The Voiceless Minority

This post is from Jason's literary corner. It discusses a book I recently read about disability and what it means to have one. I hope you enjoy it.  Thank You, Alice: How Year of the Tiger Reignites a T-Rex's Passion   I recently finished the book “Year of the Tiger,” written by Alice Wong.  I thought I would be reading another disability memoir, but I was wrong. Alice’s book was not a memoir. It was what I like to call an anti-memoir. Her book made me rethink the direction that my advocacy is meant to take. The rest of this piece will highlight key concepts of the book that I believe will improve how I advocate for people with disabilities.  Finally, it will serve as my version of a thank you letter to Alice for her tremendous honesty and bluntness. Her book is divided into seven sections. Each section follows a theme and comprises several essays embodying that theme. For example, all the essays in Origins describe how Alice’s activism began. Two essays in this section resonat

 The movie-going experience has been part of American life for decades now. At the same time, being disabled has also been a part of the human experience since the beginning of time. This piece will address the idea that although we are thirty-four years into the ADA era, movie theaters in Ocala, Florida, demonstrate how little respect people with disabilities have earned in thirty-four years. Over the weekend, I was treating my friend/caregiver, who I will call Jane, on a trip to the movies for her 24 th birthday. She was nice enough to not only drive my van for only the 10 th time since she started working with me but also because my power wheelchair broke several weeks ago and there was a delay in the delivery process of my new chair; she was willing to push me around. The first of many problems we encountered that day occurred when we got to the front door. It was only then we noticed that even though disabled people do go to places by themselves without caregivers or attendant