Lunch and Plenary 2: Women with Disabilities and Allies
(CART Transcripts)

Okay, folks, for those of you who asked prior to this conference for a special dietary request like a vegetarian meal and have not received a blue ticket, please raise your hand, for those who signed up prior to the conference and have not received a blue ticket for special dietary needs, please raise your hand.

Excuse me, before we start our official program, we would like to make an announcement. If I could have your attention please for a few minutes.

Hi, everybody, I am Laura. I am an activist with the group Not Dead Yet. Many of you know that Terry Schiavo, the woman in Florida who is in the process of being intentionally starved and dehydrated to death with the permission of the court and at the behest of her husband and legal guardian, not dead yet is organizing an action tomorrow, a press conference and rally in front of the White House tomorrow at 3 p.m. to call attention to Terry Schiavo's case and specifically to ask President Bush to tell his brother, Florida governor Jeb Bush to intervene in the case of Terry Schiavo and to do whatever he needs to do to preserve her life, which might be to take state custody of her so that her husband's authority can no longer be reexerted to end her life, and so we really would like to ask all of you to join us tomorrow if you can possibly get to the White House at 3 p.m. If you need information on how to get there on the Metro or the buses, we can give you that.

If you can't come, please call the White House line and send that message to the president to tell his brother to intervene to save Terry Schiavo. If you have questions or comments, you can see me later or Terry Lucas, please raise your hand or Robin Stevens. Where did she go? I hope you can all join us. Thank you.

Good afternoon, and I think most of you know I am Helena Berger, AAPD's chief operating officer. I didn't know I had so many fans. Thank you.

My bio is obviously in the program book, but for the purposes of this weekend there are three things you need to know, I am not an attorney, I am a New York Yankee fan, and I am also a Bush basher. That being said, I now have the pleasure to introduce our first speaker. I say the pleasure with a lot of sincerity because Ann Cody is not only a colleague of mine but a good friend.

Ann is a vice president with B&D Sagamore. She is a paralympian. She serves on the Women Sports Foundation, Sports For Girls and Women With Disabilities, The International Wheelchair Basketball Federation Executive Council and the U.S. Paralympic International Relations Committee. Ann's presentation will explore how civil rights laws, like Title IX and the ADA can help to level the playing field for girls and women with disabilities in sports.

(Ms. Cody) - Thanks very much, Helena. It is my great pleasure to be here with you all this afternoon and also to talk about a subject that is very near and dear to my heart.

What I hope to leave you with in this short discussion that we are going to have is a better understanding of the importance of advocating for access to sport and physical activity for girls and women with disabilities. I want to give you a little bit of personal background to help illustrate this point.

I have identified as an athlete all of my life pretty much, and from the very young age discovered that I had athletic abilities and had the great fortune of growing up at a time when Title IX, the Education Amendments Act of 1972 was implemented. I was just nine years old when Title IX was enacted. Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender in the provision of educational programs and activities in all education institutions receiving federal funds. As part of that, Title IX requires that all education institutions expand opportunities in athletics for girls and women.

As such, I had the opportunity to pursue sport, compete in sport, and reap the tremendous benefits that participation in sport and physical activity afford. This is something that girls and women didn't have tremendous opportunity in my mother's generation to experience and to benefit from, and I quite literally wouldn't be sitting here before you today had it not been for the tools and training that I received as an athlete, as a young athlete growing up -- the self-confidence, the strong sense of identity, the leadership skills, the ability to work as a team, the goal setting experiences, the pursuit of excellence in performance taught me a tremendous amount about myself and also has enabled me to transfer those skills to many other aspects of my life which I have been able to draw on throughout my life and in my professional career in particular. So that is just a personal testimonial to the benefits of sport.

But Title IX has -- many of us are familiar with women and girls who have benefited from Title IX, and certainly girls and women with disability, as girls and women with disabilities, we have received indirect benefits of Title IX, but in order for us to have expanded opportunities to pursue sport and physical activity, we have the Americans with Disabilities Act and make sure these are implemented, and in the implementation we consider and prioritize physical activity and sport.

I just want to share with you some of the benefits that we have determined through the past 30 years that we have had Title IX in this country for girls and women.

Research suggests that girls who participate in sport are more likely to experience academic success and graduate from high school. Collegiate female athletes graduate at a significantly higher rate than non-athletes.

Half of all girls who participate in some kind of sports experience higher than average levels of self-esteem and less depression. Additionally, women who participate in one to three hours of exercise a week may bring a 20 to 30 percent reduction in the risk of breast cancer. These are some significant benefits that we certainly want our sisters, our nieces, our mothers, our neighbors, our sisters with disabilities to have the opportunity to experience.

There has been a little bit of research done on the current status of girls and women with disabilities as it relates to health and physical activity, and I just want to share those with you to illustrate why we ought to be thinking about this and talking about this more regularly. 93 percent of women with physical disabilities report engaging in no physical activity, 93 percent. Compared with 43 percent of women without disabilities. That's a striking statistic for me personally.

The prevalence of chronic health conditions such as arthritis, diabetes, and high blood pressure are three to four times higher in people with disabilities. We know that regular physical activity is an important part of a healthy lifestyle, and certainly in my own experience it is even more important as a person with a physical disability that I pay attention to my physical activity levels in order to avoid some of the secondary complications that I am at very high risk of because of my paraplegia. I want to give you a couple sports examples of the participation rates of women with disabilities.

The Paralympic games which are the Olympic Games for athletes with a physical disability, women make up only 20 percent of the athletes competing in these games, and now obviously that number is very small because girls and women, girls and young women with disabilities aren't being exposed to sport. They are not getting the opportunities to explore this as a potential avenue for growth and development.

Also in the sport and wheelchair basketball, to be even more specific, women make up just 12 percent of the athletes playing that sport. That is one of the most visible, popular sports played among people with physical disabilities throughout the world, and only 12 percent of the athletes are women. So we have a lot of room to improve. The good news is that as the chair of the Commission For Women in Sport With the International Paralympic Committee, we are beginning to identify some policies and strategies that can help improve these statistics and expand opportunities, and it is going to take a lot of work.

It is sometimes overwhelming when I stop and think about it. But what I want to leave you with here today is a request that you help me out because we really need to take this message to our local communities, to our family members, to our extended family, to professionals who are providing recreation and fitness and sports activities in your communities, and particularly we look to -- I know I personally look to organizations like the YWCA and women's organizations to help me make inroads into areas where women with disabilities haven't yet been able to get completely in the door.

We have all I think -- we all can agree to the benefits we have seen Title IX and expanded opportunities for sport for women accomplish. We just look around us, in the work force, in our communities. There are young women who have tremendous skills and confidence and poise because of their sports participation that we want all of our young women and girls to have the opportunity to experience.

I hope that you will help me out in this effort to make sure that girls and women with disabilities are considered in the area of sport and physical activity and that we're creating access and opportunities in this arena for everyone. Thank you very much. (applause)

(Ms. Berger) - Thanks, Ann. I think what Ann proves is that many times in the disability community we see disabled individuals who are athletes and don't always think about engaging them in the civil rights movement and improving the rights of people with disabilities. I think Ann is a testament to showing that she is a strong advocate, she lobbies every day up on Capitol Hill, she is a wheelchair athlete. I think we need to make an effort to engage the athletes in the disability community and get them more involved because they can help us to increase the civil rights of all people with disabilities.

I think Ann is bringing us an important message. We are going to hear next from our future leaders. Harilyn Rousso is going to be the moderator. She has been responsible for choosing most of our panelists, for getting them here, creating the agenda. She has put a lot of effort into this. I think we should acknowledge that with a round of applause. (applause)

Harilyn is an educator, social worker, psychotherapist, and disability rights activist. She is a nationally recognized expert on gender and disability. She was selected by the National Women's History Project as an honoree for the Women's History Project in 2003. Harilyn.

(Ms. Rousso) - Can you all hear me? Okay. This is going to be very tricky. We have here some wonderful women, wonderful young women with disabilities. There are many here and believe it or not, there are many more out there.

We are very fortunate to have a wonderful younger generation of feminists who are going to move us forward and hopefully allow those of us who have been around for a long time perhaps too long to go move to Tahiti so the next generation can take over. What I would like us to do, let me just tell you what the format is. We will begin by having each of the young women introduce herself. She is limited to one sentence. No meager challenge. Then we have a series of questions that we are going to try to answer together.

The chances are good we are not going to get through them all. So my hope is that when we are done this will really be just the beginning and that you will approach these young women during the next day and a half and continue the conversation with them. They have an enormous amount to say and can educate all of us really.

So having said that, I would like to just sort of go down the line and Elizabeth, maybe you could introduce yourself. This is a little tricky here in terms of the microphone. I wonder if -- a little creativity. Okay, Elizabeth, you're on, one sentence.

(Elizabeth Macias) - All right, my name is Elizabeth Macias. I am a student at the University of Texas at El Paso, and I am the vice chair for the Disability Caucus of the Young Democrats of America, and I am the chair of the Women's Caucus for the State of Texas Young Democrats of America.

(Susanne Beechey) - I am Susanne Beechey, I am a doctoral student at George Washington University. I am studying gender and public policy.

(Jaya Vasandani) - I am Jaya Vasandani. I am a policy associate at Center For Women Policy Studies. I live in Washington. I have lived in China, Singapore, and the United States.

(Joy Levin Welan) - My name is Joy Welan. I am a student at George Washington University. I am the president of the Membership Alliance and I do other activist work.

(Sarah Triano) - I am the youth and education team leader at Access Living of Metropolitan Chicago and a co-founder of the National Disabled Students Union, and I openly and proudly identify as a young feminist with a disability. I am Sarah Triano.

(Claudia Gordon) Hello everybody, my name is Claudia Gordon. I am best known, I guess, as a community advocate. I work preferably with the grass-roots community and have for the last 13 years. I have been involved with the National Black Deaf Advocates Association. We promote civil rights and equality and access to people who are deaf and African-American. I graduated from law school in the year 2000. I am currently working at the National Council on Disability as a consultant and I am also a leadership award winner. Thank you.

(Latifa Lyles) - My name is Latifa Lyles, and by day I do fund-raising for Trial Lawyers For Public Justice, which is a public justice law firm in Washington, D.C. My activist life I serve on the NOW national board, representing the mid Atlantic region. I am active in the local DC NOW chapter.

(Kelly Anthony) - Good afternoon, my name is Kelly Anthony. I am the director of the Missouri Disability Vote Project. In my activist life I am on the board of directors and I am the chair of the Disability Rights Committee for the ACLU Eastern Missouri. I am also a clinic escort at Planned Parenthood as well as an options counselor for women receiving abortions.

(Marissa Johnson) - I am Marissa Johnson, I am the education policy coordinator at Access Living. I identify proudly as a young feminist.

(Ms. Rousso) - The young women here are going to be focused on similarities and differences of disability studies. So the first question I want to throw out is what would you say are a couple of the major concerns young feminists face today. Not an easy question. Does anyone want to jump in here?

(Latifa Lyles) - When Harilyn said she was going to ask us questions, we were to think about areas of education, work opportunities, family relationships, social, sexual, reproductive rights, parenting, violence, power and balances, gender, disability, environment, global -- okay.

I looked at all these issues, and I thought about it, and I had not two words or two issues, but one, and that was the Bush administration. I could find something in the current Bush administration that threatened women in all these arenas, and I think that the right wing attacks that we are getting faced with right now are so much more complicated than they were 25 years ago.

I think that women are comfortable, women can work, there are laws that say we cannot be discriminated against, so it is so difficult to say we need it right now, our rights are under attack, women care, young women care, but it is really, really difficult for me to mobilize women and convince them that it is as important as it was 25 years ago, it is more important.

The movement should not be smaller, the movement should be bigger, and if we don't mobilize over the next six months or 12 months, we are going to be in serious trouble if we are not in serious trouble already. I will leave my answer broad.

(Ms. Rousso) - Any other speakers here?

(Kelly Anthony) - I will take a shot at it. This is actually sort of a piggyback to what Latifa was saying. Some of the issues facing young women today are broad in scope. I personally feel that there has not been a central issue or a central focus really emerge from all of the issues that we are facing. There is not a clear cut, from my personal feeling, there is not this clear cut direction in which we are supposed to be headed. Women today have many more opportunities than generations past, and in many ways that's a good thing and in many ways that makes it very difficult to organize. I guess my question is, you know, where, oh, where, are our political leaders?

We have in Missouri one of the weirdest legislatures, one of the weirdest political climates I think in the country. We consistently elect six statewide pro-choice liberal Democrats to office, yet our state legislature, even when it is a majority democratic is anti-choice, and that just boggles my mind.

Why are our leaders so afraid to take an issue on something as important as choice? When I was working at Missouri NARAL, right out of college I went to work for Missouri NARAL, we had a 501(c)(3), and a PAC. We had candidates come to us and say very quietly behind closed doors, we agree with your issues, but we don't want to take your money. We agree with your issues, but we don't want your endorsement. My question to them was, if you think we are right, why are you whispering? Why are you not spreading it from the mountaintops?

Where is our leadership? Where is our visible presence in the state legislature?

Where is our representation? For me as a young woman, I have been called idealistic more than once. I do not see that as being idealistic or unrealistic. We should be demanding it. Our political leaders who aren't cutting the mustard are going to be replaced. Our political leaders must be our voices for our movements, our generations, and our issues.

(Claudia Gordon) - If I may, I have to agree with what you were just saying with the previous speaker. It is a very broad question, and there is no one central issue that is totally common to everybody within the body of the movement because it really depends on your particular class or your socioeconomic status, your level of education, your race, your language, all of that comes into play, which then affects the issues of what the priorities are within each of those subgroups.

As a natural part of our society, we know that the tendency is to divide over so many different aspects, different norms within each of these cultures that we become more fractionalized. We are not only women. So not only do I have to fight for equality as a woman, but I also have to fight for equality as an African-American and then as a person with a disability.

So my issues and what's important to me may be different from my sister next to me because my issues are unique to me. But as a whole body, we need to work to find those commonalities, those common trends and goals. As a member of the younger generation, I do see a need for more dialogue between the older members of our feminist movement and the younger generation coming into play, in working with the youth I often see that they are not always given equal opportunities to have a place at the table, to really have a substantive dialogue.

This panel I think is a substantial start. At the time, it is an issue of trust, you know, whether our opinion truly counts as much as those older and wiser, but with today's youth, young women are doing more than they ever did before, and we have valuable contributions to make, and sometimes those contributions are suspect, and then it becomes to the older generation a matter of giving up that power -- getting involved with the power struggle in the movement, so until we resolve those issues there won't be a common issue that we can all strive towards.

(Sarah Triano) - My name is Sarah. We were asked to say our names again. When I first moved to Chicago, Illinois, I had just come from getting a bachelor's degree in history of public policy, and I immediately called NOW, and I said, "When is the next consciousness raising group?

I want to get involved." They said, "We don't have anything like that, but we have a fund-raiser coming up that you can attend." At that point I realized one of the main concerns that Claudia just highlighted that I think is really key is the need for dialogue, the need for dialogue. Consciousness raising doesn't stop. It needs to keep going on. We have seen that in the disability rights movement, the need to create autonomous groupings, and the role that that plays in developing women and also people with disabilities, our self-consciousness, raising our respect, it plays a key role, but I also think we need to move beyond that, okay?

That is your contribution to our generation, and I think it is time to move beyond that, too, and to not just do issue-oriented organizing. You know, I am sitting there thinking, well, the problem in America is that, you know, the lack of rights for people with disabilities. Well, no, it is sexism, well, no, it is racism. Well, no, it is homophobia. It is the war in Iraq.

Finally I am coming to realize that the problem in America is the entire system itself, and it is time, I think, that young women with and without disabilities, we need to take on the mantle of revolutionary leadership for the entire country, not just for one movement or another. (applause)

But it is not possible for us to make a revolution when we are viewing the struggle as the sum of all our parts. It is time to move beyond issues and get to revolution.

(Ms. Rousso) - Does anyone else want to discuss that?

(Marissa Johnson) - I don't know that I want to follow Sarah, but I get to work with her. I want to mention something that Claudia raised, the relationships with older women. I just found out in the last few months that I have family members who were actively involved in the suffragette movement. I didn't know that growing up. I was never really educated. We learned about women's history in school, but I never had any mentors or relationships with women who were passionate about women's issues. I think that is so key for the disability movement and the women's movement to really be able to develop the next generation is to have relationships with women who are passionate and kind of bring you along with them and help develop the next generation.

(Ms. Rousso) - One last comment on this question?

(Susanne Beechey) - Just to sort of echo the things that everyone else has said, I think the need is to sort of think about how our issues all intersect and think about what we sort of have in common in our common agendas and whether that is a common enemy in the current presidential administration or whether it is a common support or whatever, but to work toward the commonalities and rather than trying to find the single issue that we are working on, think about how all the things that we are working on connect and how we can work together.

(Ms. Rousso) - Thank you. There is a question I want to throw out that maybe is more relevant for my generation than yours. When I was getting involved in the disabled women's issues and in women's issues, I often felt a real gap between disabled and non-disabled women. I really found that I have to fight my way into the disability or into the women's movement, and a lot of the fight seemed to focus on access rather than real issues, which is really what I was more concerned about, and similarly in the disability rights movement there was not an emphasis on gender concerns. So I wondered whether any of you could comment on some of the differences, if any, you see between the issues facing disabled and non-disabled young feminists. That's one part of the question. And if you see differences, what could we do to begin to bridge the gap?

(Kelly Anthony) - As far as differences are concerned, the only difference I really see is in what our constituencies choose to make visible, choose to make priority issues. I think there are many, many, many more similarities between these two movements than what meets the eye, and I don't think that we as two movements can begin to come together until we address two key problems. One is poverty. Two-thirds of the people with disabilities are living below federal poverty level. 85 percent of people with disabilities are unemployed or underemployed, working well below their skill level. So contextualize that for a moment, imagine that here today in the 21st century, which was a meeting of the minds to decide why 85 percent of women were unemployed or underemployed because we are women.

Think for a moment if today in society 85 percent of African-Americans were unemployed or underemployed because they were African-American. These are issues that face people with disabilities every day, and issues such as equal pay for equal work are great issues, they are great issues for people who have access to jobs, they are great issues for people who have jobs and are working.

However, for women with disabilities who aren't able to get in the door for an interview to a job, that's a nice issue to be working on. It's one that we strive for. I think the other issue to deal with here is paternalism. That's a common threat that I think weaves its way throughout both our movements, the issue of paternalism and the idea that this government has the idea in its head that we're supposed to be taken care of. Quite frankly, they are not doing such a good job at it. I don't know if you've noticed.

Paternalism manifests itself in so many ways. I was reminded this week of the woman in Florida who is mentally retarded and was raped in her group home, and she became pregnant. Jeb Bush, the governor of Florida, stepped in and decided the way to deal with the problem was to appoint a guardian for the fetus so that even if that woman had decided that she wanted to have an abortion, it would have been, she would have been unable to do so.

Why wasn't that woman appointed a guardian? Why wasn't that woman placed in the community if she could have been? Why are services available to women in institutions, to people with disabilities in institutions but not in the community? The issue is poverty. The issue is paternalism. In Missouri we just passed a horrendous law, the 24-hour consent period to get an abortion.

Apparently our state legislature thinks that women make decisions on abortion on the fly. I don't have anything really better to do today, I think I'll go have an abortion. This is how our state legislature views us. It is insulting. This is an agonizing decision for women. Why do we need an extra 24 hours? That is mandated by state law to come up with -- to make that decision. It doesn't make any sense. It's paternalism. It's got to stop. We have to demand better from our political leaders.

(Ms. Rousso) - Let me just ask you, do you think that non-disabled young women don't understand what you are saying?

(Kelly Anthony) - I think that it is not made a visible priority. This is both sides of the coin. For each of our movements to develop issues, to develop priorities on issues that deal with those things. It is not so much -- it is weird, it is not the feminist organizations or the disability organizations are not not empathetic to each other's concerns, but to show support we must take on issues that deal with both our communities, and, Harilyn, address the real issues of our communities, the poverty, the fact that women are losing rights more than we're gaining rights. It is a matter of priority, it is a matter of issue and visibility. Organizations have a trickle-down effect. Organizations who represent constituencies make the priority, those constituencies make the priority. I do not think it is a lack of understanding. I think it is just, to this point there has not been a real visible connection between the issues that our movements are working on.

(Joy Levin Welan) - Can I jump in for a minute. I'm Joy. I feel that our issues are a lot more the same than they are different. We are both working for equality, we are both working so that our common humanity is recognized, and I feel like I am the only activist with a disability. There are more. It's not that the other activists don't care about disability. I just feel like there is so much to focus on, the world is falling apart as we watch it, and there is so much to focus on that disability issues just aren't taking priority right now. It is something we have to work on. It is not for lack of caring. We are just burnt out, we are focusing on so many things.

(Elizabeth Macias) - Hi, I am Elizabeth. I, too, agree that disability and women's issues are quite similar, and the thing I have seen the difference between is earlier yesterday morning I left a town that was 10 minutes away from the border of Mexico, and I see cultural differences in each of these communities more than I see it broken down within if you're disabled or a woman. Right now I know I fight with younger women every day, I don't know if anyone knows this word, machismo is a huge problem, we have problem with disabilities and without disabilities who are told by their family they need to be married by the age of 20 and to be having kids because that's their job. It's ridiculous.

Then if you have a disability, you need to stay at home because you can't get married because you have a disability, and you need to stay home so we can take care of you because someone always has to take care of you because you're a woman and you have a disability. I think the cultural differences you see everywhere. I don't see that many in the Hispanic or Latinas in the crowd, so I am just saying that everywhere it is very different.

I'm glad someone is here. Everywhere it is very different. Coming from a border town, I see the issues are very culturally different more than broken down on disability or woman issues.

(Claudia Gordon) - You know, it seems to me that there are some divergent perspectives here. For one thing, I would like to say that I think there is a tremendous amount of general policy issues that are the substance of our movements, and I think that sometimes we are basing things on mainstream norms, not so much the disability norms, and I think it is an ongoing struggle. Somehow we have to figure out how to merge these things and make these norms happen, but at the same time we have to clearly define ourselves and what we consider our priorities rather than make everything an afterthought. Speaking in general terms, for example, when I was in my undergraduate work, I took a class. The class was called Black Feminist Thought.

This class really took apart the history and the feminist movement, and it really confronted the issues when the intersection of being black and being a woman becomes oppressive, and even women were being oppressive to these black women. So it is sort of this double oppression within the movement itself. So black women were facing this, and they fought their way through, and they displayed that they were intelligent such as women like Toni Morrison, and all these women who fought their way through to become part of the feminist movement, bringing with them the issues of being a black woman and their own agenda. If we could look at that model, when I sat through that class, I really understood the struggle of being a black woman, but I didn't at the same time feel 100 percent part of that struggle because I saw myself as being even more below, being a woman with a disability. I wasn't even in the radar for those issues. They just didn't include me in their body of activists at all. So I guess we are talking about the other, aren't we? We are talking about white women who initially looked at black women as their helpers, and I personally as a black woman with a disability feel as the other-other if I can use that term. So really it is very, very complicated. Today it is just different.

The issues that we are facing are different. Our youth in particular, do they even know what feminism means? Have they been exposed to the role models where they can really understand these concepts? I'm talking about in the inner city now. Kids who have parents who didn't even receive a college education, no way. So therefore that chain is broken. Then we have to get them to understand that fundamental concept, and the issues on top of it. And there is no simple answer. There is a lot of factors at play here. It is based on who you are and your individual life experiences and level of education, race, and so on.

(Sarah Triano) - This is Sarah. All right. So I leave the NOW, I call for consciousness raising group, they send me to a fund-raiser. Then I call the Feminist Majority Foundation, I go to one of their meetings, and I come in, and we are introducing ourselves, and I am going to say this without trying to create this division, this non-disabled/disabled binary, but I do think there are differences.

I come into this meeting and I say, yeah, I am really interested in talking about abortion. Okay, this is the word nobody is saying, so I am going to say it. I am really interested in talking about abortion and what constitutes meaningful choice, okay? Because I am a disabled woman, and I am sitting here in a society where 90 percent of fetuses with Down Syndrome are being aborted.

I am sitting here in a society where parents are bringing wrongful life lawsuits on behalf of their disabled child, saying that they would have been better off dead than to have been born in order to get the money so that they can pay for their medical care. I don't think this constitutes meaningful choice, okay? If 90 percent of fetuses with any other human characteristic in our society were being aborted, it would be a red flag.

So I start bringing up these issues at the Feminist Majority Foundation, and I say people with disabilities right now are fighting for our fundamental right to life, okay? The minute I say right to life, boom, I got stereotyped big time, okay? I totally support women's right to choose, okay? But I also support people with disabilities right to life, and for some reason there has been created this opposition, you can't have both.

I am like an enigma, I don't fit into one of the boxes, but we need to get into these boxes because this is where the power lies and here is where we can start to join forces.

(Latifa Lyles) - This is Latifa. I think as leaders in both movements or the movement if we are not thinking of the movements as two different movements, we really have to take responsibility for educating our members and educating our constituencies. I don't know how many meetings I have had where we have an organizer who is trying to organize an event, and she is trying to locate a location for the event, and it is down a hall, down a stairway in a bar.

I say, well, you know, hey, I know it is probably a really cool place to hang out, but it is smoky, and about three-quarters of our members probably couldn't get through the hallway and another percentage couldn't get down the stairs, and a light goes off. People are very happy to have this information. I don't think it is because people don't get it, people don't know.

We are programmed to be complacent, and I don't think that is a lost cause. I think that women want the information, I think women in the organizations consciousness raising works. I think we just have to keep doing it. It is extra work, but we cannot afford not to do the actual work. It is beyond access, it is beyond whether or not the restaurant is ADA compliant. Is your meeting at a time where a woman who has to go home and take care of her children can get to it?

Is it in a neighborhood that is accessible to women of all economic situations and all different types of areas in the city? I think that whether it is economic, whether it is cultural, whether it is a disability issue, I think we have to, as leaders, bring these issues to the table every time we have a meeting, every time you have an event, every time you do a phone bank, every time you have an action, you cannot afford not to do it. I think young women will gladly accept the information and spread the word, but we can't give up. (applause)

(Susanne Beechey) - This is Susanne. I think sort of piggybacking on the issues around abortion, I think we need to also be careful that we don't let our common enemies define the term for our debate and that we don't fall into those boxes that they set up to trap us. We need to always be conscious of where are our commonalities and rather than allowing ourselves and our actions to be forced into those boxes, to really be conscious about thinking outside of it and looking for commonalities and not be put into stereotypes.

(Ms. Rousso) - I totally support that. I think it appeals to my experience, it is very essential to have a cadre of people who are willing to speak out. My experience in many movements is that I am the only one, and for those of you who have served that function, you know how hard it is to educate and change attitudes as only one. How important it is to have group support across the lines of disability and so forth, you have to have women who will speak out on lots of things. The real challenge is how to develop that, how to go about among the women like yourselves. In my generation we were not successful.

(Kelly Anthony) - I completely agree, Harilyn. I think it is our responsibility as leaders in movements and communities to actively seek out issues that affect our constituencies and make those issues visible. We should actively seek out the issues that they don't want to talk about, and you all know who the "they" is. Were reproductive rights an issue before women's groups made them an issue? Were women getting the right to vote an issue before we made it an issue? Was equal pay for equal work an issue before we made it an issue? The answer is no. We have to actively seek out these issues, the issues like forced sterility still happens. Forced sterility, Marca Bristo earlier this morning spoke of a woman with CP who was forcibly sterilized. It happens in our community. It is not uncommon. We have to actively seek out the issues that keep women with disabilities in institutions unnecessarily.

These are the issues that they don't want us to talk about, so that's exactly the reason we need to be talking about them. These right to die issues, the Terri Schiavo in Florida. This is a perfect example of a way, an issue that our communities can work together. We are here as a community to learn from each other and to have fun and to commune with one another, but I hope we get something else out of this. I hope we all leave this conference tomorrow afternoon, I hope we leave here pissed off. I really do. Because that's the way we're going to start to see some things happen. We have got to be angry, angry that our sisters are stuck in institutions and living and wasting away and dying in these institutions unnecessarily. We have to be angry that no mental health parity exists, that if you need to go to the doctor, your company will pay for that, but if you need to see a psychiatrist for your bipolar disorder, sorry, we won't cover that. We need to be angry, and we need to go out and do something with that anger.

(Jaya Vasandani) - This is Jaya. I have a little bit of stage fright, you'll have to excuse me. Just to reiterate what I heard Claudia and Elizabeth and Susanne bring up, the original question was the similarities and the differences between young, disabled, and nondisabled women, and ways to bridge that gap. I guess as a nondisabled woman, I guess immediately I was thinking, okay, as a nondisabled woman what are the differences? What I realize is that I don't necessarily identify with the mainstream women's movement, either. I think, I just wanted to reiterate that it is important to remember that the mainstream non-disabled feminist movement is not necessarily all the same, either. There are so many differences between all of us, and one of the ways that we can come together is again not to just look at issues, like you mentioned before, but to really find the commonalities. I just wanted to bring that up, that I don't necessarily identify with one group only. I think that is a real strength among us all.

(Marissa Johnson) - Going back to the original question again of what are some of the differences, I think one thing that young people with disabilities face that a lot of others don't necessarily face or face in different ways is really having to learn how to identify themselves and gain a sense of identity with disability because it is not something that is passed on through generations, you are not often born with parents who have disabilities.

So learning to just figure out who you are as a person with a disability and then moving into, okay, who am I as a woman and as a person of a certain ethnicity, but really learning that identity is such a difficult piece, and I think that that really adds to some of our struggles, and our struggle to get involved as well. But, yeah, I was going to say something else but I forgot what it was.

(Ms. Rousso) - I sort of wanted to get back to talk about the issue of building bridges across generations. My choice of language, I am not sure if cross-generations is quite the word. I think the truth is many of us are in different stages of our lives. Some are students, some are working, some are working in more advanced levels, some have families, some do not. Some are more further along in their activism. We are on many different levels.

But the question is whether at this moment you all feel satisfied with your relationship with older feminists, and if not, what can we do to bridge that gap. One of the most wonderful experiences of my professional life was having an intern program for adolescent girls with disabilities, and I have to tell you that the mentors in the program, quote older women, in those days we were in our 30's. I have to confess to you that we all learned at least as much as those adolescent girls, if not more. So mutual mentoring is probably also included. I sort of like to hear your take on whether you have relationships with older feminists.

(Marissa Johnson) - I'll start on that one. Mentorship is one of my big passions. I don't really have any strong relationships with women who in my relationship with them identify as a feminist. I have a lot of -- I work with -- but I have only been there for six months. I have a lot of mentors in the disability community who say I am part of the disability community, and we work under that sort of topic, but I don't really have any women. My mom spent a lot of time about telling me I was not doing enough for the women's movement, but she didn't really do much, either. Beyond that I don't have any relationships that are -- I mean, I know women and I know women who are part of the movement but haven't really talked to them about that.

(Ms. Rousso) - Do you wish you did?

(Marissa Johnson) - Oh, absolutely.

(Elizabeth Macias) - Okay, this is Elizabeth. I actually just this semester, I had a teacher, I recently just got a teacher who is a feminist, and she is probably my only mentor I have ever had as an older feminist, telling me her struggles and what she has accomplished. But I think there is definitely a gap. I am not sure if it is just where I have lived, but there is definitely a gap where the older and younger generations don't really collaborate on very many projects except for when the younger people need money to go on trips. But other than that -- that is I have not been able to sit down and really pick somebody's brain. We need to speak out because maybe more younger women or younger disabled women will come up and say, hey, I'm disabled. In Texas I am having the hardest time trying to find young disabled people to come and join a caucus, and it is crazy to me because I know they are out there. Texas isn't disabled free, trust me. I can't find them anywhere. And so I think if more older people would come and talk to the younger people and say, hey, it's okay if you come out and say you have a disability if it is unseen or it's okay if you come out and speak your mind about things, then maybe the younger generation will be able to speak their mind and the movement will move further.

(Kelly Anthony) - I want to tackle part of that. I was involved with an organization known as Choice based here in D.C. It is an organization that has been established primarily to address the needs of young women, young feminists in particular around reproductive rights, employment opportunities, things of that nature, and their target is women under 30. I was involved with this organization, well, I am still involved with the organization, but I was having a conversation with somebody who worked there, and she said that she was trying her hardest, and this is an organization that will remain nameless so as not to offend, she was trying her hardest to get involved with one of the more established feminist organizations, nationally based feminist organizations, she was trying her hardest to get a representative on their board, she was trying her hardest to get a representative on planning committees for events, and nobody would take her seriously. I think it comes down to, again, substance.

Somebody has mentioned that before. And really knowing that young women have something substantial to say. I think that -- I feel that I personally actively seek out voices, I am actively looking for women all the time who can help me develop as a professional, as a person, as a feminist, but I don't really feel in an organizational level that organizations are actively seeking my input, and I think that is critical. I think if we hope to have feminism continue on into the future, and I think we should all want that, that we have to actively build those bridges. It is a relationship. It can't be one-sided. It can't be one-sided. It has to be actively sought after. We have to be active participants in that relationship, both sides. (applause)

(Latifa Lyles) - This is Latifa. I have several mentors within the National Organization for Women, and frankly, I can't imagine being a leader in this movement without those relationships. In addition to the relationships I have within NOW, I worked for a year for the Older Women's League which was an advocacy group that worked on issues facing women, mid life and older women, and without that experience there are two key things that I would have.

The first is that the wage gap for women is very real and very alive today.

It looks a little bit different than it looked 25 years ago. One of the things I learned when I was working there doing advocacy for social security and pension reform, when we start out with men today, everything looks fine. It is when we get later on in our careers, when we start to look for promotions and tenure and partnership that the gap gets wider and wider and wider, and women don't know that. Women coming out of college don't know that everybody has ambitions and feel like we are starting at the same point, I make as much now at 28. That changes dramatically at 35 and even more so at 40. I learned about the serious situation that women and women of color are in in older age and poverty. Those are the issues I would organize around, women in poverty issues and educating women about parity with men and working with working women, and short of that experience I would really have a hard time relating to the movement, I would have a hard time going out to women and educating them. I think if we don't bridge the gap, we are not going to have a movement, and I think that this is a really great start, and I am glad we are all here talking about this today, and hopefully this is a step in the right direction.

(Ms. Rousso) - I am going to ask you, did you seek your mentors or did they seek you?

(Latifa Lyles) - I feel like I've been lucky and I have just had a lot of really wonderful women around me in NOW and in the various jobs I have had. At every opportunity I ask a lot of questions, and there is never a void of answers. So I feel like I have had a very unique and very -- I have been lucky. I feel like it is sort of a two-way street. I feel like people are willing to give me the information I seek if I ask.

(Sarah Triano) - Bridging this gap in generations, all I've got to say, bring back the consciousness raising groups, please, please, please.

I see this struggle in the disability rights movement where older generations of activists with disabilities will say, well, those younger leaders, they don't appreciate what we did for them. And the younger people are saying, well, those old leaders, they don't appreciate what we are going through right now. I see this in the women's movement, too, but as a younger disabled feminist, I am here to tell you, I do appreciate what the women and the people with disabilities did who came before me. But I want to continue to learn from you, and I need a space for dialogue, I need a space to continue to learn that. So please bring back the consciousness raising groups. I am what I am today because of a lot of very strong disabled women, including Carol Gill, Laura Hershey, Nussbaum and a few isolated men here and there. I am who I am because of relationships with women. I am branching out into women without disabilities, I am growing incredibly in that the last thing I would like to say is maybe another way we could bridge this is to work in the march you're having on April 25th together, but instead of having it be a march to save women's lives, have it be a march of all lives, of people with disabilities, of women, of everybody.

(Joy Levin Welan) - If I can go back to what Kelly was saying, I think this idea of mutual respect, of mutual appreciation, mutual mentoring is extremely important. In every feminist organization I have ever worked at, it has sort of been this perspective of let me fill your head with my knowledge, let me impart my wisdom to you, and that is absolutely important. Yes, you have been through a lot of things I haven't, and there are a lot of things I still need to learn, but I feel there is a lack of appreciation for the work that we are doing as individuals, the level of commitment that we have, and we have things to teach as well as things to learn. I feel like that's not being appreciated. (applause)

(Ms. Rousso) - I sort of hate to leave any session without an opportunity for one or two questions from the floor. So if there are any burning questions out there, this is your moment.

(Questioner) I live in the inner city and I have a 13-year-old daughter.

(Ms. Rousso) - Can everyone hear her? Use the microphone.

(Questioner) I live in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in the inner city, I have a 13-year-old daughter who goes to junior high there. Every girl in her class including herself has, she has a sleepover party, and I was eavesdropping, and every single girl has had male teachers touching their faces, maybe patting a boy's back, but touching the girl's faces, the boys are feeling freer than ever to grab their asses and other parts of their body and overtly quasi, well sometimes not even overt, borderline violence toward these girls. I was wondering is that just Lancaster? I think some of it is relating to the machismo honestly, in my neighborhood. I was wondering if that is something you have dealt with, and is it worse? I am assuming it is worse if you're disabled only because if you're different, man, it is like vultures, you know.

(Kelly Anthony) - I had an experience some weeks ago, it is not going to sound similar, but I will make my point. I was walking my dog, I tend to walk her off a leash if nobody is around so she gets a little more exercise. A man who was actually two or three blocks away saw me doing that, and he made a point to come over to me and physically threaten me saying if

I didn't walk my dog on a leash he was going to kick my butt, my dog's butt, and his anger was absolutely inappropriate. Had he asked me to walk my dog on a leash, I would have done it, I would have taken it off after he was out of sight, but I would have done it. His anger was absolutely out of proportion to whatever crime I was committing. I really feel strongly that this administration, our political leaders, the climate our political climate is adding an element of hate, it is adding an element of anger that is out of proportion to whatever the original action was, and I think that it is strictly now. When young boys see their political leaders acting in such a way that is immoral, that is hateful, that is angry, it gives them a free rein to take those same actions.

Maybe it is a broad distinction or maybe it is a broad connection to make between young women having those experiences with teachers and with boys in their class and our political leadership, but I fully believe that if we elected the right people to office, that if those people were moral and upright that that would have a descending effect on many of the instances that young Americans engage in with that sort of behavior.

(Ms. Rousso) - I just want to add that unfortunately that experience is very widespread. National studies will show you that sexual harassment is really a national phenomenon, and illegal. We have Title IX which I fear is quickly going down the drain, but it is an illegal act, and we need to take it pretty seriously.

(Elizabeth Macias) - I worked in an at-risk program in inner city El Paso, Texas, and a lot of the male students would always grab and feel on all these girls, and I look at these girls and say, why don't you tell them to keep their hands to themselves? They say, we do. They don't do anything. That's when I come in, and I say, you boys, if I see you do this again in my classroom, you're out of here. But that doesn't go for all teachers. I think until there is a genuine all teachers come together and really stand by this and say this is not acceptable and men should not be touching little girls bodies like this will anything happen with it.

(Sarah Triano) - At Access Living in Chicago, I actually helped Susanne with a consciousness raising group, FEFE is slang for female. Yes these women are experiencing violence, but these young women with disabilities are also wanting beauty days, they want pageants. You know why? Because they are not being touched by boys at all, because they have been desexualized. They are seen as not sexual, and they want to be viewed as sexual, so actually if they would be touched by a boy, I hate to say it, but the girls in our empower FEFEs would be thrilled. That's just the reality I am dealing with in Chicago right now.

(Ms. Rousso) - I think the reality is we have to confront the -- it doesn't have to be only with boys who define sexuality.

(Question) I think that what you mentioned your daughter is going through is widespread, somebody up here said that I think I see a trend today in teens 13 and 14 where the what we consider sexual harassment and offensive behavior, the 13 and 14 year olds slough it off and just say, oh, everybody does that. There is also a trend with teens in terms of safe sex which is oral sex. The boys get the blow jobs, the girls give it, they consider that safe sex, and how demeaning that is. I don't know as a parent or as a woman or as a woman with a disability how to curb that so I come to places like this to learn and maybe go back and continue to pound in the message to have some self-respect as a woman. I don't think, as my friend Linda says, Clinton did us any favors when he okayed oral sex wasn't sex. I have a friend who came up here with me, and I dragged her because we wanted to use the microphone, so can I give it to her to ask a final question?

(Question) thank you. It's interesting, this builds on much of what everybody else has already said, but it is interesting the whole sex issue and specifically younger kids and realization that menses is beginning at younger and younger years due to our improved nutritional status. But it was interesting because one thing I was struck by and in fact I almost thought well maybe this is too shallow and I shouldn't bring it up, but I personally sense a resurgence of a cultural regression that I would say of traditional negative stereotype, sexism. We see it in so-called fun things like, you know, The Man Show, the Coor's Light billboards. Legally Blonde, where you can be a real smart attorney as long as you're still cute and pert. A lot of these are huge steps backwards. There has been an increased amount of this particularly in the last five or so years. There has been a huge resurgence in this. This morning talking about the reapproval by the FDA of silicone breast implants, again that doubly in addition to subjecting or possibly subjecting women once again to pain and disabling conditions, the fact that so many women feel they are necessary to begin with to complete our image, to make us whole, and let alone we have other far more significant, we have a genuine disability. How is this being perceived by members of the panel?

(Kelly Anthony) - You know what I think? I think we ought to get pissed off is what I think, and I think we ought to get pissed off and do something with it, and so I haven't talked to Sarah about this, but I have a feeling that directly following this panel, we will be starting a revolution, and anybody can join us. We will meet you at the back of the room. We are going to be angry.

(Sarah Triano) - We need to get pissed off and we need to elect our own. I don't know about the rest of you, but after the last presidential election, I have just about had it with the male monopoly on the presidency. I think it is high time that we women take our rightful place in politics and elect one of our own as President of the United States.

(Ms. Rousso) - This seems like a perfect place to end, wouldn't you say? I'm afraid our time is regretfully up. I thank all our panelists for a wonderful discussion. I hope you will sort of hang out with them during the next day and a half and learn more from their wisdom. I thank you all for your involvement. (applause)

(Ms. Berger) - All I can say is wow. I want to thank Ann and Harilyn and all of the panelists. I feel better about my future and future generations knowing that these women sitting at the table will be carrying the torch. Again, I think everyone deserves a round of applause. I have to tell you, call me crazy and don't take offense to that word, but I'm sitting here saying I think we need to take, what do we have, eight or nine women sitting at this table, and replace them with the current nine democratic candidates running for president. (applause)

That being said, we are almost back on schedule. I am going to bring up Joanne Tosti. We will find out where the next series of workshops are, and just keep enjoying the day. This is wonderful.

When we were planning this conference, we asked several Congresspeople to attend. Senator Kennedy sent back his regrets. He really, really wanted to be here, but he had another obligation today. So after some negotiations he agreed and wrote the following letter. "I commend the National Organization for Women and the American Association of People with Disabilities for hosting this impressive forum, and I wish very much that I could be there in person.

I know that so many of you have been at the forefront of all the major battles for equal justice and equal rights and equal opportunities in recent years. I commend you for coming together today to link arms for equality and justice and develop new ways to advance the great goals we share. On so many fronts, the Bush administration and Republicans in Congress are leading us down the wrong track and reversing much of the progress we have made over the years. We know the vast numbers of women and especially those with disabilities rely on federal, state, and local programs to obtain the health care they need to survive, the education they need to succeed, the job opportunities they need to enable them to live independently, and the support they need to raise their children. But this administration has constantly shown a callus disregard for the well-being by starving the Federal government and the states of resources they need to meet these urgent obligations. Their highest priority has been tax cuts for the wealthy and the wealthier the better. They have not done that once but twice. As a result of these irresponsible tax cuts, their failed policy on the economy, and their failed policy in Iraq, the Federal government is now facing a $500 billion budget deficit that will only go higher in the future. Nearly every state in the nation is facing immense budget shortfalls and impossible choices of which basic services to cut -- medicaid, education, housing, and other essential public programs are taking the hit, and we know that each and every one of these cuts disproportionately hurting women and people with disabilities. It is a total travesty and tragedy that this administration is so quick to open the federal budget for restoring and even creating new services for the people of Iraq but slams the budget shut for meeting the needs of our people who need help the most. We know that it doesn't have to be this way, and we never thought it would be this way again. I was there and so were many of you when we passed the Education For the Handicapped Act.

We said that no person with disability would ever be denied an education. We were there when we passed medicaid and Medicare which said that government would enable the needy and elderly to obtain the health care they deserve.

We were there when we passed the Ryan White Care Act. We said we would not allow the AIDS epidemic to ravage any group of our society. We were there with Dr. King when we passed the great Civil Rights Act of 1964 that tore down so many barriers of discrimination once and for all. We were there when we passed the Family and Medical Leave Act which said that no employer can discriminate against a woman for taking off their job to have a child. We were there when we passed the Americans with Disabilities Act, the other great civil rights law, which recognized both the basic rights and the great potential of people with disabilities, and we stand strong today and say we will not allow this administration to roll back these rights and these freedoms. We know that the challenges facing us are enormous. On reproductive rights, this administration has made its highest priority the repudiation of a woman's right to choose. In the coming week it now appears that Congress will pass and President Bush will sign the first anti-choice bill since Roe v. Wade and the first bill I have seen in all my years of Congress that shows a total disregard for the health of women. Banning an abortion that may be the only option for women facing a potentially life threatening birth of her child will turn the clock back to the shameful days when they said women didn't count. I know that the National Organization for Women and many other organizations intend to challenge that law from the instant it is signed, and I have every confidence you will succeed. If the Supreme Court means what it said, this bill is clearly unconstitutional. Finally, another major area where right wing Republican ideology is trumping justice is the administration's constant nomination of judges who want to roll back the guarantees we worked so hard for. They want to tear down the ADA and dismantle our great civil rights legacy.

I will continue to oppose any nominee who rejects the letter and spirit of these basic laws, and I know I can count on you for your strong support. Thank you again for all you do so well for the great causes we share and for your leadership in insisting that America must never disrespect the hopes and dreams of women and the disabled. Thank you." (applause)

Okay, here are your room updates for this afternoon. While you're all pulling out your books, I would like to remind you to please visit the AAPD and NOW tables at the back of the room. Staff is ready and willing and would be delighted to talk to all of you. Again, when you go to the meeting room level upstairs, there will be staff and volunteers to greet you and help you to get to the room you are trying to find.

Okay, here we go. The women with disabilities, facts disabilities, that will still be in the Judiciary Suite.

Violence against women in the mental health system will now be in the Susquehanna Suite.

Dykes and disabilities will be in Congressional.

Where the sidewalk ends will be in the Potomac Suite.

All of those rooms are upstairs one level.

Let me also have you turn the page to page 16 because we will not be coming together between these two workshop sessions.

Let me also give you the room updates for the 3:45 sessions.

Let me also tell you that the rooms have changed as well for the evening sessions.

I would encourage you to again work with the volunteers, read the reader boards, and we certainly hope that we will be back on track tomorrow and we will be able to keep this as organized as possible so you can all find the rooms in a quick fashion.

Again, staff and volunteers will be helping you as you get off the elevators to find your locations.

Thank you.

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