[This blog post was written by Prof Katherine Runswick Cole of Sheffield Univeristy and Katie Clarke of Bringing Us Together]
As you visit this site, you will see a timeline of policy failures and inaction by politicians; a blog about numbers which reveal little progress has been made towards an ‘ordinary’, let alone flourishing lives, for people with learning disabilities; and another blog setting out what people with learning disabilities want to happen in their lives and yet nothing changes to make these things possible.
These blogs are powerful, painful and enraging. And there is little space for hope on these pages.
Perhaps you simply can’t live hopefully in these hopeless times. An appalling lack of concern for people with learning disabilities, stretching back across decades, from politicians and policy makers from across the political spectrum, have resulted in terrible human rights abuses in the lives of people with learning disabilities. As David says in his blog and Chris’s numbers bear out, ‘nothing’ has got better.
Perhaps it would be better for us to leave that message on these pages there, undiluted and untouched, to drive home the forceful message to politicians, policy makers and the public that people with learning disabilities have been persistently and systematically discriminated against for decades. Perhaps talking about hope is a step too far away from the project’s findings which document a catalogue of failures and are, by any measure, bleak.
And yet, there may be a place for hope.
Hope is not something that can cancel out the outrage and anger we feel about the injustices people with learning disabilities face. Hope for the future should not be used to excuse or diminish the responsibility of those who continue to perpetuate or tolerate these injustices.
But hope can remind us that there is nothing inevitable about the political and societal choices that diminish the lives of people with learning disabilities. There is nothing ‘about’ people with learning disabilities that mean that their lives have to be this way. We know from studies that people who hold higher levels of hope have less anxiety and stress in their lives. It is not only beneficial to us as individuals but also to society as a whole. With collective hope can come resilience and encouragement to persist and challenge failing systems and the chaos around us.
Though holding onto hope can happen across all kinds of divides and different groups of people, we also know that the world is not organised fairly. Although money, home, work, security, connection don’t automatically help in a situation lacking in hope, they can help and we live in a society characterised by all kinds of intersecting inequalities of class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality and so on.
In her 2018 book, Sara Ryan wrote about pockets of brilliance in the lives of people with learning disabilities, moments of hope.
And so, we conclude this blog with moments that bring us hope – hope in the face of adversity, hope as we rage against injustice, and hope as we hold those responsible to account. Hope that comes into being when something, however small, changes. Acts of resistance and unexpected acts of kindness which sow the seeds of hope even in a seemingly relentlessly hostile environment for people with learning disabilities and their families.
We’ve included a few moments of hope from our experience. We would love it if you would share yours here too.
Katie
I am hopeful that we can continue to grow as a movement. Thanks to social media, zoom and being able to connect with hundreds of like-minded people since the beginning of the pandemic I have found solidarity and new friendships. I have met so many amazing disabled people and family members who I have learned so much from, developed my thinking and who have made me stronger. We are not on our own and there are many of us sharing the same belief systems and values. Onwards and upwards!