#CripTheVote Twitter Chat
Mental Health, Ableism, & Elected Officials
Sunday, December 3, 2017
4 PM Pacific / 7 PM Eastern
The co-partners of #CripTheVote, Gregg Beratan, Andrew Pulrang, and Alice Wong, are thrilled to have guest hosts Dior Vargas and Dustin Gibson join us for a discussion on mental health, ableism, and elected officials.
How to Participate
When it’s time, search #CripTheVote on Twitter for the series of live tweets under the ‘Latest’ tab for the full conversation.
If you don’t use Twitter, you can follow along in real time here: http://twubs.com/CripTheVote
If you might be overwhelmed by the volume of tweets and only want to see the chat’s questions so you can respond to them, check @DisVisibility’s account. Each question will tweeted 5-6 minutes apart.
Check out this explanation of how to participate in a Twitter chat by Ruti Regan: https://storify.com/RutiRegan/examplechat
Check out this captioned ASL explanation of how to participate in a chat by @behearddc
https://www.facebook.com/HEARDDC/videos/1181213075257528/
https://www.facebook.com/HEARDDC/videos/1181213075257528/
Introductory Tweets and Questions
Welcome to the #CripTheVote chat on mental health, ableism, and elected officials. We are excited to have guest hosts @NotThreeFifths @DiorVargas with us today! Our chat will be 75 minutes to give enough time for all our questions.
Please remember to use the #CripTheVote hashtag when you tweet. FYI: ableist language and mental health will be part of the conversation so please practice self-care if you become distressed.
If you respond to a question such as Q1, your tweet should follow this format: “A1 [your message] #CripTheVote”
Q1 Community check-in. What a week (actually, what a year). How are you doing, especially in light of the recent vote by the Senate on the tax bill? #CripTheVote #TaxOnDisability
Q2 How do you define ableism? What are some examples of ableism in politics, including media coverage and conversations by and about elected officials? #CripTheVote
Q3 When people casually use ableist language such as ‘crazy’ and ‘insane’ to describe the current political climate or the behavior of politicians, why is this harmful to the disability community, especially people with mental health disabilities? How does this impact POC differently? #CripTheVote
On a similar note, check out this great article from @NOSeditorial by Ivanova Smith on intellectual disabilities & ableist insults/slurs: http://nosmag.org/stop-using-intellectual-disability-as-an-insult-trump/ #CripTheVote
Q4 Ableism is a anti-Black construct. What are some of the ways ableism and racism intersect and how can we confront ableism without being racist?
For more information, check out @talilalewis’s article on ableist language: https://medium.com/@talewis/disability-aint-for-ya-dozens-or-demons-10-ableist-phrases-black-folks-should-retire-d9f8483076e9 #CripTheVote
Q5 There is a lot of frustration and anger with the Administration and in particular the behavior & actions of the President. What are some constructive ways of resisting & protesting that aren’t ableist? #CripTheVote
Q6 Recently, 27 mental health professionals & psychiatrists published a book about the dangers of Trump. What's your reaction to these types of 'warnings' to the public? https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/diagnosing-donald-trump #CripTheVote
Q7 The Goldwater rule is the informal name of a rule by the APA that psychiatrists should not give professional opinions on the state of people they have not evaluated. Why is this rule important? Is there ever a time it should be breached? #CripTheVote https://www.psychiatry.org/news-room/apa-blogs/apa-blog/2017/03/apa-remains-committed-to-supporting-goldwater-rule
Q8 How does this type of public speculation and armchair diagnoses impact elected officials with mental health disabilities and other people with disabilities who may want to go into public service? #CripTheVote
Q9 The DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) is relied upon to provide common language for diagnostics. Is this a tool that we should be using? If not, why is problematic? #CripTheVote
Q10 How will legislation like the 21st Century Cures Act affect our community? What do laws like this tell us about politicians’ understanding of #MentalHealth & #Disability? #CripTheVote
For more on the Act and the Murphy bill (which was folded into the Act): https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/wins-loses-21st-century-cures-act
This concludes the #CripTheVote chat on mental health, ableism, & elected officials. Thank you to our guest hosts @NotThreeFifths @DiorVargas!
Please keep the convo going. A Storify of this #CripTheVote chat will be up shortly.
You can find updates & info about our future chats here: http://cripthevote.blogspot.com/ Our next #CripTheVote will be on 1/21/18 about chronic pain & opioids with guest hosts @msdeonb & @alexhaagaard. Thanks again!
You can find updates & info about our future chats here: http://cripthevote.blogspot.com/ Our next #CripTheVote will be on 1/21/18 about chronic pain & opioids with guest hosts @msdeonb & @alexhaagaard. Thanks again!
