Heterosexuality and able-bodiedness has been defined not by what they are, but by what they aren’t. To give meaning to homosexual and disabled, it has been written down as deviations from the norm. In this case the norm being heterosexuality and the able-bodied. Much like Audre Lorde often focuses on the intersectionality of her many characteristics, these four categories rely on their other, to exist; you cannot have one without the other.
There is much similarity in the LGBT movement as there is in the Disability movement. Both have roots in the constant normalizing of what makes them different. Both have terms used previous as harmful and derogatory, now at the face of their theories (queer and crip.) However, most importantly they define what it means for society to be normal. Society requires these definitions so that they can label and pursue and prosecute the “abnormalities” from a “perfect” society to stabilize institutions that were thought to be in jeopardy from this deviance. Queerness was defined in the 19th century as an oddity. Eventually defining it as a homosexual, which is the defined as someone who deviates from the “norm” and has relations with a member of the same sex (discluding women at the time, because of course they cannot be trusted with the knowledge that they can have relations with other women.) The definition was morphed into many different terms like gross indecency, or sodomy, or my personal favorite “somdomite.” The point being that without defining what queerness is, you cannot have these institutions like the law governing it, which is what society wants.
Society wants to govern personal aspects of life, so that life runs more smoothly. In theory, the more people deviate away from that norm, the more chaos it causes. With disability, society defines it as someone with a body unable to function “normally.” This normal being that someone is not hindered by how society has created buildings, jobs, school systems, government, etc. To deal with this deviance, instead of working to make these institutions and places more accessible, society created ways of moving them out of these environments. For example, literal institutions were created to move them away from society itself.
McRuer says in his introduction “According to the flexible logic of neoliberalism, all varieties of queerness — and, for that matter disabilities — are essentially temporary, appearing only when, and as long as, they are necessary.” (29) He is calling attention to the idea that definitions are not all encompassing. Where it is considered a disability in one setting, it can be the norm in another because nothing is being hindered.
The “norm” is personal. My norm is different than my roommate’s norm, or my professor’s norm. My norm is different than someone with a disability. This does not make someone else lesser of a person. A queer woman with down syndrome is just as important as the next. The fault is with the way that people with disabilities are ostracized because they cannot conform to the way society wants, because their norm is just too different than the mass population’s norm.
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I Pledge: Rebecca Hinson
I liked how you started and ended your piece by defining how society views being normal. I wish you directly quoted some of the dictionary definitions that were included in the article because these really struck me while I was reading. If being normal is not lacking something, it seems that there is no such thing as being normal. I was talking with my group in class about how as an collegiate distance runner, I have abilities that most of the rest of the population does not, but I would never describe someone else as disabled because they could not run. I thought that this article, the Rosemarie Garland Thomson article and your response to this article showed that marginalized groups are a social construction based on the societal bias of what perfection is, and this accepted view of what perfection is comes from comparison to others and labels based on simplified views.