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Transcript

Welcome.
Gosh, I
wish my
class would quiet down so much
when I get in front of them.
Those of you
that have had me know
that doesn't happen.
My name's Keith.
I'm a professor in the
special ed department,
and I'm really pleased to be here
to introduce our speaker Keith Jones,
who I think you will find has some
very important messages for all of us.
And I want to mention that this
this speech,
this talk
has been provided
by a grant from the Ershigs,
who also sponsor
the Ershig Assistive
Technology Resource Center...I
probably should be using my mic.
So sponsored
by the partly by the Ershig family,
who also supports
the Ershig Assistive
Technology Resource Center
that we have in our Woodring College
and the Assistive Technology
Resource Center is essentially
a loaning library,
a place that anybody can come and check
different assistive technologies that we
have that
may help people with disabilities.
But we've also found that a lot
of our assistive
technologies are helpful
for people without disabilities, too,
who may have some
some learning challenges
or some temporary challenges.
We have information on a table right,
right outside in the hallway
if you want to pick that up.
We also have some
information on our website.
And
mentioned that
Keith has--he's done so much,
I made myself notes so I wouldn't forget.
He's president
and CEO of Soul-Touching Experience
and organization
and a bringing perspective
to the issues of access,
inclusion and empowerment,
which affect him
as well
as other people with disabilities.
Mr.
Jones is extremely active
in multicultural
cross disability education
and outreach
efforts
to enable and empower
people with disabilities to be
included members of society
and also be included
in this broader discussion
of social justice. And
unfortunately, when we
look at discussions of social justice,
very often
the disability
community has been neglected
and that so that's
a very important aspect
He's I think his hopes
are also very important in his time
in society as we're seeing politicians
and radio hosts
mock people with disabilities.
Some people say that politicians
state that
watching the Paralympics
was very difficult
which is certainly not
an empowering statement
or evolving statement.
And we've also had legislation
in the House
designed to weaken the Americans
with this
excuse me, Americans
with Disabilities Act
and make it even more difficult
for people with disabilities
So Keith has also been featured in films.
Those of you in my classes
or any of the special
ed classes will certainly be seen
or will see including Samuel.
If you have if
it's available through
Western's library, you can stream it
He's also in Maggie Daubins
legend has it.
He has been recognized locally
and actually is a strong advocate
on a wide variety of issues
and is recipient of
numerous awards,
including this one after this long
the prestigious new
Leadership Development Award
from the President's
Council on Employment of People
with Disabilities So with that
hey.
I'm going to pass it over.
To someone right now.
Have my newest. Friend. There you go.
Thank you, Keith.
And the funny talking to you.
So how y'all doing?
All right.
Well, again, thank you for having me.
Thank you.
To Western Washington University
for inviting me
my first time in the Evergreen State.
Yeah. Yeah.
And it's just as great as I thought it
would be.
Although I love it.
The people have been awesome.
Everybody's been great.
I wanted to
they were just going to have a
you know, I'm not going to talk at you.
You know,
some people get up and go,
oh, my God, it's so depressing.
I could do that. But no, that's boring.
So we're going to have fun,
but we're going to talk about
is why it's important
you know, why you're here in college
and what are you going to do at the
you get drunk, inappropriately,
cram for tests.
Or.
Do your paper at the last minute,
put the margins
extra wide so you can get to the 15 page
could triple space in between the pair
shouldn't didn't tell you any of that.
So Keith,
if you see them just ignore it and
that they never
But but I wanted to
ask you
because as I sit here
and you know
you hear the introduction, I'm.
Like did all in that.
Mean I realized how old I
Well I'm here
because I think what's important
is that you guys
and you guys showed up, which is great.
But we talk about disability
in a very unique sense.
You know,
we talk about disability in terms of.
Oh, my God, isn't it
amazing that he went to college?
Oh, my God.
Did so.
Now,
just to tell you a little about myself,
I was born last millenia.
Oh, my God.
I'm sorry.
Only having a moment.
Like a time.
There was no inclusion.
So when I came along, my school
were strictly for kids with disabilities.
And at the time,
they were called school
for the handicapped.
There was no
there was no concept to us going beyond
that school.
They would
keep us in that school until we were 22.
And then once we turned 22,
we get an SSI check,
and they would put us
either in a group home
or end senior housing.
So the reality of people with disability,
particularly of the age
between the ages of 18 and 22,
is you don't have a parent who likes you.
I hope your parent likes you.
You know, if you had to get out
you people face challenges.
So, you know,
you worried about what you're going to do
when you graduate.
Most students with disabilities,
when they talk about going to college.
Do you guys remember
when you started thinking about
applying to school
and getting all excited
and taking your SATs
and things like that?
That really doesn't happen for students.
Look into special education,
at least not regularly without a fight
without a hard fought journey
just to get to the point
where you can be with your peers.
I'm going to ask the question.
You don't have to snitch on yourself.
How many of you participated
in this
in your day to day in high school?
And I know people are
raising their hands, although
your teachers are
not here, you're good, you're good.
But I you know, as a student
with a disability,
you know,
you really can't sneak
out of the classroom in a wheelchair
and be like
And so.
Those are some of the things.
And basic things like,
you know, homecoming
The things that you would do
as a high school student
before you came here
are not really afforded
to students with disabilities
unless they are fought for,
unless they are included.
And inclusion has become like a sexy
kind of catchphrase, like,
hey, we should include students
with disabilities in class.
Yeah, well,
maybe you should just include students
and just teach
versus saying this child is a diagnosis
so he can't be in my class.
Just to give you an example of 19.
I'm scared to say
the year, but I will say it out
loud anyway.
1978.
Hmm. Damn.
I just.
It hurt 90.
8000.
88 in upstate New York.
The school is Lansing.
It was a Lansing elementary school.
I walked through the door
as the only child of color.
The only person of color
the only person with a disability
because I was the first one
to be included
in their entire school districts.
Which was,
uh, hmm.
And adventure.
So every day, and I don't know anybody
with Converse,
the old Chuck Taylors
with the Rubber Soul in the till.
I used to rock those,
those were my joint.
We'd stand in line at lunch time,
but every day I would.
Go to class to like, if you're a.
Cripple while you drool like that.
And I would be teased
and tortured and taunted,
and I would go to the teachers
and say,
you know, they're teasing me
and torturing me.
And the teachers are like, Oh, shut up.
Just go on.
Because they have not had a student
with the disability
in their entire teaching career.
They did not make the connection that
if you let kids bully
those who are different,
then you are setting a very bad precedent
because they picked the wrong one.
Yeah.
So they would bully me.
The abuse.
I emphasize try.
Well, let's put it this way.
My mother had her own parking spot
next to.
A.
Field
and they would come out
and that was one day So Tommy,
I remember his name distinctly
because I kicked his ass in the
line, but there's no story
And but it was like,
what was the purpose of being then
a child with a disability was in school.
What's the point of being upset
that a student with a disability
wants to be included in your class?
Like,
what's the reason that a teacher
would be so upset?
That there's a different kind of student.
In her class classroom.
Because she was uncomfortable?
And if you're not comfortable
with my disability,
it's not my job to make you comfortable.
And I have a sick sense of humor.
So I'll make you extremely uncomfortable.
Like, you walk up and sneeze - achoo!
- Oh, my God.
You have cerebral palsy now.
I don't know.
You better go get some rubbing alcohol.
You'll be okay.
But you have to have
that kind of mentality
because people will look at you and say
the most asinine things.
And that
was 40 years ago.
40 years later,
on the way here--and Keith,
I had told you about this yesterday--when
I landed at your lovely airport
-- nobody knew that I knew English.
I was like, what the hell?
How do you not know?
I'm like, I'm speaking English.
I mean, you guys understand me, right?
And I got off the plane.
Can he walk down the plane?
Walk down the plane, jump off
and go walk?
Do you need help?
Does he need help?
You can ask. Me.
Do you need help?
This is how they talk to me.
Okay.
I got a sick sense of humor, [labored]
"I need help."
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God. And why?
Because apparently you have a disability.
You can't answer any questions.
At all.
So I get off the plane,
I'll get in the wheelchair.
Is anybody meeting you?
Yes, I have somebody meeting me.
Oh, that's so sweet.
And then they start
talking to each other.
Is he going somewhere?
I think he's going to meet somebody.
And I'm just sitting there like,
you know, I can hear.
You.
I'm the only black man on the tarmac.
I can hear you
But again, the assumption,
what is wheelchair disability?
Clearly,
he can't do it.
Only though
I was like, oh, I'm so proud of you.
You traveled all by yourself.
The hell is wrong with you.
You know what?
I'm proud of you
because you haven't forgot to breathe
yet, so.
All right.
But that's the kind of mentality that
people have,
is that people with disabilities
have to be simply heroes to do
basic stuff.
Like,
we need to be extra ordinary
in order to go grocery shopping.
To give you an example, a friend of mine,
it was a good day. Because it was payday.
I had a check,
and I was like, Yes,
money in my pocket, woop!
woop!
Heineken in the refrigerator!
So we go up to the window
to cash the check,
me and my friend, we're sitting there
just talking
much like everybody else does
when they're out with your friend.
And there was a gentleman in front of us.
Cashed his check,
went on about his business.
We minding our business.
Cash my check, get my money.
The man looks at me
and looks at my friend and says.
Is it okay if I give him some money?
You better say yes.
And I didn't know to be offended
or to feel like a cheap prostitute.
I didn't know.
But I'm sitting there now.
I had clearly just cash my check.
He saw. This.
He saw the money go in my pocket, but.
He still turned to my.
Cousin and says "Can
I give him some money?"
And my cousin just went "Ask him."
Yeah, right.
I'm not going to say no, bruh.
Like
But he started feeling.
Like he had his wad of money.
And I'm like,
Okay,
because I'm looking
at the top of the stack--it's
all hundreds.
Hell yeah, Ima take your money.
So he starts
peeling back
hundreds, and I'm like, okay.
You can stop, but he didn't.
He kept going in there with $50.
Okay.
He gets all the way down to the $1 bills.
It's like, here's three.
Wait, damn.
Get the hell outta here.
I took it, though.
But why did he do that?
That's like, what the.
Yeah, that's a reason, he was an ass.
There's a good reason.
But he did it. Why?
I mean, he saw. Us cash a check.
He saw me put money in my pocket,
and he still was determined to
help the poor cripple guy,
as opposed to understanding that
the money that I was cash
the check
that in cash
came from something called a job.
You know, that thing that you go to work
and they pay you for it.
But he could not conceive.
Of a person with a disability.
Having a job.
And apparently -- now
I can make all kinds of assumptions
about how he came to that conclusion.
But my cousin looked at me
like, oh,
did he just really give you money
after you cashed a check? I said mmmhm.
And I said, he
coulda shoulda gave me a car.
But, you know, next time, right?
But these are the things that.
As much as we talk about education
and inclusion,
you are only in school
for 16 years, maybe 20.
Depending on how long you go.
But you're in society for another 60, 70.
You should be prepared
to treat individuals as humans.
You don't have to like everybody.
You--and
trust me,
everybody probably won't like you--but
you need to have the ability
to not look at somebody
and instantly make a snap judgment.
Oh, he's in a wheelchair
so clearly something's wrong.
Probably cause he's drunk.
But that's a whole other story.
I know friends who drink and drive.
Did you know--this
is a complete digression--but
did you know that
if you had too many drinks in Tilly's
and you're in a wheelchair,
they will cut you off
for drinking and driving?
I had no idea until I got to the third
rum and coke, and the lady was like,
We can't serve you anymore. What?
Why not?
Because you're driving.
Okay.
I was, How much time do I have
till I get the next one?
But those are the kind of things
that, you know, in society,
we go out and-- like,
you think about it, you go to class,
but what's the fun part of college?
I think other than homework?
It's hanging out with your friends,
making new friends,
going to parties, visiting,
going to football games, and sporting
events and homecoming
and all of this stuff.
Having those illegal underground parties
in the dorms that your
your dorm,
your hall monitors are not supposed to
know your door monitors.
But as a student with a disability,
those things seem like fantasies
because the graduation rate
is abysmal for students in four years
with disabilities
who don't have IEPs, or who have IEPs.
Now, the last time
I think I checked the cohort data
this morning,
so I don't want to
completely misrepresent it,
but the students graduating in four years
with special education
and 504s or IEPs, is roughly
is about 20-30%
for the state of Washington.
That's in four years.
And then it goes up for over a fifth year
over the six years.
They did a--they just adjusted it
for October's
cohorts in the state of Washington.
So that means if you were student with
a disability,
and you came in with your friend,
your friend was five times
more likely to graduate on
time than you were.
Why is that?
Is it because your friend was smarter?
Probably not.
Probably have the same smarts.
But if you had a diagnosis
and they did not, instantly
you were put on the path to nothing.
People put students
with disabilities and say, Oh,
well, we'll put him on
a transition program.
Transitioning to what?
If you transition me to a winning
lottery ticket, I'm cool. And.
But if you transition me to poverty.
I'm not cool.
The average SSI recipient
receives $790 a month.
That's $9600 a year.
So you ain't poor, you extra poor.
And if you live in subsidized housing
that means
30% of your income goes to rent.
So off the top you have $500
for the month.
That breaks down to $125 a week.
If you go grocery
shopping and you like--how
many of you like to eat?
I like to eat, too, like,
food is like a necessity, right?
So if you just have
basic necessities like,
and you can't have a vice.
So this is how you can't really
have a vice, like,
I don't know, breathing,
you know, laundry.
Like you can't have those kind of vices
if you're poor.
And so students with disabilities
have to really be prepared to fight,
every step of the way.
In my home room 30 years ago,
there were 32 of us.
Two of us
graduated in four years, out of 32.
Two.
Two of us went on immediately
to higher education.
Our other friends went on and some
did the transition, and some aged out.
Because at 22 your services stop.
But if you think about it, I
asked this question yesterday,
how many of you would have liked
to been 21 years old in high school?
I mean you can be drunk every day
because you're 21,
but why would you want to?
So why is it appealing for a child
with a disability
to stay in the high school
for eight years?
People don't stay in college
for eight years
and you can
really get messed up in college.
But these are
the things that children will face.
And if you're not,
if you is students of Western
Washington University
go out and don't change the world,
this will be a continuing plea.
And it gets more severe for students
who have different ethnicities
in their backgrounds.
Particularly if you are
an African-American male
and you have an emotional outburst
in the school, you are tracked off.
If you are a Native American, Alaskan,
if you have an emotional outburst,
you're tracked off.
If you have any kind
of emotional outburst,
they'll track you off,
and it is almost virtually impossible
to get back on
to the standard track
of going out in four years.
That's why it's critically important
that you as students
and faculty and parents
don't look and make a splash judgment at
somebody whose disability may be visible.
More importantly,
to those
whose disability may be invisible,
because most of the time, once
you find out that somebody
has a disability,
people change the way they
interact with you.
So back in the day now, everybody, now
you got Instagram, SnapChat.
Back in the day, we had what they called
chat lines.
So you pick up the phone.
Okay, ours was corny,
it was "155-0-fresh"--so
you would dial that 155-0-fresh,
and you had a nickname--mine was Hershey.
Don't--just leave me alone, I was,
I was young, I was reckless
and I'd
get on the
phone and [deep smooth voice] "Hello."
Oh, he sounds sexy.
[deep smooth voice] "Yeah."
Can you put me in the hall with Hershey?
[deep smooth voice] "What's up?" But then
when they meet you: "Ew!
Why you got--ew!"
Because they perceived my disability
as being a negative.
So
what do you do when you come to college?
You're not just here to learn
this statistic.
This is where you meet
some of your lifelong friends,
your long term relationships,
your connections for jobs.
But if you are a student
with a disability,
you never really get that access.
If you think about Western Washington
University,
I asked this question yesterday,
what is the total
disability population on this campus?
Hmm.
When you all have social events,
how accessible and inclusive are they?
When you
have your parties, how out of your way
do you go to invite somebody
that you never invited before?
who may walk
differently,
process information differently?
Those are the things that people don't
think about until it hits close to home.
So as a student, as I grew up--
I told the story
yesterday -- that when I got to college,
it was crazy.
My homeroom teacher, I'll set this up
because they really didn't like me,
they thought I was an anarchist.
How dare you think I'm an anarchist?
It's true, but I'm not,
so there was one class that I had
and I had injured my knee and I refused
and my other and I couldn't participate.
So I told the teacher,
I said, I can't do it
because I got bad knees which is true.
Although I was lazy.
But I had bad knees
and the teacher says,okay.
And all my friends were like, yeah,
I got bad knees, too!
Yo, shut the hell up.
You ain't got no bad knees!
And so I sat down
and I went back to the home room,
and the teachers locked,
and they took everybody to lunch
because, you know,
if you were in Special
Ed, you had to move as a group,
like a pack,
and they took the pack to lunch
and they locked me in a room,
listen, we don't like you giving
these kids ideas
that they can have their own voices.
What
the hell is wrong with you?
They thought that I had started a revolt
in class.
So they say that I had started
the revolution,
that these kids were unruly
and that
I was giving them false hope
that they could go to regular class
That's what the teachers said.
Then they said, well, we can't wait 'til
you get out! Neither can I,
because I don't want to be around you.
And so the next,
like maybe three months later,
I come back, took the SATs, got
the scores, came back.
My teacher said, Keith
we really think you should come back
for another year of high school.
Mm-mm.
You know, I'm a senior.
If I come back,
I'm not going to be a good student. No.
And they say
that was because of my spelling.
And I asked her,
did you ever hear of spell check?
Like,
of course, autocorrect will
have you sending
very dirty text messages
to the wrong people.
It happened to me last week.
I was like, I'm so sorry.
And then, like, now I have a stalker.
But that's a whole nother story.
But she was like, you need to come back.
And and as she's talking,
I asked her if she can pull out a letter
that was in my bag.
And she was really serious.
Oh, you need to stay,
you need to come back--and then she reads
the letter
and notices
that it's my acceptance letter to college
that I had gotten on site that Saturday.
So I was, Hell no, I wasn't coming back.
And if I wanted to come back,
why would I come back to a school
where teachers
are presuming incompetence?
Why would you?
So it's
not just about getting
to western Washington. University,
it's about
what are you going to do
to change society after this?
What do you
what are you going to do
in your circle,
in your sphere of influence,
so that people like myself
or your family members
don't have to worry about,
because they have the diagnosis,
They can't do all the inappropriate
things that people do in college
because that's what life is.
I had a parent
come up to me and say,
my child will never go to college.
And I said, Well, why?
Because he's a cripple.
If that's what your mother thinks,
what you think
the world is going to think of you?
If that's what your family thinks,
that you can't do this...?
Tell you anothter story:
The reason this is important
is because
how do you learn to negotiate society?
By being a part of it.
And so in school, you learn
that's what high school is like.
High school is really like
The Hunger Games.
Yeah, I'm from District 11,
how y'all doin'?
[laughter] Because you like,
you get in, you're a freshman,
you have to survive freshman year.
You have to, like,
fight your way through sophomore year.
You get to junior year, you're like,
I've almost made it!
Right.
And then you get to the end
and then they try to kill you. But
in the end,
you go to college.
But in high school and in college,
these are the years
when you get to be free
and you learn yourself,
you learn your identity,
you explore all of these avenues.
But for students with disabilities,
one of the things
we don't never get to talk about
is our identity.
Whether it be sexual, emotional,
because, you know,
our dreams are always cast
in, well,
this is what we think you can do.
This is what we think
you're able to do versus
what do you want to do?
What you willing to try to become?
So as a student in high school,
one of the things that I swore
that I would never do is go to prom.
I was trying to keep the family
tradition alive.
And I was sitting in biology
class, chillin'.
Because I was going to a house party.
I was not going to do a prom
because the house party
was going to be on and poppin.
So I had different plans.
So I'm sitting in the classroom
and the teacher's aides
who think I'm an anarchist
come knock on the door.
Can we talk to Keith?
Hell, no.
What do you want with my life?
And they take me on the hallway.
Well,
we have a young lady in your class
who wants to go to the prom.
Okay?
She doesn't have a date.
Hm, that's too bad.
She really wants to go.
Okay.
We call, uh we called your Mama.
Why did you call my mama?
Well, your mother said
that you would love
to take her on a d---No,
no, no, no, no, no.
I'm going to a house party.
I'm going to be chillin.
She can take her own self to the prom.
I'm a progressive male.
I think women can do anything.
[laughs] And of course,
for any of you who have ever gone
to a prom or formal
and have gotten your stuff
at the last minute,
you know that you get the
ugliest stuff on the rack,
and it never fits.
So they blackmail me into taking this
young lady to the prom.
Mm. Mm.
So I ended up with a hot pink
cummerbund, and high water pants,
and shiny, ugly patent leather shoes.
Yeah.
It's really hard
being sexy in a hot pink cummerbund.
I mean, I did it, but,
you know, it was really hard,
and so and,
you know,
you can't get limos, so
my mother rented a Buick.
Hot pink cummerbund, and it'll be like,
this is just bad, all the way--
I told you
I didn't want to take her to the prom.
I was going to have fun!
So we go pick her up.
And when I say we
now, can you imagine your parents
taking you to the prom?
And then walking into the prom with you?
That happened to me.
I've been
emotionally scarred for 40 years.
And so we take her, and we go
and everybody takes pictures--"Oh,
she's so sweet"--it
was the worst night of my life.
And I have a prom picture
-- have you ever taken a picture
when somebody catches you
in the middle of your sentence
and your mouth is wide open
and you look like you're having,
like, a seizure or something? Like,
that's my prom picture.
But the whole point of it was
the whole night
was that
when we got to when we got to the prom,
what made it really bad
was how I had to come into the prom.
This was 1980.
So the ADA did not exist.
So the
accessible entrance was
we came in through the loading dock.
We had to walk through the kitchen,
past the dumpsters,
through a service elevator, past
trash, up
and out through the service entrance.
All because I used a wheelchair.
That's why it's important
that we have inclusion.
So that --
I wouldn't have felt bad
if everybody had to walk past the trash
then we all would have been equal.
But everybody else got to walk in
through these
beautiful glass doors
with these marble floors
and taking pictures
and standing on the front of the hotel.
Meanwhile, I'm coming in
through the side entrance
like an unwanted pet.
That is the,
that is the memory
that I hold from my prom.
Never mind the fact that I had a date
I didn't walk
and I had a hot pink cummerbund,
but I'll be all right.
But why is that important?
Because these are the events in your life
that are critical
that they make
memories that lasts forever.
And the fact that they didn't even think
about the people with disabilities
coming to the prom,
they didn't plan accordingly.
So when you have your events
and you say, we're going to have a party,
we're going to have the rock
climbing wall.
Yeah.
Keith Jones won't be climbing
the rock climbing wall.
Not unless you got insurance.
But how are you planning?
How you engaging?
Like,
do you see people
and if you see a person with a disability
are you,
you know,
do you run up to them
-- here's a question.
Have you ever thought
about dating somebody with a disability?
Silence.
If you find out
the person that you were interested in
had a disability,
would you continue to pursue?
If you are at a bar and find a hot
-- you see somebody hot
and then they roll
the world in a wheelchair,
does it change how you think about them?
And if the answer is,
if you don't know the answers,
then the answer is already yes,
because that is what it is.
Like,
academics is one thing; it's
the application of those
academics that makes you value.
And for people with disabilities,
we don't really get a chance
to go out and hang out
and do that kind of stuff
because of society's perception
of what we can and cannot do.
Now, my friends and I were
slightly different. A little bit.
So a couple of years ago we decided
to go -- warning, graphic
discussion taking place,
not too graphic because it's too early --
but a friend of mine
and I,
it was like three of us,
you know,
and we use wheelchairs
and we were like, Hey,
let's go to strip club, okay?
Going to the strip club.
Rolled up to the strip club,
and the bouncer looked like
he had a heart attack.
Oh, my G---y'all, uh,
y'all tryin to come in?
No, we're just going to sit at the door
and look at everybody else go in.
The hell you
think?
I don't know if, y'all forgive me,
I don't know if y'all can get in.
They didn't let us in
because they said we were a fire hazard.
I was like,
Yeah, no, I'm hot,
but that's a whole nother...right?
But a fire hazard.
And, you know, have you ever had
somebody turn you away,
but you look in, and it was like,
no, we don't have any seats.
But you look over their shoulder
and they're like, a thousand empty seats?
This is what it was like.
It's because people
had made an assumption
that if we came in, we were a liability,
that if we came in,
they just
did what most people do,
that we could be a problem.
The the goal of what you're trying to do
is to change society
so that people can move independently
and do what they want to do.
Inclusion is just--it's
beyond the classroom.
If you've never seen a person
who is different than you,
you will never be able
to appreciate their differences.
If you never dealt with a person
with a disability as a person,
then you will always
see the disability prior to the person.
I had a crush on the girl in high school.
Oh, I thought I was the man.
I was like [deep smooth voice] Yo.
You know, when you try to date somebody,
your voice gets deeper.
You start to talk like this.
[deep smooth voice] Hello.
How you doing?
Oh, so you gonna be my girlfriend?
[high-pitched voice]
"I'll be your girlfriend."
I was like, Yeah,
Ima meet you at school tomorrow.
Well, okay.
So the next day in school,
I go up and say,
Hey, you know, what's up?
And she was standing with her friends
and her friends was like "Ew!"
and just started instantly
talking about "He's drooling.
Why he walk like that?
Ew!
He's cripple an' you trying to date him?
Girl--"
And she was like, "I
ain't dating him,"
and pretended
that the conversation we had
never happened.
Peer pressure.
People have -- people see me with my kids
and ask me whose kids are they?
I wish they were somebody else's kids,
so I'd have my own money,
but they mine.
And then they'll go, They're yours?
Yes, they're yours.
And that means you had to....
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Certain times, right?
So....
But even the most basic of things,
people don't appreciate the difficulty
it is.
Just to have people talk to you,
just to have people acknowledge
that you have an opinion.
If I go to a restaurant with a friend,
they'll say, What do you want to eat?
Then they'll turn to the friend to say,
What does he want to eat?
Typically, my friends are looking
very "Better
ask him, he's the one with the money,"
and now I'm like [in
mocking strained speech]
"I don't know what do I want to eat,"
which makes them feel really bad.
And then I'll do it again
because my job is not to enlighten you.
My job is to make an order so I can eat.
I had to tell a friend yesterday
it's not incumbent upon people
with disabilities
to make people
without disabilities comfortable.
It is analogous to a woman.
It is not incumbent upon you
to make a man feel safe in your space.
Your job is to be who you are.
As a person with a disability.
Our job is to be who we are.
The disability is a part of who we are.
It is not who we are.
Cerebral palsy is part of Keith Jones,
part of my identity.
It does not define my identity.
My sexiness defines my identity.
I know.
But I'd say these things to you because
right now we're in a situation where they
they had a vote in the House of
Representatives two days ago
that they are taking $2.8 trillion
away from Social Security.
They had a vote think
what, three months ago
where they gutted the ADA.
So like and Betsy DeVos,
our illustrious department,
we're okay on the veto.
Mm hmm.
Well,
they rescinded all of the protections
for students with disabilities.
They also have decided
to skip over civil rights complaints
that are lodged
with the Department of Education.
So if you are a student with a disability
and you're an LBGTQ student,
student of color,
English is your second language
-- -- you have no protection.
There is none.
So it is incumbent upon
you as a as a community
to give those protections, because
at least next time it might be you.
This is how people with disabilities
have been fighting for years.
They are protesting on the state capitol
and the nation's capital as we speak
because Ben Carson decided to say
that people
who are low income
and need housing assistance,
their rent should triple.
So remember I told you this, $790
a month.
30% of it goes to your--right--now
half of your $790 is going to your rent.
That means for 29 days of a month
you are living on $10 a day.
How many of you can live on $10 a day.
A good coffee costs you like $7.
This is you
get like a bunch of extra shots.
My Frappuccino is 13, but--okay six.
All right, I'm sorry.
I got kids so I need much caffeine
as I can get.
Chasin'
they ass
all around the house--"come here!"
But those are the kind of things
that when you talk people don't believe.
If you're not prepared to do what
is right after school--so
it doesn't matter
whether you're a teaching student
whether you're a business student
or whether you are a psychologist,
if you're not prepared to engage
a human at a human level,
you will let the
small things distract you from possibly
your future wife, your future husband,
your future business partner...
...the next dean, your next president,
solely because a diagnosis interfered.
I've had parents come up to me
and tell me that they will never think
their children will do anything.
And I have to remind them
it is okay to mourn the loss of the child
you thought you were going to have.
For nine months you had this idea
you're going to give birth
to this perfect baby boy or baby girl.
And then you give birth
and then there's a diagnosis
and now you go down the rabbit hole.
Now you start to see how friends act
when you have that different child.
The divorce rate among parents
who have children with disabilities
is twice the national average.
So once the parent has a child with
a disability
it puts an extra strain on the family.
If there are siblings in the family,
there have been studies
where siblings feel
that they have been neglected
because this child had come along
and requires much more attention.
Why is that a problem?
These are the realities that face people
with disabilities in families.
So if
I'm going to come to Western
Washington University,
if I've gotten to the point
where I can come here,
that means that
my mother and my father
have had battle scars
for 30 years, 20 years, 18 years.
Because the basic perception of a child
with a disability
is that Oh, that's cute.
We'll give him some services
and we'll get him an affordable housing.
The data is stark.
People with disabilities
outside of the senior community
are the most isolated communities.
We're in Western.
We're in Bellingham.
How here's a question:
How wheelchair accessible
do you think Bellingham is?
Everybody was like, Oh, hell no.
So if you can't get around,
how do you party?
I mean, you can take over but, like,
if you can't get around,
how do you socialize?
How do you connect?
If you can't get around?
How do you do
basic stuff like go to the store?
If you ever look at a wheelchair,
if you ever look at a person
in an electric wheelchair, read
the little sign on the bottom.
It is
do not operate in inclement weather.
Which means
that--and you're in Washington--so,
either your wheelchair
short circuits...it happened to me.
But these are
the kind of things that we talk about
and why it's critically important--it's
beyond getting the grades,
it's beyond
joining the club,
it's what are you going to do
to make sure
that the fabric of your community
is welcoming and truly inclusive?
How many of you go out
and use the automatic door
-- if you go to the grocery store --
and if you can't use the automatic door,
you mad as hell
that you got to use your muscle
to pull it open.
All right.
Then none of that would have happened
without the ADA.
And there's an active --
we are in an active political climate
where my physical existence
is being seen as not valuable.
There's an active eugenics movement
where they are eliminating
entire disability populations.
There are active movements
where people are saying
you can't come here.
In, I believe its the Netherlands,
they have said that every person,
every woman who gets pregnant
must be tested for Down syndrome.
And if their child is
discovered to have Down's syndrome,
they will abort that fetus.
They are eliminating Down's syndrome.
Now this--so if they
if they can go from Down's syndrome,
what's the next
disability they don't like?
What's the next issue?
Cerebral palsy could be next.
I ain't going.
Y'all can try.
I ain't going.
But these are the realities.
So just to put it in the context
about why it's important
to be a community of inclusion
and things like that,
and the reason
that if you find friends with disability,
you give us strength,
we give you strength.
So we were out.
I tried to catch a cab.
Okay,
never mind I'm
a black man
trying to catch a cab, I'm
a black man with a disability
trying to catch a cab.
So I went up to the guy
said, Can I get in the cab?
He said, Oh, my God.
What kind of drugs are you on?
It's like,
apparently not the best kind, so, hmm.
He's like, no, no, we don't take your
kind. My kind? The hell?
I had to go over to--so I went--this
was at South station in Boston.
I went to the I went to the security.
I said,
excuse me, can I get a hand in a cab?
Because in that let me in the cab,
he looked at me like,
what kind of drugs are you on?
I was mad
because I didn't have any drugs,
at least not to kind I wanted.
I was like,
can I get the drug
that everybody seems to think I'm on?
But all of that
was because they saw me walking
and because of my cerebral palsy,
I walk with a different kind of gait
and the assumption visually was
he has to be on something
versus that's
just how he moves.
It took me 40 minutes to get into a cab.
Seven different cabs
refused to let me in the car.
Last June
when we were on our way to rehearsal,
I called an Uber, and I sat,
the lady pulled up, I rolled out
and you know, they give you the alert,
"Please meet your driver outside."
So I'm like, Hey, how you doing?
I'm here.
She looked at me
and got on her phone and then called me
through the window on her phone.
And I answer the phone, say hello.
She's like, I'm here.
I said, I know, I'm looking at you.
She said, Where are you?
I'm right here.
She refused to get out of the car
because she did not want to deal
with the person with a wheelchair,
canceled the ride and drove off.
And everybody, so, you know,
I called a cab
and got down to where I was going--and
people are like, that's bullshit.
You need to cuss Uber.
I said, this is on a daily basis.
So the reality of being a
person with a disability
is not that--it's
more than just inclusion in class.
If we're not in society
seen as a viable functioning part,
then we can be discriminated against
and kicked out, not picked up,
not given rides,
not allowed to date.
They have literally told
a couple in Ohio,
one person had cerebral palsy,
the other one had MS.
They had a child
they said that they were not capable
enough to be parents
and they took the child
for no other reason
other than the fact
that the parents had disability.
It's stark,
but it's not impossible to change.
Everybody in this room
can be the key to changing it.
You just have to be willing
to look at the human,
the humanity in everybody.
Do you know the World
Health Organization
definition of disability?
Anybody?
Going once, going twice.
Okay.
The World Health
Organization in 2009--no,
2011--changed the definition
of disability from residing in the person
to residing in the environment.
So that if you are a person
with a mobility impairment,
but everything is level and flat,
you are not,
you are not disabled
because you can get into those places.
I'm disabled
if there are steps into every place,
if I use a wheelchair.
So the environment
is what makes you disabled,
not your diagnosis.
That's a radical shift.
If you've ever been at a crosswalk
and you've seen the light
come on and you've heard the beeping,
that's so people
who are visually impaired can cross.
That's radical.
It makes sense
because sometimes
if you aren't paying attention
and you hear the beeping--
--people who are not blind can use that.
These are the things, these small steps.
But people
are constantly looking at people
with disabilities as if we are the other
if we need to be different.
Now, me,
just tell you another story because
I have a really weird kind of like so
we were in the airport again
because I fly a lot
and my friend and I were going
because he is traveling
with me this time.
So we had to tickets,
we were at the gate--I'm
trying not to laugh
because this was funny, to me.
He said,
the lady was like,
[in slow condescending voice]
Are you traveling with us today?
[Keith Jones] I'm
at a gate in the airport,
what the hell you think I'm doing?
[slow condescending voice] Oh,
I'm so proud
that you made it to the gate today.
[Keith Jones] Are you okay?
I think she was on the drugs
they thought I was on.
And my cousin gave her the things
and he was like, no we're in these seats?
She was like
and she looked at him, was like,
I'm so proud of you.
That's so wonderful.
Thank you for the tickets.
And he was like,
Do you think I have a disability?
And she started talking
really, really slow.
Are you
going to need help
on the plane?
Yo, I'm not getting on this plane
because she's crazy,
and I don't know about the pilot,
and it was like,
but they kept talking to it.
It was a miracle
that we had gotten to the airport.
I guess
they thought we were catching the bus.
No, but they were slow
that they literally
were making the assumptions
about who we were.
And as I'm on the plane,
how many of you played
Candy Crush or still play Candy Crush?
Okay, I'm addicted to Candy Crush.
So I'm on the plane playing Candy Crush.
And now I have to say this.
I use my foot to play Candy Crush.
So my phone is down here
and the lady's like,
oh, my God...[starts sobbing]...
I was like, why are you crying?
She was like,
I'm so...you're just so amazing.
I was just watching you playing
Candy Crush
and...[emotional sobbing]
The hell is wrong with you?
What's wrong with you?
I got scared!
And then the flight attendant came out,
and she's like,
oh, my God,
everybody on the plane is just so amazed.
You're such an inspiration.
I was like,
if I'd known Candy Crush coulda did
this I'd have gone
on America's Got Talent.
What are you going to do?
I'm going to play Candy Crush!
But why was that?
Why was it so impressive to them?
Whenever I have my phone, I use my feet.
So my phone is always on the floor
and I'm always on it.
And I cannot tell you how many times
people have run up,
grab my phone and put it on my lap.
Oh, my God.
Did you know your phone was on the floor?
Oh, yes. I'm using it.
And I'm sending a text.
Do you know this ass