Video – What Does International Day of People with Disability Mean to You?
Wed, Dec 2, 2009
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What International Day of People with Disabilities means to me
IDPwD is a day to take time out to reflect on how people with disabilities have been included in my life: how we have impacted on each other. I hope all parties can say positively.
Christine Walton
Part of me is filled with satisfaction on how far the general community has come in understanding issues related to disability and part of me is still challenged by how far we still need to go. I look forward to the time when IDPwD is a total celebration of us just being a totally inclusive community.
- Christine Walton, ADDC
What does this day mean to you?
Have your say. Read below what IDPwD means to other people.
I’m attempting to view this in the 2.4.2.5 rc of the seamonkey web browser and the header looks rather cut up. You should probably take a look.
International Day of Persons with Disabilities (IDPwD) is a chance for disability and human rights activists from different cultures, religions and languages around the world to share one day to raise awareness of disability discrimination and call for change.
IDPwD can close the gap of understanding of disability issues between the disability community and the non-disability community. The different lenses with which disability is viewed by these two communities is growing wider and deeper. On the one hand, persons with disabilities are advocating for human rights and equal opportunity. Social attitudes and physical barriers in the environment, rather than the impairments themselves, that are disabling. One the other hand, persons without disability view disability through the charity-based approach. The non-disability community views impairments as disabling; that is, impairments act as a barrier to participation by persons with disability in society.
IDPwD represents a day in which the disability and non-disability community can come together to understand disability from a human rights-based approach (rather than a charity-based approach) and to ensure everyone understands that attitudinal and physical barriers (rather than impairments) are the greatest obstacles to participation in society by persons with disabilities.
Persons with disabilities are friends, family, co-workers, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters and children – they have a right to be part of the community, to be provided with equal opportunity and to live a life free of discrimination.
It is also important to note that the number of persons with disabilities is likely to increase. Soldiers are returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with disabilities, children are developing mental illness as a result of conflict, civilians continue to encounter landmines decades after wars have ended, and instances of disability as a result of disease and illnesses is prevalent in developing countries which lack clean water and sanitation are on the rise.
IDPwD means understanding impairments do not lead to inability.
IDPwD is a day that reminds me that I have so many people to look up to, to give me strength and encouragement when I’m feeling down or have had a bad day.
As a person with a physical disability and also someone who works in the disability industry, IDPwD has a dual meaning. Firstly the day gives me the chance to remind politicians and the general community that people with disabilities have the same rights, feelings and aspirations as everyone else. Secondly working in the industry, I take time to reflect on what I do and whether or not I have in some way helped to make a difference in the life of someone else with a disability.
International Day of People with Disabilities is stopping to recognise and celebrate the immense value of people with disabilities, their families and their friends – to realise their dignity and courage. People with disabilities and the ones who love and support them, have often been shunned and rejected by society, making an already challenging journey all the more difficult. In Australia today, awareness is growing and support services are becoming more readily available, no matter what your socio-economic background. Although even we, second on the Human Development Index, have a long way to go. There is still a degree of judgement that prevails and social services are still not yet adequate enough to meet the needs of individuals and families who manage a disability.
To me IDPwD is a global call to action, urging all of us to do more to raise awareness about the rights of persons with disabilities.
IDPwD is an important day where we celebrate how far we have come in furthering disability rights. But this day we also recognize how much more work lays ahead to ensure equal rights for persons with disabilities worldwide, especially in the poorest countries.
IDPwD is the day many voices come together to celebrate all our varying abilities and encourage others to do the same.
Pauline Kleinitz- CBM Australia-Nossal Institute Partnership for Disability Inclusive Development
I feel that IDPwD is a great opportunity to celebrate the great diversity of our community to celebrate the success and challenges that a Person with a Disability can or has experienced.
IDPwD is a reminder for me to visit someone I haven’t visited in a long while.
‘International Day for People with a Disability brings the community together’
‘People with a disability sometimes get overlooked and feel ignored’
‘We get looked at as really cool!’
Toby Crook is on vocals and banjo & keyboard in ‘Sector 5 Extreme’ @ 11.35am at the IDPwD Music Festival, 3 Dec at Macleay Pary, Belmore Road Blawyn North. (Mel 46 C5)
IDPwD is a wonderful opportunity for us to reflect on ‘disability’. How do we relate to people with a disability and how can we include them in our lives.
We are all missing out on having some amazingly beautiful and gifted friends simply because we are not going beyond ourselves and looking towards someone else.
This year I have met some incredible people who have a disability and this has changed my life and given me a real understanding of how intelligent and gifted they are. I am so thankful to each one of them for giving me a new understanding of ‘disability’.
It is but one day of the year which highlights the fact that we need to keep creating a world together where for 365 days every year each and every person has all the supports that they need to fully participate in the enjoyment of life’s possibilities, and, barriers to that enjoyment are identified and removed. IDPD demonstrates we are not there yet but we are on the journey to that point. When we don’t have to have a special day set aside – we will have arrived.