I recently went to a meetup for a Leftist group in my community. I made it very clear when I met them and during the group that I was disabled and that’s what radicalized me.
During the meeting a lot of talk was going towards things like “What you can do in your community” which was heavily workplace focused, unions, etc. I totally get that.
However when I asked about what kind of role I could play and said I couldn’t participate in public facing events, I got some pushback like “That’s not everyone’s strength but you can get better at it/It’s good practice”. I probably didn’t make it clear enough that it was related to my disability but I felt a little bit bummed by that.
They further went on to saying that in the end they’re looking to get people educated in theory and build “leaders” in the community and that’s the most important part. But I’m never going to be a leader. I’ve tried to join local groups but I’m always on the fringe of them and also can’t participate fully due to my disability, including disability related groups I’ve tried to join. I’ve been told I could be a great case manager but again I just can’t interface with the general public like that.
I’m conflicted about going again due to this. I felt a bit like I would be a leech just doing some of the readings and not contributing to the community in the way that others are going to be doing. I did say I would be happy to support fellow comrades in the group if they needed help with any medical or social support resources in the area.
What place do disabled people have in the revolution or groups like this, really? I mean the best I’m realistically going to get is infodumping to someone I’m never going to see again about communism in rare scenarios. I don’t have a wide social network and most people I know have similar political views to me.
I could probably speak to the group further about this but I feel a little bit tired being placed into the role of “disability educator” and am kind of feeling like maybe I should not bother.
This is a difficult question and it’s one that I personally grapple with a lot.
First off, doing the readings without contributing back to community organising efforts is not leeching off of them. There’s always another seat available and it’s not like you attending is going to be robbing someone else of their opportunity to attend.
Being there and acting in a respectful and attentive way means a lot to any facilitator. Moreover, you’re probably going to contribute to discussions which will create a richer learning environment for everyone in the group so I’d encourage you not to downplay the contributions you will make by attending.
To the broader question, often it’s about finding a niche within the organisation or perhaps carving one out for yourself. If you know that you’re not cut out for the front-facing part of the org due to having a limited capacity, don’t let people push you into doing it. Stand firm on this. Then try to find where your capacity and your skill set meets the needs of the organisation and work your way into doing that stuff. You might have to be patient as you build trust and credibility with the people in the organisation but often you’ll find a dire need for better systems and procedures as well as stuff like logistics management, archiving, proofreading, design, web development and so on.
Often these roles will take you far away from dealing with the general public and they will be stable and consistent jobs that you can tackle at your own pwce.
What place do disabled people have in the revolution, really?
Far be it from me to discount the struggles of people with disability in majority-able bodied orgs but some of the most influential revolutionaries were themselves disabled, at least by modern standards:
Karl Marx himself, Rosa Luxemburg, Antonio Gramsci, and even Stalin.
This fact doesn’t make the difficulty that you’re facing any easier but historically disabled people have played a crucial role in the radical left and it’s worth remembering that.
