yeah, barf, pfft, gag........
Tamar Raine
[log in to unmask]
Now serving tee shirts! and soon to come, Maui posters and other items;
www.cafepress.com/tamarmag
> [Original Message]
> From: Kendall David Corbett <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: 9/8/2006 1:00:21 PM
> Subject: [SDS] "Chicken Soup is Pabulumf say disabled people" : Chicken
Soup for the Special Needs Community
>
> This is very good, and contains a quote from Bobby Greer. He lives on
> through his writings!
>
> (SDS is the Society for Disability Studies in this case, not Students
> for a Democratic Society)
>
> Kendall=20
>
> An unreasonable man (but my wife says that's redundant!)
>
> The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
> persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
> progress depends on the unreasonable man.
>
> -George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Terri Sue Longhurst=20
> Sent: Friday, September 08, 2006 10:15 AM
> To: Kendall David Corbett; Keith Miller
> Subject: FW: [SDS] "Chicken Soup is Pabulumf say disabled people" :
> Chicken Soup for the Special Needs Community
>
> Thought you find this interesting
> terri
>
>
> Terri Longhurst
> Wyoming Institute for Disabilities
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Lamp, Sharon A. [mailto:[log in to unmask]]=20
> Sent: Thursday, September 07, 2006 12:40 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: [SDS] "Chicken Soup is Pabulumf say disabled people" : Chicken
> Soup for the Special Needs Community
>
> (i had trouble getting to the Ragged Edge story "chicken soup is pabulum
> say disabled people" through the url below. once i got there, i copied
> the text and i have pasted it below in the event that others might have
> similar difficulty.)
>
> hi jim and all,
>
> first, thank you jim for organizing the disability resistance to the '97
> chicken soup threat--and although the soup thing is back, it seems that
> these efforts did hold them at bay for 9 years!
>
> i also appreciate that you gave us some history on this issue. i see now
> that a few of my fellow chicagoans at the time such as writers cal
> montgomery and carol cleigh joined in this effort.
>
> i'm reading through and considering the various approaches being
> contemplated by list members. but i'd really like to hear more from the
> original group of chicken soup protesters, if any such folks feel like
> responding. e.g., will you be coming back together for the 2nd round?
> any strategy suggestions?
>
> carol cleigh, maybe you can treat us to a copy of your winning essay in
> total?
> sharon lamp
> [log in to unmask]
> #
>
> Chicken Soup
> is Pabulum
> say disabled people
> Reporting by Mary Johnson
>
> People with disabilities need to know they are special, courageous,
> capable and have something to share with others," said Chicken Soup's'
> Jack Canfield and Mark Hansen in a message soliciting contributions.
> "Not so," said activists. "Special is patronizing."
>
> Businessman Jim Hasse, who has cerebral palsy, was so disturbed this
> past summer by the thrust of a proposed Chicken Soup book that he turned
> part of his Internet website into a bulletin board to solicit opinions
> from other disabled people. The new book was to be "for, by and about
> people with disabilities." Uh oh.
>
> The original Chicken Soup books were harmless enough but became "less
> benign" when they "started targeting specific groups," said Hasse. The
> upcoming one would "likely perpetuate the tendency in society to define
> people who have disabilities by their differences."
>
> "People who have disabilities can probably expect to receive a double
> whammy with this book" -- they'll be portrayed both as "different" and
> "special" -- "two stereotypes most of us are trying to overcome."
>
> Through August and September, Hasse's discussion group buzzed. On one
> point virtually all participants agreed: "People with disabilities are
> often deemed courageous or heroic for simply living," as Sean Barrett
> put it.
>
> "Thinking that I'm more 'special' than others just because I happen to
> have a disability is patronizing," Judy Kuster wrote, "and certainly
> should not be justification for another Chicken Soup book."
>
> What's wrong with this picture?
> "The best part of this project is that a portion of the proceeds of the
> book will go directly toward helping people with disabilities," said an
> informational page on the website of real estate agent Ralph Roberts,
> who has been putting his energy behind the effort. "Betcha ten to one
> they won't be funding any disability rights efforts," John Phillips said
> when he heard about it.. "Will their millions go toward fighting to get
> the Americans with Disabilities Act enforced? Will it go toward getting
> the attendant services bill through Congress? I'm not holding my
> breath."
> "They'll put their money into perpetuating some feel-good, do-nothing
> program," added Tom Leonard.
>
> "What I keep working to overcome is sentimental crap like this that
> allows all those people out there to be amazed that I can even get up in
> the morning and brush my teeth -- while not hiring me for a minimum-wage
> job, although I've earned a Master's degree," wrote a respondent who
> told Hasse he was deaf and blind. Most disabled people, he added, were
> "fighting to be themselves, have accommodations and still get an equal
> opportunity. "
>
> But these fights, he added, were not the ones the public applauded. "I
> betcha a million bucks they will pick out the most sappy stories in the
> world," the ones where people overcome their disabilities. . . ."
>
> That's a safe bet. Samples that authors Jim Canfield and Mark Hansen
> provided on their website included one titled "Everybody Can Do
> Something"
> -- the story of Roger Crawford ,"born with no hands" and a "shrunken
> right foot and withered left leg" who nonetheless gamely intones that
> "my parents taught me I was only as handicapped as I wanted to be." The
> other, "Yes, You Can," is the story of "burned beyond recognition" W.
> Mitchell whose "positive mental attitude has earned him appearances on
> the 'Today Show' and 'Good Morning America' as well as feature articles
> in Parade, The New York Times and other publications." Yet another
> vignette praises the "refusal of total or full acceptance of one's
> disability."
>
> "Great and inspiring stories encourage self esteem, promote a feeling of
> worthiness and help pave the way to success in life," say Chicken Soup
> authors. Nothing, say disability activists, could be further from the
> truth.
>
> BOILING OVER 'SOUP'
>
> FDR and 'Jane'
> Franklin Delano Roosevelt is perhaps the ultimate "overcomer" of this
> century. . . . [But] he had many social advantages. . . . He was born
> exceedingly wealthy. He had a fine education . . . and family which
> could and would support him. . . .
> Contrast my friend Jane . . . [who] lives in a nursing home -- she'll
> never get out except in a pine box, though she aches for freedom. She
> was born with cerebral palsy. . . . She uses a manual wheelchair which
> she cannot push because Medicare was too cheap to replace her power
> chair when it wore out. She has little education, very little money, no
> real family and little hope.
>
> You'll never see Jane in Chicken Soup because she would remind able-ist
> bigots of the shameful way they treat our people. The purpose of their
> sappy sentimentalism is to hide people like Jane behind a facade of
> 'overcomers.' [Yet] which is the more authentic experience of
> disability?
> Which story cries out for change -- and which functions to support the
> status quo?
>
> The publication of [Chicken Soup's] sappy, sentimental hogwash will ...
> further marginalize and obscure Jane's reality ...
>
> -- Carol Cleigh
>
>
> Not for disabled people at all
> "The flavor of these stories plays to the able-bodied," wrote a
> perceptive Bobby G. Greer. He wasn't alone in his perception. Carol
> Cleigh won the contest Hasse sponsored on his website by discussing "the
> function such stories have outside the community of persons with
> disabilities."
>
> Despite its subtitle -- "by, for and about persons with disabilities,"
> the Chicken Soup industry's latest venture, wrote Cleigh, "isn't really
> about people with disabilities at all. It's really just a way to make
> "bigots feel good about themselves while they discriminate against us.
> They are allowed to think, 'well, we must not be treating them too badly
> because some of them are successful,' and 'why don't all of those people
> overcome obstacles as some have done?'
>
> "This is not unlike men who wrote about the 'woman problem' earlier in
> this century" -- or, she could have added, whites who talked about
> providing " 'uplift' for the Negro."
>
> The book would neither "help or empower us," she continued, but would
> harm the cause of people with disabilities by reinforcing the
> "perceptions that our differences from 'the norm' are 'the problem' and
> what we 'need' is to be 'fixed' or encouraged to courageously
> 'overcome.' " Cleigh termed this "pure, able-ist drivel which serves to
> mystify 'the problem.'" The real problem, she said, was "discrimination.
>
> "There is no reason that public buildings, housing, transit, grocery
> stores and theaters should not be accessible. Disabilities are nothing
> new. Nondisabled people build the world so we cannot enter. . . What's
> at stake here is whether we are a minority group facing discrimination
> or a collection of 'unfortunate' individuals."
>
> Sharon Campbell struck a similar theme. Nondisabled people reading this
> book "need to see how they can make changes in their actions and
> attitudes so we don't have so darn much to overcome."
>
> A new definition of 'inspiring'
> "I guess there probably won't be an examination of the prejudices of
> [nondisabled] people; that probably won't be inspirational," wrote Anne
> MacClellan. "If the editors of this book want inspirational stories I'd
> like to see them focus on some of [those who] campaigned to change laws
> and attitudes."
>
> The authors of Chicken Soup had no concept of what could really inspire
> disabled people: that was the message of many who participated in
> Hasse's forum. Susan Ludwig thought that the new Chicken Soup book, as
> now conceived, would merely "isolate people from one another."
>
> Many people worked to explain in their messages that disabled people
> were hungering not for sappy sentimentality but for the power of the
> disability community itself.
>
> BOILING OVER 'SOUP'
>
> 'Just to see what they'd do ... '
> Chicken Soup is going to reinforce the idea that my disability is a
> personal difficulty that somehow I've managed to surmount, instead of a
> complicated web of ... physical and social customs that seem almost
> designed to shut me out. ...
> I've submitted substandard work to people just to see what they'd do,
> and had them rave about it ... what I [actually] do doesn't matter at
> all to so many people. My worth to them is dependent only on some myth
> they have; I myself and what I do are irrelevant ...
>
> -- Cal Montgomery
>
>
> The real kind of "inspirational" stories disabled people needed, one
> wrote, were ones that told them they could have power to break down the
> social and physical barriers that society put in their way -- that this
> was what the disability rights movement was all about.
>
> The "real story," wrote Deborah Kaplan, was about "what has happened to
> our lives and our images of ourselves through our connections" with
> other disabled people.
>
> "We see through each other's b.s.," she wrote, and we "recognize the
> commonalties of living with a disability. We can be honest with each
> other without worrying about how the other person will interpret our
> disability experience."
>
> Though it was difficult to use the word, she added, "we truly 'inspire'
> each other by reminding ourselves that we are not alone, that we do not
> have to handle all this stuff all alone.
>
> "What we have in common is the cultural context of disability. I have
> had the same experience with other disabled people from all over the
> world. We are treated poorly everywhere -- and we can support each
> other."
>
> "I wanna hear a story 'bout a teenager who holds a sit-in with her
> disabled and non-disabled friends to get an elevator fixed," wrote
> Michael Michaelangelo. "Let's write about real crips in a real world."
>
> "We need a story about the disability community ," Kaplan continued, "--
> about how it feels to know you are not alone, and that there are other
> cheeky, sarcastic, powerful, witty, wise disabled people to share this
> life with."
>
> In many ways, Hasse's discussion group accomplished exactly what Chicken
> Soup authors said they wanted (but apparently have no real idea of how
> to do). " Thank you for the effort you are making to draw members of the
> [disability] community together," Ludwig wrote Hasse. "If Chicken Soup
> did nothing else, at least it did this."
>
>
> Something was wrong
> -- Jim Hasse
>
> Reader's Digest subscribers may like Chicken Soup books, but don't try
> to warm it over and serve it to people who have disabilities. Chicken
> Soup stories are written and selected according to a very rigid
> problem-triumph-lesson formula that seldom reflects reality and is
> inherently sentimental. Their sentimentalism tends to reinforce the
> stereotypes we all have about one another. Feeding stereotypes further
> divides us. It does not bring us together."
> When Jim Hasse, a Barbaroo, Wisconsin businessman with 32 years of
> experience in corporate communications, checked out the website being
> used by authors of the best-selling Chicken Soup for the Soul series to
> solicit stories for their new book, Hasse felt offended, but at first he
> didn't know why. TIPS FOR ...
>
> Chicken Soup editors
>
> don't use stories that show how "special" disabled people are.
> don't pick stories of people who "overcome disability" by hiding it.
> do recognize that your format plays to nondisabled sentimentality.
> do tell stories of disabled people fighting for rights and access.
> do show readers how they can make changes in their actions and attitudes
> "so that people with disabilities don't have so darn much to overcome."
> do tell stories about the activist disability community, about common
> bonds disabled people share.
>
> After thinking about what such a book would mean to him, born with
> cerebral palsy, he wrote a letter to Chicken Soup authors expressing his
> concerns. Hearing no response, and not convinced the Chicken Soup
> authors would thicken the pot, Hasse used a discussion forum on his own
> website to establish a dialogue among those with disabilities and those
> without about presumptions Chicken Soup authors need to avoid in the
> stories they select for publication. His Website now contains a summary
> of the discussion forum's results.
>
> Hasse promised to award $50 out of his own pocket to the person who
> posted, in his opinion, the best advice for the authors in terms of
> usefulness, originality and conciseness. He also offered a complimentary
> copy of his book to two other individuals who posted the most useful
> advise for the authors. In 1996, Hasse self-published Break Out: Finding
> Freedom When You Don't Quite Fit The Mold, a memoir of 51 true stories,
> each illustrating a turning point in his understanding about what it
> means to be presumed different in the U.S. and abroad.
>
> The $50 recipient, W. Carol Cleigh, summarized her August 20 posting
> this
> way: "The only real purpose of such a 'Chicken Soup' book is to
> perpetuate and re-inscribe able-ism."
>
> Jim Hasse can be reached by e-mail at: [log in to unmask] or by fax at
> 608/356-3797.
> END
> *
>
>
> Hi, Sharon, Jim and all:
>
> The disability community defeated the Chicken Soup book idea about
> disability in 1997, using the Internet (and my site) when both were was
> still cutting their teeth.
> See http://www.ragged-edge-mag.com/nov97/chick.htmpois Chicken Soup.
> <http://www.ragged-edge-mag.com/nov97/chick.htmpois%20Chicken%20Soup.>
> Do we need to go through this again?
>
> Jim Hasse
> Developer, Facilitator, Marketer
> http://www.tell-us-your-story.com
> Madison, WI
> ---
> James R. Hasse, IABC Accredited, Global Career Development Facilitator
> Senior Content Developer
>
> eSight Careers Network
> The Global, Cross-disability Online Community Addressing Disability
> Employment Issues.
> New York City
>
> URL: http://www.eSight.org
> E-mail: [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>
> Please note:
>
>
> If you have questions/comments/concerns about the content of this
> posting, please e-mail them to the list manager at the following e-mail
> address: [log in to unmask]
>
> If you wish to be taken off the Listserv, please email Joy Hammel in the
> Chicago office at the following address: [log in to unmask]
>
> If you would like to know how to become a member of SDS, please go to
> the SDS home page at http://www.uic.edu/orgs/sds/ and click on
> "Membership Information". Alternatively, you can call the Chicago
> office at 312-996-3513, or e-mail Joy Hammel at [log in to unmask]
>
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