of different ways. I think again, it's just a reflection of the ableism that we live with every day in our culture. This idea that if you have a disability, your childlike, it's a very old stereotype and it's just still around. You'll see different versions of it. The one I like to point out is, say somebody at a grocery store, they're a bagger, they have a cognitive disability and they're 35. Right. A grown man. [00:08:40] Speaker A: Yeah, but yet every grown woman. [00:08:43] Speaker B: Or a grown woman. Of course, but. And then every little old lady who comes through the grocery stand, pats their head and pinches their cheeks and talks to them like they're 10. It's so common. [00:08:57] Speaker A: You see that, you see dehumanizing too. I mean, particularly at that age. But really any age, pat. The age where that appropriate, acceptable behavior to do to another person. [00:09:22] Speaker B: Yeah. And it infiltrates pretty much every aspect of sex education because there's this assumption that the majority of my experience is with folks with cognitive and developmental disabilities. So I'll just say that when I'm making generalizations, that's usually the group I'm generalizing about. One of the other things you'll see is young women being dressed as little girls, not being allowed to do things that we culturally associate with being a woman. So no dating, maybe no makeup, no revealing clothing. They might not go anywhere without their family. I think it just crops up in a lot of different ways. And when you start to have these conversations with families, often one of the first things you hear is, well, how would they have sex? How would she meet anybody? [00:10:41] Speaker A: Yeah, that would. The red prints I made in Tom Shakespeare's book, the Sexual Politics of Disability. A young woman's family thought that her being in a wheelchair would somehow negate her sexuality and was shocked, just shocked that she brought home her high school boyfriend. And again, paraphrasing, without your disability would take care of that. And that we would be saved this embarrassment. Really. Dating is a embarrassment. Okay, have I been in a coma for the last 80 years? What have I met Hannah? What have I met? How does being in a wheelchair negate your internal desires? [00:12:08] Speaker B: Right. I mean that's what's so absurd about it is it really is based on nothing except for ableism. There's no facts involved in this conversation. So. So I think, but like I said, I think with most families it comes from the fear of their child being vulnerable. The ironic thing is that the best protection from sexual abuse and exploitation is confidence and education. [00:12:48] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. It's just so mind boggling that. Well, you go back decades and I mean we were talking about this last episode where sex was only intended for marriage and that the bludgeon virgin would learn who's a woman who would learn sexual expression from her new husband who may or may not be a virgin. We don't know, but I mean it's just like. Yeah, just throw two people into a physical arena and let's just see what, what happens. When has that ever been a good idea? It's just like. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, go on. [00:14:17] Speaker B: Yeah, I think it's. I mean, obviously there's cultural differences and some people feel very strongly about, you know, being a virgin until you get. [00:14:29] Speaker A: Married, which there's nothing wrong with that. I have to point out that a clinical pillar of your inner beliefs, whether it's fostered by your religion or judge your self belief, that's fine. We are not saying that's wrong. Whether you have a disability or whether you do not have a disability. [00:15:09] Speaker B: That's right. I think the fact is, is that the United States has a very problematic relationship with sex education. And we always have. Communities differ widely in their beliefs around how to talk to children and young people about sex or if to do it at all. But then when you throw ableism into that mix, even people who may otherwise consider themselves open minded about sex education will sometimes draw a line about educating people with disabilities. There's, you know, when you look at the history of ableism and discrimination, there's a few common stereotypes that you see. One is this naive child that regardless of how old they are, they'll just forever be a baby to be taken care of. Yeah, right. One of the other stereotypes though is that if you have particularly a cognitive disability, that you're over sexed, that you can't control your impulses, that you're dangerously need to be held in seclusion away from any sexual stimulation because you wouldn't be able to handle it, couldn't hold yourself back. That's still out there. And this idea that if you teach young people about their bodies and about sexuality, that somehow you're flipping on that switch of compulsion and legendary board game. [00:17:13] Speaker A: That we use to play with children or watch them play, I believe it had little tools. It's called Operation and Learning about the Human Body. I mean, it. It's like it should. [00:17:39] Speaker B: It's absurd. It's all absurd. I mean, there are situations where people who really struggle with impulse control and compulsive behavior, when they start utilizing masturbation or watching pornography, it can become something that's difficult for them to control. But that said, that can also happen with people who do not have a disability. Right. So that's not stopping people from talking to their non disabled kid with impulse control struggles. Right. So it's not any more relevant to the disabled community than it is to the non disabled community. It's just really an excuse, you know? [00:18:26] Speaker A: Yeah. And I mean, we should really rename it podcast. Welcome to the obscenity hour, folks. We did. God. All the absurdity regarding sexuality in general, but no, it's just fascinating how if you want to hold away from disability for a second, and I'm sure this will shock no one, and if it does, my heart goes out to you that I'm the first person to tell you that. But it's the. If we have a guy, a young guy who sleeps around, he must be a stud, a man, a manly man, a lady killer, metaphorically speaking, a bull, an ox, on and on and on with a young woman who had the same experience or anywhere close to that weed chimp they call a sloth. All the whole. What's wrong with this picture again, Obsidian folks. And then you, you pull in disability and those derogatory terms begun even more derogatory in and of itself. And you don't need to have a cognitive disability when you're talking about sex and disability and people who don't understand the sexual drives and desires of people with disabilities. We might as well all have cognitive disabilities. And that's not a slam on cognitive or intellectual disabilities. It's just another derogatory term that people use to shame people with disabilities in regards to their sexual expression, sexual identity, and self worth overall. Am I wrong about that? [00:21:49] Speaker B: No. And I think, I mean, I do want to. I do want to make sure that while the people understand that while the barriers are different for folks with a physical disability, it's not much different. There's still a ton of bias. You know, you still see the same stereotypes. I think when somebody uses a wheelchair or has. Yeah. A mobility device of some sort, I think they, the perception of them as a potential threat goes down. People don't think of them as, you know, becoming obsessed about it or not being able to control themselves because they see the mobility limitation as, you know, makes that renders that person safe. That in itself is a ableist stereotype, of course. [00:23:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:23:02] Speaker B: But it. So you'll often see even men who have, you know, some kind of mobility component to their disability, whether it's cerebral palsy or spina bifida or, you know, what have you, those men are often babied more than a man who only has a intellectual disability. [00:23:32] Speaker A: Wait, say that again and then explain to me why. [00:23:38] Speaker B: Okay, okay, so. So let's say you have two young men in their 20s, one has down syndrome, one has cerebral palsy and uses a wheelchair. The young man with down syndrome could. People could very often, I will say, are concerned that if they start to talk to that young man about sex, if that young man understands. Understands what sex is, if he starts to masturbate, anything like that, any sexual activity, we run the risk of creating a, a sexual deviant, Somebody who could potentially be out of control and not be able to hold themselves back. Right. [00:24:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:24:35] Speaker B: That same kid in their 20s who has CP and uses a wheelchair. People do not worry about that same risk because they don't see that young man as a potential threat. Instead, it goes the other way. Oh, you poor thing, you're in a wheelchair. Well, you must not really want to have sex. I mean, does all that stuff even work? [00:25:09] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay, go on. [00:25:15] Speaker B: So you see these, these weird, detailed, nuanced stereotypes. It's, it's not cut and dry, the same across the board. I also think that some communities experience a lot less of the ableism. For example, people with spinal cord injuries very regularly are talking to their healthcare providers about their sexuality. It is exceedingly common. I don't know if that's because usually people who have a spinal cord injury are a little bit older. Right. Maybe they're in high school or their early 20s when it happens. Potentially they already have a partner, maybe they even have a marriage. And it's considered one of the most important topics for somebody to discuss with their doctor. I don't know why that is, but it is, it's the, it's one of the only kind of, you know, I identity groups within the disability community that I see regularly having access to accurate sex positive education. Not when they're young of like not as a child but with their health care providers. It's absolutely everyone is open to talk about it. I will say there's other disabilities where you don't see quite the pushback. They tend to be treated more like a non disabled person when it comes to sex ed when they're young, which is folks that are deaf or hard of hearing. It it isn't usually considered impactful to their sexuality. Right. We don't think of somebody who's deaf or hard of hearing as having different hormones than their non disabled peer. Yeah, I will say that that's kind of true with folks with vision disabilities. [00:27:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:27:40] Speaker B: Not completely because you do see a lack of sex education of young blind kids unless they're in, in an isolated learning environment like a state run school for the deaf and blind. If they're in a public school. I think it's similar to kids with intellectual disabilities in that the teachers really struggle to include them in those classes because they don't have adequate training in how to adapt those lessons for kids with visual disabilities. [00:28:28] Speaker A: And so let's talk about sexual dividend. See because that's also a topic that comes up a lot in research and in med conception of people with disabilities. Will all the to use a very broad large sale will either all age sexual lacking any sort of sexual drive which again if that's you, there's no problem at all. All it's when you use a broad brush like I'm using to paint the entirety of the disability community or a certain section of the disability community or any community as either asexual or sexually deviant. First of all those are opposite ends of a very very very broad spectrum and it should doesn't work that way. Nothing does. I mean why we think that sexuality you either have point A or in the next galaxy point Z. It should boggles my mind. But let's talk about sexual deviancy and why we over prescribe it in our thinking almost not all modes modes even further than thinking that people with disabilities magically, magically don't have a sex drive at all. What is it about deviance and disability, those two terms. Why are they so often interlinked when they shouldn't be? [00:31:51] Speaker B: I mean okay, so I don't know that I'm really in the best position to tackle this topic. But by your best I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll take a stab. I think that culturally not just us in general humans and groups. Right. That we often other things in order to shore up our connection with our community. So we find reasons why we are like each other. And, and how we do that is often by pointing out how somebody else is not like us. Okay, so anything that is other is automatically deviant. It's villainized. Right. Because it's not us, it's not safe, it's not attractive. And we do that in sexuality with people with disabilities, for sure. People who are queer identified, asexual, people in poly relationships, people who are interested in S and M. I mean, we do it with kind of every type of sexual expression except for for man, woman, married, missionary style. Right. Like anything other than that. [00:33:47] Speaker A: Thank you for bringing that back because if you want, I would go into. That is the basic primary root of what mankind thinks encompasses the entire totality of sexual and healthy sexual expression. It's that man, woman, marriage merchant, varied style. And for procreation. [00:34:35] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:34:36] Speaker A: Life should not be around the books here. I mean, it's like therein lies the starting point of the basic understanding of sexuality. And then how that had or hadn't evolved in the last, I don't know, 5,000 years or something like that. Remember, folks, I'm bad at math. And so thank you for taking a stab at that. I now want to ask the opposite question, which I think you already alluded to, is why do you think it's easy for people to assume that if people with disabilities are not sexually deviant, then we must magically not have sex, drugs, be asexual? Why do you think that that is so prominent and had been for quite some time. [00:36:24] Speaker B: I think that goes back to the. The very old stereotypes of people having intellectual disabilities and being childlike. But when you read early research or how they came to different conclusions around various diagnoses. Right. When things hundreds of years ago, it was very often intellectual disabilities were very often described as remaining like a child. And people have a lot of associations with that. Somebody who's innocent, somebody. Somebody who's has no malice. It's. I. I find it interesting because honestly, I don't equate childhood with any of those things. But it's an old stereotype and I think it's still around the idea that if you. Well, like the example you've been using, if you struggle with some types of complex challenges like algebra, then I'm never. [00:37:57] Speaker A: Gonna live that down. [00:38:02] Speaker B: So if that's the case, then you must not have the potential to. To contemplate more complex relationships. Falling in love and wanting a family and that sort of thing. I mean, it. Again, it's based on nothing. It's. [00:38:24] Speaker A: No, it's really isn't because huge biology fact that slides in the face of everything about that and it had to do with young women biology legend and you can correct me if I'm wrong, that by the age of 10 the female body starts preparing itself for the birthing procedure. Or am I right about that? Or am I slightly off in my facts? I may be going off history and that you young women were mothered at a significantly younger age. And then I think I remember reading that correctly and that 13 is when the menstrual cycle Scots have been in. But I'm not a biology teacher. [00:40:03] Speaker B: There's a range. There's a range. It's related to, you know, your genetics. It runs in families. To have your first period in a certain age range, it is related to your percentage of body fat. There's, you know, there's a little bit more that goes into it. [00:40:29] Speaker A: Yeah, but the overall point I was trying to make is Mother Nature, if biology had its own guidelines that prepares one of the woman for eventual co creation at such a young age regardless of the history. Doesn't that fly in the face of the assumption that because the female body is already gearing up for that process? What? I mean, who are we to question mother Nature in biology? It just turns not make sense to me that we would assume that people are forever childlike and some people are again not trying to spare that at all. But just using that blanket assumption is. It boggles my mind. [00:42:21] Speaker B: I mean really we're just talking about ableism and discrimination. It's really that simple. It doesn't come from anywhere else. I mean it's, you know, it's not logical, it's not scientific, it's based in, I don't know, it feels like forever, but it's not really forever. Hundreds of years, maybe more, I don't know. But different communities have dealt with. [00:43:00] Speaker A: It's definitely more. Yeah, it's just. I mean this is the unending topic which is why I definitely referred to this as a ongoing segment instead of a two or three part episode series where we try to unpack the most complicated and emotional subject ever to exist in just a few short hours. Yeah, yeah, let's, let's try to do that. Do you want to stay up with me for like three weeks and try to talk about this and really unpack all of the ins and outs and the assumptions and the misconceptions? I mean there's, there's a reason why people have been obsessed and Addicted with sex and really exploring everything about the topic. I. I want entire lives. [00:44:40] Speaker B: Sure. I want to go back just a minute to the concept of people being more safe if they have. Yeah. More confidence, more self confidence, more education, better sense of self worth. I think, and this to me has nothing to do with disability, but I think in general, people are less vulnerable to exploitation if they value themselves and they are not as easily manipulated. [00:45:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:45:32] Speaker B: By people who might want to take advantage. If you see yourself as a worthy partner, as somebody who is attractive and appealing and has the potential for relationships, if you see yourself that way, then you're less desperate for that attention and approval from others. What you often see with young people and why they're so easy to exploit is because they are terribly insecure. And when you add disability into the conversation, the level of insecurity and social isolation can really increase. And obviously these are generalizations. I'm not saying everyone with a disability is socially isolated, but we know that in general, for example, touch starvation is a real scourge, you know. [00:46:46] Speaker A: To bring back to basic biology. If a baby isn't touched the verge several hours since its arrival on this planet, it dies. Humans are foolish to think that somehow we outgrow the touch starvation or the lack of touch annihilation. Qualm. No qualm. Conundrum. Not a conundrum. A very serious problem. Because everyone, I don't care who it is, I don't care your intellectual level. Everyone has a physiological and emotional need to be touched, to be held, to be cuddled. And that does not only apply to humans. I mean, my dog right now is looking at me expecting me to either cuddle her, pet her, or feed her or walk her, or somehow all of the above at the same time. If anyone figures out how to do that, please give me a call or drop me a email. But point is, touch starvation does not magically or otherwise go away. It can be in very often is a scourge on the level of depression, isolation, poor health. I mean, we could go on and on, but that's a very valid point you bring up and I think a point that most people either are not aware of or Haboo adds some pop psychology sensibility or. [00:49:46] Speaker B: Yeah, it's very common to not have to not have that aspect of somebody's life addressed. When we're talking about a service team. For example, you might have an employment support organization and a group home and payee and family. And somehow in all of these conversations about what it means to be healthy and independent we're not talking about just the most basic human needs of touch and relationship and love, as though we can create an atmosphere without any of those things in which people can thrive. It's an utter lie. It is absolutely impossible to have thriving people without touch, social relationships and love. So the. The fact that it won't even be included in a conversation of people whose literal jobs it is to help somebody have a good life, it's very disheartening. And I personally tend to focus on the groups of people that I think can have the largest impact when it comes to having these conversations. So that's usually parents or provider agencies or self advocates. Sometimes if you educate self advocates adequately, they will drag everyone else forward with their parents and their providers kicking and screaming. Once people understand that they have these rights as a human being and that there are safe supports out there, that they can have all of the things that other kids have been talking about. Once they truly believe that, usually that's all it takes. And everyone else just has to suck it up and be along for the ride. [00:52:22] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, why all acts a very, it seems to me, a very obvious question. But we know person can assume how critical a sexual identity, sexual self worth will be to the average person throughout their lives. Why do you think, what do you think it means to a person with a disability? And how do you think that a person can adopt a healthy sense of sexual identity to themselves? [00:53:47] Speaker B: Right. [00:53:48] Speaker A: You know, they're not around people who would agree. [00:53:55] Speaker B: Yeah, I really do think that. And this, I feel like this is true of all people. Okay. Not just people with disabilities. I think that most of us grow up in an environment that's not particularly nurturing of that aspect of our humanity and that we have to create that health. [00:54:24] Speaker A: It's a detriment. It's really a judgment that can and often does follow a person throughout their entire lives. [00:54:40] Speaker B: Absolutely not. [00:54:42] Speaker A: Address. [00:54:44] Speaker B: Yeah. And so I think that, you know, part of being the puritanical country that we are, most people don't grow up with a healthy sense of their own sexual self. And we're forced to discover it for ourselves in adulthood, whatever that looks like for us. So it may be relationships. You know, it's a lot easier to explore your sexuality in the context of a safe, health, healthy relationship because you're not risky, you know, you're not quite as vulnerable if you're already in the relationship. I think therapy, honestly a lot of therapy, depending on what you're trying to unlearn. [00:55:38] Speaker A: Say that louder. Why won't you and she say it like five billion more times. [00:55:49] Speaker B: I know. I, It's. I, I at least take a little bit of. Have a little bit of hope, because younger people seem to not have the same aversion to the concept of therapy as older folks. And I. That gives me hope. [00:56:05] Speaker A: OB one bar. [00:56:08] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah, I think so. And also, I think it's interesting to be old enough to have seen the shift in pop culture and how sexuality is addressed. It's still unhealthy and unrealistic and ridiculous, but there are little pockets of honest sexuality out there in the media, and that's something that basically didn't exist my entire childhood and young adulthood. The fact that you can see gay couples in commercials is fabulous to me because regardless of what we think about somebody else's sexual identity, they need to feel positive, they need to see representation. They need to let go of shame in order to be a healthy person. So it doesn't matter if you resonate with something. It doesn't matter if it means anything to you, it means something to someone else. Right. Not everything's about you. Not everything is meant for you. And that's something that I feel like people often struggle with. Well, you don't have to like it. You're not the audience. Right. And with sex, I think that's a big deal, because sexuality, what we all find sexually pleasurable, it is a huge range. [00:58:03] Speaker A: And again, it's a tired spectrum. [00:58:10] Speaker B: Absolutely. And because of that, in order for people to feel represented, that range of lived experience needs to be able to be expressed. So, you know, I know that there's a myriad of opinions, and mine is just another one, frankly. But about these things and having stuff in the media and available online and all that, I do feel like when we decide not to educate our children, what we are doing is defaulting to what they're going to learn on their own, which 90% of the time is inaccurate and unhelpful. [00:59:05] Speaker A: So you want to say the name or should I? [00:59:11] Speaker B: Go ahead. [00:59:13] Speaker A: It's too extracurricular, as you said, very unrealistic and unaccurate representation. I'm thinking of pornography. [00:59:30] Speaker B: Right. Well. And I will say this just to put it out there. Pornography is entertainment for adults. It is not intended for children. [00:59:46] Speaker A: No, no, certainly not. [00:59:50] Speaker B: And I think that sometimes we forget that it's okay to tell young people that certain things are not beneficial to them at a young age. Right. And that's how we protect them. There's no reason that porn should be any different than a rated R. Movie. Right. We're not letting our young children see horror films and have horrible nightmares and we're not letting our young children watch pornography. It's an adult form of entertainment. I don't think that that necessarily means that you're not sex positive. To me those two things are not related, even though culturally we like to put them together. If you're a sex positive person, if you're pro sex education, then you have to be pro porn. I feel like pornography is a, is a type of entertainment that some people are interested in and golf clap to them. You either are or you're not really. Nobody should really care. Right. And it's completely separate to me in my mind from sex education. How we deal with sexuality with young people, it's just doesn't need to be part of the conversation in my mind unless. Unless young people are being exposed to it because it can be quite damaging depending on how young we're talking, I think. But that's not porn's fault. Okay? Because porn is meant for adults. It's our fault. When we conflate healthy sexual expression with artificial adult entertainment. Those are not the same thing. Yet time after time when we're talking about sexuality, people want to bring up pornography as though they're somehow permanently linked, which is absurd. [01:02:25] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean we, we could do a whole, and we probably should do at some point a whole fascinating series on what you just said about why they shouldn't be linked and how to unlink them for the benefit of everyone, regardless of your ability level. It's just like it's not every. You can't paint. You can't or shouldn't paint everything with a broad brush. It's like. But I mean also porn, it's so pervasive and so readily available that I mean, I don't blame them for giving it conflated with being sex positive in whatever angle you want to take and talk about that term. Yeah, it's a job, it's entertainment. It, it's. That's. The un failed to bring you back to that point of. Well, if you talk about sex positivity, which again, we can unpack those two terms in and by itself, you must also be talking about pornography with sex positivity words around a lot longer probably than the modern equivalent of pornography or adult entertainment. It just. If it wasn't, it should have been, but if it was, we want aware of it to really equate it. [01:05:03] Speaker B: But I, I feel like it's intentional. I feel like people who. [01:05:10] Speaker A: Oh, good, weeds. [01:05:13] Speaker B: I feel like people who do not believe in the concept or the benefit of comprehensive sex education are intentionally attaching it to sex work and pornography in order to act as though if you agree with one, you therefore are accepting of children being exposed to all of those things. No sex educator that I have ever met. Okay. Or ever read or anything is talking about exposing children to pornography or sex work as part of their sex education. Yet when you hear critics, that's exactly what they want to bring up. Well, if we're gonna talk about condoms in school, then who hookers and porn? I. It's the stupidest, but I think that it is. [01:06:23] Speaker A: Welcome to the absurdity our folks you've been been listening to ve continue again that that point is so. Because I assume that there are a lot of people out there who come. I mean, what you just said about practicing safe sex. Safe sex. Well, that equates hookahs and pornography and sexual workers. Those are all different terms people. You can't and shouldn't be able to link them. It's just same sex is different than pornography or sex work. I mean, we could talk about sex work and the intersectionality of in relation to the disability community. [01:07:52] Speaker B: Let's have that conversation. Put a pin in it. We should put that in our parking lot. [01:07:58] Speaker A: Yes, no, of course. And so wrapping up, there's no way out to say Vid's ongoing series on disability and sexuality. Congratulations, Hannah, you have another job. Well, but what how I like to wrap up every interview and I often view interviews, ads, the introduction to a larger topic which most of them become large, larger topics and they link back between seasons or in even current seasons. But I always like to ask these two questions in case there are any aspiring self advocates who want to get in to your line of work, which clearly you have a passion for intellectually and everything else, which again, people should have that passion for something they really care about and and want to really give back to the community or to certain sections of the community that are often voiceless minorities, which we've hopefully already alluded to that positive or basic sexual education to students with disabilities is severely lacking in this country and really always has been. [01:10:35] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:10:36] Speaker A: So there are any self advocates who want to become more proactive in facilitating sexual education. What would be some action points on some vibes you would give them? [01:11:10] Speaker B: First, I want to say please join us. We need you more voices. The better self advocate perspective is the most important perspective. I the only reason I do this work is because there's not enough self advocates doing this work. [01:11:33] Speaker A: So please, I wish repeat that. That's a very important point. [01:11:42] Speaker B: Exactly. The best sex educator for somebody with a disability is a person with a disability. Self advocates will always prove provide the best service to their own community simply because of their lived experience. It is essential for caregivers, for providers to listen to the lived experience of people with disabilities. That's the only way these things are going to change. So I do hope there's some people out there who are intrigued by this work because it's so important and it can be so immensely powerful. When you help somebody work through some of these struggles to get to a point where they have a satisfying sex life, it's, it's just terribly important. So I really do think there's a lot of ways people can dip their toe in this type of advocacy. Right now, across the country, elections are coming, there's a myriad of bills and laws in the works specifically regarding sexuality. Get to know your state, get to know the politics in your area and see if there isn't something that you could support or discourage related to disability and sexuality. Probably there is, regardless of where you are. Another thing that you can consider is getting involved with your local school boards, things of that nature, libraries, places that are being being forced to limit the availability of effective tools for sex education if you're so inclined. Those types of organizations need a self advocate, pro sex voice. They need it. Another option would just be to get involved in your immediate surroundings. Whether that's talking to families that you know, talking to provider agencies that you're involved with, maybe having a presentation at a parent support group, things of that nature. Try connecting with your local center for Independent Living. Often they're a fabulous resource for self advocates trying to create outreach education opportunities. There's no way that you can be involved in sex education that won't be impactful. We need it desperately. Disabled or not, sex education is, it's being attacked in a very real way all over the country. And as people with disabilities, we need to acknowledge that our friends are going to suffer the most from these attacks on sex education. We're already marginalized in these conversations and it's just, just going to get worse. So anything you have the energy to do is going to be helpful and useful. Advocacy can take place in lots of different ways and any way you do it will be meaningful. [01:16:11] Speaker A: So I like to think that both advocates with disabilities and those who have yet to discover or embrace their own disabilities listen and watch this program. I'm not naive enough to think that both groups or groups within those groups take away the same things from every episode. So as my guests, what do you hope that advocates with disabilities take away from everything we've talked about across these episodes? And what do you hope that those who have yet to discover their disabilities take away from the examples? [01:17:20] Speaker B: I think I truly hope that self advocates can connect with some of the things we've talked about, recognize that their experiences are not unique to to them, that there is a community of support out here and they're not alone. That they can reach out to others who are like minded and get the support that maybe they haven't gotten in their younger years. As for allies who are temporarily able bodied, I think that just checking your own ableism, just check it when you're making an assumption about that individual in your life or some individual you see or encounter. Check that bias. Where did that come from? Is it legitimate at all or is it just something that you grew up around? Maybe a stereotype you've been exposed to in the media? I think the very literally, the least we can do. Okay. Is control our own bias. [01:18:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:18:52] Speaker B: So start there. [01:18:55] Speaker A: Well, Hannah, it's been a delightful pleasure getting to talk to you. Beginning to explore the vast complexities of disability and sexuality. I knew we couldn't do it in just a few hours and I look forward to talking to you again very soon. Thank you always for your candor and your insight and thank you most of all for the work you do with such a passion with giving back to all community. We need more people like you out there doing the good work you're doing. [01:19:53] Speaker B: Thanks Keith. It has been super fun. I can't wait to do it again. There's so many things we haven't talked about yet and I really appreciate the opportunity. I appreciate that you're open minded enough to entertain this topic. [01:20:12] Speaker A: Oh ye Jim, thanks. You have been listening to Disability Empowerment. Now I would like to thank my dads, you are legend and the Disability Empowerment team that made this episode possible. More information about the podcast can be found at disabilityempowermentnow.com or on our social media at disabilityempowermentnow. The podcast is available wherever you listen to. Podcasts are on the official website. Don't forget to rate, comment and share the podcasts. This episode of disability empowerment knowledge copyrighted 2020.