Crip News v.29
Spoiler alert! Today's issue discusses who won RuPaul's Drag Race Season 14!
NEWS
America’s Next Disabled Drag Superstar
Season 14 of RuPaul’s Drag Race concluded with the crowning of a game-changing queercrip legend, Willow Pill. The show has featured many disabled queens in the past, including Yvie Oddly, Tamisha Iman, Ginny Lemon, Ongina, Trinity K. Bonet, Chi Chi DeVayne, and another season 14 finalist Daya Betty. But Willow brings a crip sensibility that we’ve never seen before. Whether it was her discussion of the way psilocybin (magic mushrooms) helped her process her relationship to death, her coming out through her reckoning with chronic illness, or the death of her sister who shared the same congenital impairment, I think we can say that Willow Pill is the first politically disabled queen to win the crown.
Maskless Abandon
Disability rights activist Ola Ojewumi explains the way the lifting of the mask mandate on public transportation shows us the combination of eugenics, classism, and corporate influence on public policy. “You hold the power of life with your breath,” she says in a feature on Now This.
Burdens of Accessing Essential Support
In a memo to federal agencies, the U.S. Office of Management & Budget offered guidance on how to reduce barriers to essential public benefits programs, including using plain language and describing the “psychological costs” of information collection and surveillance that are required for people to access programs like SSI.
New Works
SOUL(SIGNS): OPERA is a series of short films exploring the intersection of opera and ASL, created by Up Until Now Collective, commissioned by Boston Lyric Opera, Opera Omaha, Opera Columbus, and Portland Opera. In “What Makes a Man a Man?” Brandon Kazen-Maddox signs the role of Emile Griffith in this American Sign Language version of an aria from Terence Blanchard's CHAMPION: AN OPERA IN JAZZ. Also featuring Andrew Morrill and Alberto Medero, and a new audio recording by baritone Markel Reed.
“Contemplating Beauty in a Disabled Body” by Chloé Cooper Jones was published as a long-form essay in The New York Times Magazine. It’s an excerpt from from her recently-released book Easy Beauty. “I want to keep the idea of beauty like a stone in my hand,” she writes, “turning it over and over.”
CoMotion, “one of the largest Deaf and disability performance festivals in the world,” runs through May 1 in Toronto.
Gus Alexiou writes in Forbes about why innovative disability representation is uniquely suited to the music video form.
More ASL on More Screens
Gaitrie Persaud-Dhunmoon has joined the cast of Nick Jr.’s Blues Clues (season 3, episode 50) as Camila, a Deaf librarian. Persaud-Dhunmoon is also known for her anchor role on Sign1News.
An Instagram post from @mediagirls shows the logo for Snapchat with text. “Snapchat Creates ASL Alphabet Filter! / “We’re constantly working to expand the ways Snapchatters can express themselves and make connections through our Camera. We hope that Lenses not only evolve the way we see the world, but help us feel closer to one another. Today, we’re launching an ASL Alphabet Lens in partnership with SignAll. It’s a first of its kind Lens experience that inspires Snapchatters to start learning American Sign Language.” -Snapchat”
Sex Work and Disability: A Quick Guide
Subscribe to Selena the Stripper @prettyboygirl’s Patreon and get access to the guide.
CALLS
Support Jermaine Greaves
In an Instagram post from @blackdisabledlivesmatters: Help a Black Disabled Activist Stay Housed. Jermaine Greaves is an activist, event planner, student, & founder of the Black Disabled Lives Matter movement in NYC. Jermaine is currently in URGENT need of funds to avoid eviction next month. Please share! How to donate: Venmo: @jermaine-greaves, Cashapp: $jermainepartyplanner, PayPal: paypal.me/jermainegreaves, Gofundme: https://gofund.me/3d906a4f
Museum Access Consortium Seeks Project Coordinator
In an Instagram post from @maconsortium: Large, dark blue text against a grassy green background reads “We’re Hiring (again!) Project Coordinator, Disability Justice Education Project.” Beneath the heading are four cartoon images of disabled people - from left to right: a person with light skin and pigtails uses a walker, a person with brown skin and wearing a blue hijab has one arm that ends right below the shoulder, a person with brown skin and two curly puffs of black hair uses a white cane, a person with light skin and short black hair signs “help” in ASL. Beneath these people is the URL “MACAccess.org/jobs”
EVENTS
Kinetic Light’s world premiere of Wired is sold out for in-person tickets at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, but you can still get tickets for the livestream on Saturday, May 7th from 8-10pm CT. Pay what you can, $0-30.
People’s Hub will host Culture Is Our Weapon: Cultural Organizing 101 on Wednesday, April 27th & Thursday, April 28th 7-9pm ET with Joe Tolbert Jr. True cost $200/person, pay what you can starting at $80. Register here.
The monthly End Abuse of People with Disabilities webinar will focus on Providing Accessible and Effective Services to Survivors of Sexual Assault with Disabilities on Tuesday, April 26th at 2pm ET. Register here.
The Leslie Lohman Museum of Art and the NYC Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities will present a two hour virtual training on creating accessible PDFs using Microsoft Word and Adobe Acrobat Pro on Wednesday, April 27th at 12pm ET. Register here.
The Longmore Institute and Project HEAL will present Disability Justice in Eating Disorder Treatments, featuring M. Reim Ifrach, Marquisele Mercedes, Allilsa Fernandez, Anna Sweeney and Milton Reynolds. Wednesday, April 27th at 4pm PT. Register here.