Daily Archives: December 24, 2019

In the midst of tremendous cultural shifts during the 1960s, I was a youngster often recovering from experimental surgeries and struggling to understand why I was different. On my familys 12-inch black and white TV I witnessed people gathered together speaking out against injustices surrounding race, gender, sexual orientation and class struggles. But I didnt see people like me displayed on the evening news.

Since the late 1800s, most people born with disabilitiesin Europe and the United States were properly shunned housed in institutions. Such facilities were for the most part located on undeveloped parcels of land and rarely seen by local residents. They were out of sight, out of mind. Individuals many placed as babies were put away under the guise of it being for their own good and the good of society and regarded as second-class citizens. Many with physical disabilities acquired cognitive delays due to lack of environmental stimulation. Societal attitudes propelled a sub-standard segregated life and furthered stigmatization.

Related: 8 Reasons Why Cerebral Palsy Is My Best Christmas Gift

World War II had ended two decades earlier and remained in the worlds rearview mirror. Millions of Jews and others were murdered in the name of eugenics, an attempt to create superior humans in a twisted misinterpretation of Darwins survival of the fittest. The others included people living in private and state-operated institutions, identifiedunder Nazi policies as life unworthy of life. Individuals with congenital, cognitive and physical disabilities (including people termed in the 20th century as feebleminded people with mental illness, epilepsy, deafness, blindness, cerebral palsy and muscular dystrophy) for elimination from the chain of heredity.

My young self was ignorant of these horrid events and yet mindful of others perceptions. My pre-school-aged memories are filled with Why do you talk that way? or How come you walk funny? comments I heard whenever I stepped out my front door and into the world.

A stiff upper lip persona took shape inside of me. My childhood naivet vanished like smoke from an extinguished candles wick. Adults interrogated my mom with similar questions. They spoke over me as if I wasnt there. Moms attempt to shield her baby girl against implicit discrimination often failed. She made valiant efforts to protect me from the perpetual dreaded question, Whats wrong with you? dipped in a thick ooh. It reeked with flashing red lights. There was no mistaking the underlying message. You dont belong. I didnt belong. Strangers stares and words cloaked me in shame.

Related: To the Person Ashamed to Use Tools to Help Their Disability

I have cereba paly, I replied, delivered with a meek smile. I know, I tal funny. I ound illy. I followed it with my trademark snicker. If I can make them laugh, they will feel some ease and know that Im fully aware. It gave me a slightly opened door to enter, a chance to connect. How I longed to belong.

In addition to receiving instruction and therapies (presently known as early intervention), my special school provided a sense of belonging. I shared an incomprehensible bond with my classmates. Different. The politest label people beyond the schools grounds considered us.

Kids who were not my classmates laughed when they met me. Shouts of retarded or Frankenstein often hit my ears. Their words power shook my already precarious balance. Frankenstein referenced my walk. I walked with my arms held up towards the sides of my chest. My hands pointed towards the ground. This stance assisted with balance as I staggered on tip-toes turned inward. Oh, how I longed to be like everyone else.

Related: 8 Tips for Managing Your Menstrual Cycle With Cerebral Palsy

By first grade I had decided my experiences at the other end of strangers voyeuristic looks and labels werent worth sharing with Mom and Dad. The fear on their faces when expressing such encounters pierced me. Dads fear disguised behind familiar splashes of disgust reinforced the ridicule I felt. Mom, on the other hand, delivered a well-pat response. Some people are ignorant, Jen. Your purpose in life is to educate them. Her strong words clung to my brain. These words developed into my lifes mantra.

On a ride home from school one day, my bus idled at a busy intersection. A mother and her young daughter caught my eye at the corner gas station. The girl appeared to be 5 or 6 years old close to my age. They giggled as they ran around their car. My onlooker smile turned to tears before the green light signaled the bus driver to proceed. I yearned to run carefree, to play without hearing Dads voice with or without him present saying, Be careful, Jen. Youre going to fall.

Our school bus rolled forward and struggled into gear. I strained my neck to retain the girl and her mother in my sight. What are you looking at? the boy seated behind me snickered, laughing as he noticed the tears streaming down my cheeks. Why are you crying?

Its nothin. I turned away in embarrassment.

Where do I fit? ran through my mind. That is my first memory of attempting to process being different as Mom said. To Moms credit, different was a palliative term. I never heard disability throughout childhood. The word was not a part of the societal vocabulary. Crippled, impaired, handicapped and retarded graced our countrys vernacular, on the rare occasions such discussions occurred at all.

Throughout the 1960s and into the 70s, our culture gave little thought, let alone consideration to persons with disabilities. Segregation of children and adults with disabilities continued. For those not living in institutions like me, buses drove us each weekday far from our homes and the neighborhood schools we wished to attend.

Up with a stuffy nose one night, I snuggled with Mom on our couch. The lights were off and the TVs volume was set low so as not to disturb Dads sleep.

Who tat? I sprang from a near sleep.

Oh. Thats Ironside.

Ironide? What his name? My interest peaked as I raised my head from Moms chest. They let him be a cop?

Hes a detective. She seemed unaware of my questions motivation.

Wow! Deteive. What happen to em?

Happened to him? She whispered in a thicker-than-usual Kentucky accent from nearing sleep.

Why he in a wheelchai?

Oh! Mom shook awake from her respite. Somebody shot em. He cant walk no more. She whispered.

He coul wak before? Tat ad. I was struggling to whisper so as not to wake Dad. I hoped my words had reached Moms ear.

Yeah, its sad. But remember, Jen. TVs not real. Its actin.

Oh, yeah. So he can wal in eal life. ight?

Yeah. His real names Raymond Burr.

In my 5-year-olds wonderment, I thought only kids were different. Raymond Burr on Ironside was the first adult I ever saw who was different. My excitement to learn more about the man on the screen and the budding identity of me taking root gave way to the nights silence.

6 Lessons 'Margarita With a Straw' Can Teach Us About Disability

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How We Can Improve Disability Inclusion in Schools

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What It Was Like Growing Up With Cerebral Palsy in the 1960s - Yahoo Lifestyle

Parenting in 2019 often feels very confusing in this way. Every decision can be met with second guessing,anxiety, ambivalence, and a large online community of people who will either affirm or reject whatever it is that youre doing. Sometimes, youdont even know that what youre doing is wrong, and you may be told that there is no way to repair the damage youvedone, and guess what? You still have 18 years left of raising that kid youve already ruined with your poor decision-making. Good luck with that.

A new book written by two academics looks at the many complexities of present day parenting and exposes some of the different (and similar) approaches society took to moms in earlier times. In Youre Doing It Wrong!: Mothering, Media, and Medical Expertise, authors Margaret M. Quinlan and Bethany Johnson detail all of the ways we are flooded with mixed messages about parenting today, and how to navigate this messy terrain to find the voices that will really help.

In a phone interview with SheKnows, Quinlan, a mother of two, related to my feelings of constant maternal bewilderment. You cant blame us for constantly stressing about the ways in which we may be failing our kids. Theso-called village has all but disappeared for most people, so every day, Im at home alone with my son. In place ofthe villagehas come the internet, which can be an incredibly helpful resource but also create more confusion and chaos by spreading false information. For example, the growth of anti-vaccine sentiment in recent years has been linked to measles outbreaks, an illnesspreviously thought to have been wiped outin our country.

Moms nowadays are often left to their own devices after birth, as if its not bad enough thatthe U.S. has the highest maternal death rateof any developed country. Maternal mortality iseven higher for women of color. Black mothers arethree to four times more likely to diethan white mothers, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A2018 studyfrom the University of Illinois at Chicago found thatheart disease is a leading cause of maternal deathin the U.S., and another study published earlier this year found thatsuicide and drug overdoses are leading causes of death in new mothers.

In researching for her book, Quinlan found that many new mothers were better cared for a hundred years ago than they are now. Doctors made house visits to see new babies rather than ask moms to haul their newborns into crowded, germ-infested offices.

We were able to figure out how to better support immigrant women in Boston in the 1900s better than were able to do it today in a lot of ways, Quinlan, an associate professor of communication studies at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, said. People came to your house and it was free whereas most of us are alone and fathers are back at work.

For many women, itsthe pediatrician who noticesthat mom is not okay. At the same time, the pediatrician only treats kids, and its not easy for moms to manage their own health issues when they must care for a child 24/7.

When you go to the pediatrician and ask about [yourself], they say, youre not my patient, and you then have to go to a lactation consultant and call all these people [all] while youre baby is screaming, Quinlan continued.

The internet also allows us tocompare ourselves to other momsand question our own parenting abilities along the way. It can be easy to look at apopular influencers Instagram pageand think she has motherhood and life figured out, especially if she has tens of thousands of followers, major sponsors paying her, and gorgeous backdrops for all the photos of her and her beautiful children. Quinlan says that while she admires people who have been able to do this, she recognizes that this does not represent her world or the reality for most moms.

My life is never going to look like that, she said. Ive never had a picture of me and my family going through a field. We justdont have the money for a photographer and its not my reality.

All this comparing can lead to feelings of doing it wrong, and while this might seem like a relatively new phenomenon on social media, its deeply rooted in the parenting experience. Quinlan explained to SheKnows by phone that the past looks a lot more like the present than we all may realize. In the early 1900s, many people in the U.S.competed in Better Baby contestsin thespirit of eugenics. Thankfully, competition among babies plays out in a much different and less harmless way today. Instead, we see other peoples babies walking or talking early on social media and ask ourselves, Gee, my baby is that age. Why isnt he doing any of these things yet?!

Quinlan, who shared that her son is having some issues with food that has warranted visits to various experts, said its important not to frame everything as a choice or fault moms for not doing research on whatever issues they may be facing.

Lets not assume that everyone is able to read peer-reviewed journal articles, not that theydont want to, but even Idont have time to read some of the stuff Im going through with my son, I am just surviving, she said.

This is whereProfessor Emily Ostercomes in. Oster, a popular academic figure among moms online, has made a name for herself analyzing research on child rearing and pregnancy to help mothers make informed decisions about parenting. Quinlan agrees that Oster provides a wealth of information for mothers who may not know how to sift through the many conflicting studies and pieces of research they stumble upon in search ofanswers on parenting: will breastfeeding really make my child smarter? How dangerous is co-sleeping? Will allowing my child to cry it out scar him/her for life?

Oster isnt the only person online who can help new moms figure out what works best for their families. Quinlan noted the existence of internet fertility support groups, which for many women are a significantly more affordable option than fertility treatment. Women in these groups can check in with each other during the two-week wait, the time period from ovulation to when someone would get an accurate pregnancy test result.

In the fertility research wevedone, weve found some really amazing community in Instagram, people following up on each other during the two-week wait, people willing to fill in the social support gap of people who arent sharing with their families, she said.

Internet-based mom groups are also good options for someone who might not be able to pay dues for groups that meet in person, get their newborn out of the house, or ditch work for meetups.

A lot of people are posting at 3 a.m. to Facebook because theyre scared, theyre alone, theyre trying to decide, OK, this is a $300 copay. If I go to the ER in the middle of the night, it could end up being thousands. Should I wait until 9 a.m. when the doctors office opens and pay a lower amount? Quinlan said. Instead of shaming them [for not going to the ER right away], say what can I do to help you? What can I do to support you? Idont know whats happening in that rash picture [you shared on Facebook], but can I Venmo you $5 for a coffee because tomorrow is going to be a long day? What can we be doing to support each other in these crises and not shaming each other?

With social media and the internet, its easier now more than ever to find what youre looking for online, whether its a thyroid support group or a niche community that celebrates your favorite parenting style. It can be overwhelming digging through everything in between, but discovering a community that best suits your needs might make parenting feel a lot less daunting, and remind you that so many people are in the same boat. Quinlan told SheKnows that she learned more from some of these online groups than shed find in the pages of more traditional sources.

Some of these things are harder to find in medical textbooks or some of the pregnancy books, she said. I think theres a lot of space for a lot of people who have a lot of different experiences, and we need to talk about what those look like.

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Motherhood Has Never Been More Complicated Heres How to Simplify It - SheKnows

THEY are small huts, scattered across the country, which appear on the outside to be fairly unassuming

But behind the walls of the barely habitable dwellings lay the truth of a bizarre experiment that saw Scottish authorities attempt to control a distinct racial group in a bid to get them to integrate into mainstream society.

Known as the "Tinker Experiment", it saw members of the travelling community placed in specially provided huts, far from the rest of society, in a bid to break them into joining the rest of the population and effectively kill off their culture.

Remarkably, most of these sites only closed in the 1980s, but one in Pitlochry remained in use only a decade ago.

READ MORE:Gypsy Travellers: Scotland's human rights shame

Now members of the travelling community are demanding an official apology from the Scottish Government for what they call Scotland's secret shame, and they're planning a protest at Holyrood next month.

They are angry that other sections of society have received apologies for historically poor treatment from the state while they still wait, despite it being illegal to discriminate against gypsy travellers on grounds of race since the Equality Act of 2010.

Shamus McPhee, who was a subject of the experiment at Bobbin Mill, Pitlochry, pointed out that each reason the Scottish Government had given why it couldn't apologise for the Tinker Experiment could be rebutted through a previous apology to another distinct group.

He said the Government had in the past said it was unable to apologise for the actions of a previous government, ignoring an unreserved apologise to the gay community. On another occasion, he said, it claimed claimed it couldn't apologise for local government initiatives or the actions of public bodies but apologised for the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry.

Mr McPhee said another government defence had been that it couldn't offer apologies for events which predated devolution, but that that overlooked an apology to those affected by the contaminated blood scandals of the 1980s and 1990s.

He said: "A programme of eugenics saw Gypsy Travellers separated out on racial grounds for removal from Scottish society. This marked a top-down, concerted approach, designed to eradicate a specific group of people.

"I think that quite a striking analogy can be drawn between our treatment, almost colonial in aspect, especially the level of subsequent denial, and that of the aboriginal people in Australia. The extent of that institutional racism is most clearly illuminated in the response from central government in Scotland, which has been described as 'wilful blindness' on the part of the ruling elite."

READ MORE:Scotland needs to do better for Gypsy/Travellers

His sister Roseanna adds: "Although the authorities said it was a housing experiment it was actually a racial experiment, it was a form of eugenics because nobody could be put in the houses unless they were what they called a 'tinker'.

"There was no one from mainstream society who was put there and we were kept away from that mainstream. These houses were specifically designed to ease the tinker problem."

The genesis of what became known as the Tinker Experiment in private government circles began just over a century ago. In a deputation to the Secretary of Scotland in 1917, it was claimed that "with kindly treatment, tinkers could be reclaimed and brought into line with ordinary civilisation".

The chair of the Department of Tinkers in Scotland, the Duchess of Atholl, asked for a Scotland-wide census on the numbers and social make-up of these communities.

This was an attempt to measure what was called at the time in the press as the "Tinker Problem", and then solve this problem by assimilating travellers into mainstream Scottish society by threatening to remove their children into care.

By forcing them to send their children to school for a set number of days, the gypsy families would have to settle in permanent accommodation as governments and local authorities recognised that the families had a close bond with their children.

Due to the secretive nature of the plan, exact figures have been hard to come by, but it is believed that thousands of individuals were forced to exist in properties with no hot water, electricity or proper washing facilities.

Those who refused had their children taken into care.

Throughout the 20th century huts to house travellers were built in at least 10 different locations across Scotland.

These included the Bridge of Don barracks in Aberdeen, Red Rocks in Inverness-shire and Muir of Ord on the edge of the Black Isle.

These sites were basic by design with minimum living facilities and were closely supervised by the authorities.

On the Muir of Ord site, the idea "was to train the tinker how to live in a house, instead of in sheds, old buses and under canvas which would give them a better chance in life".

In Perthshire alone, 35 traveller families were housed in substandard huts, many unaware that they were part of a racial experiment.

Perthshire Council initially bought a former WWII prisoner of war hut to be used as housing for four gypsy families.

In a letter from 1945 concerning the creation of the property, the council ignored bylaws for minimum standards of housing, instead applying regulations intended for tents, vans or sheds.

The huts were deliberately substandard to encourage travelling families to quickly move into mainstream accommodation and so be assimilated into Scottish society, reasoning no-one would put up with the property for more than three years.

However, this assimilation was difficult as many gypsies felt they couldn't practise their own culture living in a council estate isolated from their own community.

Those affected have repeatedly asked the Scottish Government for an apology, but without success.

Most of these sites closed in the 1980s but one in Pitlochry remained in use only a decade ago.

The Bobbin Mill huts were partitioned with asbestos-coated wood into four sections for different families to occupy.

Each hut consisted of one bedroom and a toilet and cold water sink. It had no electricity and accommodated up to 10 family members.

Yet according to resident Alexander Johnstone, who lived there from the 1960s, the poor conditions were despite the fact there was ready access to utilities. "Even though there was a gas tank nearby and a house over the back that had electricity only about 30 metres away, they wouldn't install it for some reason.

"I never saw a council person the whole time I was there, and if anything was broken we just had to fix it ourselves."

The building was condemned as unfit for human habitation in 1962 yet the council continued to place families there throughout the decade.

Many former residents believe that their recurring health problems today stem from the asbestos dust and freezing conditions of their childhood home.

Roseanna McPhee recalls a locum doctor who had previously worked in South Africa making a house call.

She said: "He compared the huts to Soweto. If you didn't just get on with living in the bad conditions and thole it, the children would be taken into care."

Even if the families did suffer in silence, their children were still at risk of being removed.

Jessie McPhee's family were also occupants, but she and her twin brother Robert were taken into care in 1956 at birth as the local council decided there was not enough room to accommodate any more children in the family of 12.

She believes her parents simply accepted the authorities' decision out of fear that all of their children would be taken away from them.

Jessie returned to the family home to start primary school, but Robert was placed in a boarding school because of his behaviour. He kept running away from the home because of the treatment he received there, coming from a minority group. She is convinced Robert, who died 20 years ago, never recovered from the double rejection.

She said: "He felt he had been rejected twice, by my parents when he was taken into the children's home and then by the boarding school. He was an alcoholic who drank himself to death because he couldn't accept what had happened to him."

The experiment in assimilation failed as the children were mercilessly bullied at the local primary and secondary school and then became stigmatised because of their sub-human housing, which affected their chances of forming relationships outside those in the same situation.

Roseanna explains: "You couldn't assimilate. If you went out with someone from the wider community and they found out you were from the hut, you never saw them again.

"People could accept you were a traveller or a gypsy but they couldn't accept that you were living in these appalling conditions they couldn't understand that you didn't want to be there they didn't understand that you were put there."

When asked about the Tinker Experiment, the Scottish Government acknowledged the treatment the travellers had received and the impact it had on them, but again stopped short of an apology.

READ MORE:It needs guts to take the road less travelled. And for Gypsies, that means protecting their children from the outside world. But at what cost?

A spokesperson told The Herald on Sunday: The lives of many gypsy travellers have been blighted by the historical housing polices of councils and charities. We absolutely recognise the devastating impact which these polices had on families, many of whom are still suffering the consequences.

A joint Scottish Government and Cosla 3 million action plan to tackle the discrimination and challenges faced by the gypsy/traveller community was published in October.

See more here:

Scandal of The Tinker Experiment: demands for apology over Scotland's treatment of gypsy travellers - HeraldScotland

This weekend, Pope Francis spoke to Catholic high school students about how to reach nonbelievers, stressing that Christians should live their faith out loud rather than trying to try to coerce people to convert, invoking the crusades as a time of great shame.

In front of an unbeliever, the last thing I have to do is try to convince him. Never. The last thing I have to do is speak, the pontiff said,according to Disrn.Instead, he stressed, I have to live consistent with my faith. And it will be my testimony to awaken the curiosity of the other who says: But why do you do this? And yes, I can speak then.

Never, never bring the gospel by proselytizing, he said later. If someone says they are a disciple of Jesus and comes to you with proselytism, they are not a disciple of Jesus.

Pope Francis invoked the crusades and conversion by the sword, calling it shameful and noting that Christians across the globe are similarly wrongly killed for their faith.

We are not in the times of the crusades, he said. Either the baptism or the sword. This has happened in history! They also do it with us Christians in other parts, they are also doing it but what we did was shameful because it is a story of forced conversion, of not respecting the dignity of the person.

The Holy Father said he first learned of the principle of coexistenceback in Argentina, amid mass migration.

There is a mixture of blood, a strong mixed race in Argentina I am the son of a migrant, and this has made a culture of coexistence, he explained. I went to public school and we always had companions from other religions. We were educated to coexist: There is a Jew, Russian, ah come, come! I am a friend of Russian! They said Russian because the majority of the Jews came from Odessa, some from Poland but the majority from Odessa. Then there were some Arabs, Lebanese, Syrians Ah, Turkish! Come, come! This was Muslim, this was Jewish. But we all played football together, we were all friends.

This has taught me so much, that we are all the same, all children of God and this purifies your gaze, it makes you human, Pope Francis said. In Argentina there is a small group of closed-minded Catholics who do not want Jews, do not want Muslims, but this group I have never liked it, is a group that is on the fringe, they have a cultural magazine but they do not have impact in society.

But listen: Never, never bring the gospel by proselytizing. If someone says they are a disciple of Jesus and comes to you with proselytism, they are not a disciple of Jesus, the pontiff said.

Pope Francis has repeatedly focused on the dignity of each human life. Last summer, for example, the pope compared aborting children for birth defects to Nazi eugenics. The Daily Wire reported:

I have heard that its fashionable, or at least usual, that when in the first months of pregnancy they do studies to see if the child is healthy or has something, the first offer is: lets send it away, the Pope said, according to CNN, which appeared shocked by the news that the Pope is, indeed, a faithful member of the Catholic Church and opposed to the practice of abortion which the Church believes ends a human life.

I say this with pain. In the last century the whole world was scandalized about what the Nazis did to purify the race. Today we do the same, but now with white gloves, he continued.

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Pope Francis Tells Students How Not To Convert Unbelievers - The Daily Wire