John Dickinson-Lilley: ‘Disability isn’t a bad thing – it’s just different’ – Gay Times Magazine

It was great speaking to John Dickinson-Lilley, former elite athlete, Stonewall Sporting Champion and Director of Communications at the British Museum, for Disability Pride Month.

I started by asking John about the importance of Disability Pride Month.

Disability is still broadly regarded as a bad thing. People have an emotional response to disability. Quite often that instinctive response is, ‘Poor you!’ I think there’s a big piece of work in terms of celebrating being disabled, really owning it and enjoying it. This isn’t a bad thing – it’s just different. How people perceive disability – on the one hand you’ve got people who think disability is a fundamentally bad thing and then you have people at the other end of the spectrum who keep saying you’re so inspirational. Lots of people think disability is so bad that managing to do anything in a day is a significant achievement, let alone having a career or being a ski racer as I have been.

Tell us more?

It’s a concept in the disability community known as “inspiration porn”. That’s very much using disability as a crutch for abled people to get on with their own lives. It’s not actually celebrating disabled people. It’s a form of objectification of disabled people. I think Disability Pride Month is really important because it’s an opportunity for people to share their stories and experiences and shift that narrative.