Crip News v.63
A holiday gift guide! And talk to you in 2023.
…and that’s a wrap on the first full calendar year of crip news. i’ll take the next few weeks to focus on the essential art of coziness and be back with issue 64 on january 9th. thanks for being here.
-k
NEWS
Merry Stuff First
The Queen of Christmas, Mariah Carey, celebrated the “Black Boy Autistic Joy” in a recent performance of “All I Want for Christmas Is You” by 10-year-old Kevin “Knox” Johnson III. Sleigh, Knox!
Teen Vogue named “Accessibility Ace” Isabel Mavrides-Calderon one of its 21 Under 21 for 2022.
The Foundation for Indian Contemporary Art named Priyanka D’Souza of Resting Museum as one of its 2022 Emerging Artists Award winners.
The Plague of Profiteering Care
In 2022, there was no shortage of news from the industry of greed that is U.S. health care. For example, The New York Times recently published a feature that shows how one of the nation’s largest health systems strategically weakened its workforce for years leading up to the covid pandemic, creating fatal chaos inside short-staffed hospitals. Its investment company (its investment company!) manages $41 billion, yet its nonprofit status allows it to dodge more than $1 billion every year. “We are a ministry. We’re not a business” said one former executive who received millions of dollars in annual compensation.
Simultaneously, insurers and health care systems across the U.S. are violating disability anti-discrimination laws by sending bills and notices that are inaccessible to blind people, spiking their premiums and imposing a de facto “disability tax.”
The dangers of the corporate rush to cash in on virtual care is another horrifying theme from 2022. An investigation by The Markup and STAT has found that 49 out of 50 telehealth companies they reviewed are non-consensually sharing users’ sensitive health info with Big Tech companies, leaving the door to impairment-specific targeted advertising wide open.
Even dying with dignity has become a cash cow. Let’s hope policymakers make holding these profiteers accountable one of their New Years resolutions.
The Beauty of Direct Action
Protest artistry - marshaling people power in the style of the world we need - is a wonderful tradition of goodness and rage.
Senior and Disability Action recently caroled for a return of mask mandates at Oakland City Hall. They were joined by Raging Grannies to declare that no one is disposable.
In Seoul, members of Solidarity Against Disability Discrimination (SADD) staged a four-day rush-hour protest in the subway, literally and symbolically disrupting business as usual to demand increased government funding to protect disabled people.
And Nothing About Us Without Us, a new exhibition at the People’s History Museum in Manchester, U.K. up through Oct. 2023, “showcases an extensive collection of protest material brought together for the very first time,” including banners, t-shirts, photographs, cartoons and sculpture. Also, SHAPE Arts was recently awarded a £840,000 grant for a 4-year project to record and digitize the heritage of the Disability Rights Movement.
Activists’ fire will keep us warm through the winter ahead. ❤️🔥
New Works
The new issue of Buffalo Zine features an interview between disabled artists Chella Man and Aaron Rose Philip.
In VoCA Journal, Whitney Mashburn reflects on the “living archive” project Holding Space.
Learning for Justice published “Confronting Ableism on the Way to Justice” by Keith Jones in its Fall 2022 issue. “We can’t have a truly equitable social justice movement,” he writes, “without disability rights representation and visibility.”
Performance Space New York has announced the second half of its Healing Series, including the return of the I wanna be with you everywhere festival on June 21, 2023. And you can already RSVP for free.
“For each other” recently closed at Gallery 400 in Chicago.
Arts Wellbeing Collective in Australia has published a free, downloadable Work Well Guide “as a response to recent research into the mental health of practitioners” in the arts.
“ONCE UPON A HOT CRIP SUMMER” is the theme of Issue 3 of Look Deeper Zine.
Angel Bat Dawid and JJJJJerome Ellis are in conversation in the Winter 2023 issue of BOMB Magazine.
Works by several disabled artists, including Jen White Johnson, Jezz Chung, and Sulaiman Khan, are featured in the Applied Utopia textbook from Slow Factory.
The Crip News 2022 Holiday Gift Guide
December is a bewildering time when you know how capitalism fuels and depoliticizes ableism. We can’t buy disability liberation, but perhaps we can support disabled artists as we look for gifts for our loved ones this week. I am delighted that my dear friend and personal tastemaker, Louise Hickman, helped me assemble some suggestions for disability-centric gifts this year.
This is just a sliver. Drop your own suggestions, including crowdfunding links, in the comments.
Donate to organizations advancing Disability Justice. For example, check out Creating Freedom Movements and other collectives featured on Resist’s 2022 Giving Guide.
Buy one of the many disability books released in 2022, including: The Year of the Tiger by Alice Wong, The Future is Disabled by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Black Disability Politics by Sami Schalk,
KINGDOMOF THE ILL Reader published by Hatje Cantz.
Joerg Hundertpfund’s Tooth Brushes.
Untitled (Turtle and Person) by Joseph "JD" Green.
A vintage wheelchair-using Barbie.
The Sliding Spoons Pin by Bibipins.
Works by the tablers from the 2022 SAD Zine + Craft Fair.
A Resilience Journal by Yo-Yo Lin (including an instant and free PDF!).
Something from Meriah Nichols’s list of Deaf made gifts.
What else? Leave your suggestions in the comments.
CALLS
New Disabled South is hiring a full-time Research and Coalition Organizing
Theatre Deli has issued a call-out for disabled, D/deaf, neurodivergent or learning disabled artists, theatremakers, or creative practitioners for its The Social Model... & More Festival in 2023. For more info and a BSL video, click here.
An unnamed “premium TV series” is casting Deaf talent for 5 multi-episode roles. No acting experience is necessary to submit. Project will film March-Sept 2023 / location TBD. For audition information and instructions, please email:
Izcastingsearch@gmail.com
Open call for audio submissions: 2 community soundzines coming out in early 2023. *Trans Yearnings* *Disability Justice Dreamscape* We are collecting songs, poems, prayers, instrumental pieces, and rhythm for and by trans and/or disabled people. Please share your joy, rage, grief, and the wisdom that's been getting you through. Email a track already uploaded to your SoundCloud or an mp3 (with audio description, soundzine choice, and a related image) to gatesofresilience@gmail.com!
For folks with headaches and/or migraines: Ice Kap ice hats and Nuveda headache relief oil roller. Both created by women with migraine, if I’m remembering correctly!
also this disability holiday gift guide by emily ladau and kate caldwell! https://emilyladau.com/2022/11/2022-disability-holiday-gift-guide/