DISABILITY MATTERS:
Death, not disability, is the end of the world
CBC News Viewpoint | February 03, 2005 | More from Disability Matters
This column will feature three writers, each with a different disability. They all have something to say about living with a disability and how they view awareness and attitudes toward disabilities in Canada. The column will deal with the rights of people with disabilities, eliminating inequality and discrimination, and issues of self-help and consumer advocacy. Our plan is to rotate among our columnists to have a new column each month.
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Ed Smith is a retired educator and full-time writer. His humour column runs in several papers and magazines and he has had eight books published. He has been quadriplegic since 1998. Ed lives in Springdale, Nfld.
Clint Eastwood just lost me as a fan, something I'm sure will keep him awake nights.
His latest movie, Million Dollar Baby, has won praise from everyone who's seen it, and perhaps a few who haven't. As a person with quadriplegia I see it as nothing more or less than a scurrilous attack on people with spinal cord injury specifically, and those with disabilities generally.
A couple of years ago I gave a keynote presentation to a conference on disabilities. It was meant to be an upbeat and "go get 'em" type speech and from the standing ovation at the end it seemed I had succeeded admirably. Less than an hour later one of the delegates to the conference (we'll call him Jack) button-holed me in the hotel lobby. He looked me up and down and then spoke in confidential tones.
"When I see you now," he said, "and remember what you used to be like, I think 'twould be better if you were dead."
Jack and Clint would have hit it off well. Million Dollar Baby, which Eastwood both directs and stars in, is the story of a fight manager with a promising young boxer. The fighter gets a spinal cord injury in a fall and at her request the manager (Eastwood) kills her as she lies in a nursing home. The film will likely win all kinds of awards.
Not from me, even if I had them to give. Eastwood has hardly been a friend of people with disabilities. He was sued in 1997 for refusing to include $7,000 worth of accessible bathrooms in his $6.7-million resort renovations. Caring chap, Clint.
So it's what the boxer wanted, right? It's what I wanted, too, when I discovered I was paralysed in almost 90 per cent of my body. I pleaded with my wife to have me shot or put down in some merciful fashion. At the time, I didn't even care if it was merciful. That was for the first two days. Now, six years later, I'm rather glad she didn't.
Actor Christopher Reeve had a similar experience. So did many people I know who have suffered from catastrophic injury.
Incredibly, a preponderance of the population, even in our "enlightened" Canadian society, agrees with Jack that we're better off dead.
Some years ago I did a short editorial segment for CBC radio in which I defended Robert Latimer's second-degree murder conviction for having taken the life of his multiple handicapped daughter Tracy. I disagreed strongly with those who wanted him pardoned and set free. The producers told me later that calls and e-mails were running five to one against my position.
It's no fun being quadriplegic. We have to battle attitudes that believe us to be incapable of speaking for ourselves, unworthy of any accommodation of our physical needs, and something less than "normal."
We wait in the snow or the rain outside hotel and restaurant doors that don't have automatic openers, hoping some kindly soul will see us and come running before we perish. We endure while waitresses and store clerks talk over our heads to our spouses or caregivers about what kind of pie or size shirt we want.
We get stuck in cubbyholes in the back of theatres and movie houses. I have almost been physically attacked while asking an able-bodied motorist to remove his vehicle from a handicap parking space so we could get close to an entrance.
While I was in a rehabilitation centre in Toronto my wife called several churches to see if they were accessible. Perhaps we chose the wrong churches or the wrong denominations or the wrong religions. She didn't find one that wouldn't have put me at the front of the church to be stared at, or in the middle of an aisle to be an obstruction.
Despite all this, the vast majority of spinal cord injured persons have a good quality of life. We have family and friends, hobbies and pursuits, occupations and pleasures. Life has changed irrevocably, but it has not become a hell so tormenting that we'd be better off dead. On good days it's downright bearable!
Million Dollar Baby sees no opportunity for any quality of life with spinal cord injury. Its premise is that unless you can walk and/or use your hands your life has no value.
I know several people with quadriplegia who swear up and down that they are really happy. Some of them have even said they're glad they had the accident because it changed their lives for the better. A friend who is also quadriplegic assured me not long ago that he didn't have a complaint in the world.
Although we all admired Christopher Reeve for many reasons, some of us had problems with his obsession that the only goal in life worth pursuing is to walk again. That just isn't going to happen for many of us so we get on with the task of making a contribution to our community in whatever way we can, and being as happy as the next person while doing it.
Being physically disabled is no picnic, God knows. But, Clint and Jack, it isn't the end of the world.
LETTERS:
Ed Smith, thank you for your article. Both before your accident and since,
your writings always inspire your readers to see the world from a different
perspective. In your important contribution to our understanding of
ourselves and of society, nothing has changed.
In a world where one must LOOK "perfect," is anyone surprised that the
Hollywood solution for a person who has become "less than perfect" is death?
Looking old, appearing less a "golden beautiful person," and wearing
non-designer clothing are almost enough to make a person want to die in that
culture.
When Hollywood sees a handicapped person, it is their own discomfort when
confronted with a person who is "less than perfect" that they are reacting
to. Because they are people obsessed with physical "perfection," the
handicapped person confronts them with their own mortality and imperfection.
In 21st century Hollywood, to be less than the conventional view of
"perfect" is perhaps the greatest failing that a person can have - a failing
certainly worthy of a "Hollywood" death!
Margaret
Thanks for sharing your deeply learned experiences. It is sad to know that such a successful film would choose such a negative dramatic ending in order to sell tickets. This ill-conceived plot seems to be based on misinformation, stereotypes, and oversimplification of a complex issue. As for living in Newfoundland, my partner and I were visiting her homeland this summer, and were shocked by the lack of accessible stores and restaurants in the commercial districts of most towns and cities. I would hope that the city councils and planning departments can get more proactive and aware of disabled access issues in Newfoundland, so that people can get around town more independently, where and when they wish.
Kris Elder | Victoria
Ed Smith's piece on the Clint Eastwood movie is one of the best
opinion pieces I've seen on this topic in national media in either
the U.S. or Canada -- and I think I've seen about all that's been
published on this brouhaha.
Mary Johnson | Editor, The Disability Rag's Ragged Edge Online
Hi, thanks for your article, and your determination is an inspiration. I have post polio syndrome, and suffer from severe fatigue. I can relate to the attitudes that you write about. It's sad that there are such ignoraignorantlerant people in the world. In a way I am as guilty as these people, because it is impossible for me to understand them in their arrogance. Just maybe your article will shed a little light in their sad little world. Life is good, and what you make of it.
Hugh Parks
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