Advocacy to Activism: Direct Action as Core Components of Disability Rights and Justice on November 6th

In this edition of Judi’s Room, Nicky Boyte from American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today (ADAPT) will discuss the history of the disability rights and justice movement with a focus on the importance of organizing and taking action. Her presentation will include highlights from the highly successful National Action that she led in North Carolina in June this year.

ADAPT is an American grassroots community that organizes disability rights activists to engage in nonviolent direct action, including civil disobedience, to assure the civil and human rights of people with disabilities to live in freedom.

From ADAPT:

“There is a place we go to every time we go to a National Action. It is not a physical place, but rather a place within ourselves where the candle of human dignity burns at its brightest and the pursuit of choice drives us to remarkable outcomes. We access this place all across the country where justice has been denied, and it is within this place where we the people demonstrate our power.

When we arrive at this place, we are fueled in equal parts by love and rage. The rage is for the inequities in our society. The love is for ourselves, the person next to us, those we left behind, our communities now, those who come after us, and even the people who have no idea (yet) about the struggle for independence that people with disabilities face daily.

Any might think it is a tragedy to acquire or be diagnosed with a disability; it isn’t. The tragedy is when we are denied our civil rights, our dignity and our right to choice. This is what fuels our righteous efforts. In ADAPT, we strive to promote this energy and this love. Finding the imperfect balance between love and rage is not easy.”