A couple of weeks ago the Red Sox celebrated Disability Pride. I love how common such celebrations have become. Sure not everyone will be enthusiastic about it but at least most people have been exposed to the concept. I was excited to get tickets.
But then I got to the friendly confines of Fenway park and my enthusiasm struck out.
We got there after the first inning because the start time was 6:45 and I worked until 4. I had to get home and feed Happy before heading over to Julie’s, and driving in. Then we had an adventure finding the parking spot that Julie procured for us. Because there’s always an adventure when Julie’s involved!
As a result we missed whatever pre-game ceremonies there may have been.
Our seats fortuitously ended up being behind a fellow DHH advocate. I say “fortuitously” because that was the only way we would have known it was Disability Pride night. (Y’know apart from buying the tickets through a link that said “Disability Pride Night”) There were no between-inning announcements or anything on the screens. No flags or flyers. And the promo jersey with Red Sox spelled out in ASL was only available for people who bought tickets through that link above.
Then there was the fact that Disability Pride month is July.
This was May.
I appreciate the effort but my appreciation only goes so far. We need to do better than this because I left the park feeling like this was just a billion-dollar organization checking a box. While hearing loss may not be as life threatening as some of the other minority groups covered by the DEI umbrella, I’ll be damned if the crack down on DEI initiatives isn’t impacting us, too.
Such initiatives are becoming increasingly slipshod.
Or at least such initiatives are seeking as much bang for their buck as possible. The jersey celebrated the DHH communities with ASL – but really excluded those of us in the HH part of that initialism that don’t know ASL. It celebrated those with dexterity challenges with velcro in the place of buttons. And it had a braille patch on the arm to celebrate the blind.
Those are three very different groups with very different needs.
But hey, at least the Sox sold some tickets the historically bad team ownership has put on the field can’t bring in on their own, right?
This is the kind of performative activism that really angries up my blood. It’s done only because there’s a quid quo pro; we’ll acknowledge your existence but only so we can get you to buy a ticket. Too often we devolve our thoughts and opinions to sound bytes and hot takes. We try to prove a point without taking the time to do our homework on said point.
Five years ago Naomi Osaka told Megyn Kelly to “do better”.
Kelly didn’t do her homework and called Osaka out for appearing on a slew of magazine covers even though Osaka had refused to talk to the press citing her mental health. Those photo shoots happened a year before Osaka decided to buck tradition and take care of herself. That was in 2021. But it might as well have last night.
Mental Health is another area that needs more work.
As in the acceptance that it’s a valid health concern and not a character flaw. Last month was Mental Health Awareness Month. Were you, ahem, aware of that? I’d hope so, Julie and I did a series of episodes on mental health and hearing loss! The Sox Disability Pride Night made me aware of how my hearing loss affects my mental health.
As we walked through the crowded concourse (we were far from the only people to show up after first pitch) on our way to our seats, I was almost physically assaulted by the blaring music. If the night was about Disability Pride, then why was the music so loud? Most of us with hearing loss have loads of trouble finding the voice of the person we’re talking to amongst background noise so loud it should be called foreground noise. Such volume is one way for there to be more of us, too. That’s to say nothing of the visually impaired and the struggles they have using their better sense.
That was just one of many times where I doubted my self-worth.
At an event purported to be for those like me, the hosts did little to accommodate, or even acknowledge, me. It made me feel isolated in a crowd of 30,000+ people. Osaka was right then and she’s right now. People need to do better. I admire her restraint that comment shows. She didn’t resort to name-calling, she replied instead to the action, not the person.
We could all stand to be more aware of the whys and the hows of our actions. That includes organizations with global influence.
We can all do better.
We’re all in this together.
Kindness costs nothing.
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