Happy National Disability Employment Awareness Month!

And wow, do we still need “awareness” in that long holiday name?

It’s the 80th anniversary of a month that began as a way to recognize the contributions of people with physical disabilities, which expanded over time to include other forms of disabilities and tap the leadership of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy. On the holiday site, you can find tips for employers, posters, sample proclamations, and videos, as well as ways to keep this party going past October. This year’s theme is “celebrating value and talent.”

No one would ever put me in charge of a pithy poster, but let me offer a short list of alternative themes that reflect the reality of working with a disability. If you can fit them on a t-shirt that isn’t made for several people to co-wear, then let me know and we’ll start the Etsy store:

• “You already have disabled employees. They’re just too afraid to tell you because they worry you’ll fire them or treat them differently.”
• “Despite decades of civil rights laws, disabled people are more likely to be unemployed and/or living in poverty than they are to be your colleague with a living wage.”
• “Our current federal programs keep people out of work who want to work because they can keep so few resources and we assume that all people work at the same pace and capacity as others. Once you start making money, you’re hurled into the machinery of capitalism to try and make more money.”
• “Disabled people don’t get special things. Most won’t even ask for a reasonable accommodation because they’re so exhausted from advocating and getting treated poorly, dismissed, or minimized.”
• “We can’t have functional systems of employment unless we address surrounding barriers in communities, including access to healthcare, insurance, transportation, child and elder care, and education.”
• “Discrimination is a jerk. It makes people sicker. It disables people and it happens a lot at work– where people feel most economically vulnerable.”
• “Disabled people are not only unemployed, but underemployed. That reality can be linked to a number of factors, including stigma, lack of mentorship, ableism, and pity.”
• “Employees with disabilities exist in liminal spaces where they feel vulnerable, yet they are often perceived or depicted as litigious, unreasonable, or unreliable. They may feel like they need to shrink themselves, mask, or be something different just to survive. That labor has its costs.”
• “Living with a disability and working is ironically costly when you have a system that keeps you on the margins. Most disabled people will do anything they can just to not fit the ableist stereotypes, not be too ‘needy’, and find some stability.”
• “Stop asking other disabled people if neurodivergence is a ‘thing’ or a trend. That question can go in the same pile as your question about bathrooms or pronouns.”

People want to be paid well, treated with respect, responded to as a human being, seen, and valued. No law makes someone else do that in a natural, healing, and forthcoming way, but we can offer that to each other as colleagues and employers.

Disclaimer: Justice, Actually, is a blog for humans (with an appreciation for dogs, cats, and capybaras), not legal advice.