The BBS Bonfire has been over a week in the making – a list of the pet peeves of many less able people. We’ve been venting our frustrations and it’s been fun, cathartic and occasionally more serious. Tonight we’re finally off the put these annoying aspects of accessibility and less able life onto our nearest bonfire. Before that we need to rattle through the final list. Prepare for fireworks!
Katie Hopkins would probably be a contender to go on our bonfire for her comment about Tanni Grey-Thompson which was the sort of comment you’d never get away with about another social group. It’s annoying to think that less able people are still considered ‘fair game’ for tasteless jokes. But, as it happens, Edenbridge Bonfire Society have beaten us to it and burned their own effigy of her. So we’ll just stick to a selection of things about how the less able are treated to go onto our fire.
As you’ll see, these aren’t things that can physically and practically be burnt (although legally neither can Katie Hopkins if we’re going to get technical) so what we’ve decided to do is pop the ideas we’ve been complaining (ranting?) about over the past week into an envelope and burn them in effigy. Burning and envelopes – we’ve somehow managed to be simultaneously very dramatic and slightly banal. Here’s the full list of ideas from BBS writers and readers:
We couldn’t not put dodgy ramps on the bonfire. Whether they’re ramps to nowhere – which take you half way up a flight of steps or into a wall – illogically steep ramps or these death trap tracks which we’ve selected as the example to put on the fire. They’re incredible difficult to use and feel extremely unsafe when you’re on them. They’re so unsteady and poorly designed – no one’s going to use the steps in between the tracks so why not just have a full ramp?
Quasi Khazis are one of three pet peeves about disabled toilets going on the BBS Bonfire. BBS reader, Margaret, agreed with our post on these loos which are claimed to be accessible but are just large rooms with no real aids. She highlighted that a ‘disabled toilet’ with no hand rails will not be forgotten and less able visitors will tell their friends not to go there making it a guaranteed way to lose customers. So it’s bad for everyone; let’s chuck them on the bonfire.
Jimbo provided us with another story which reminded us that as well as being a physical thing the idea of quasi khazis extends to how able bodied people approach them. If they think of the disabled toilet as just an extra toilet for everyone then it’s just not worth having. Here’s the story he sent us – illuminating to say the least:
“I was once at a busy club that was apparently modern and had just been renovated not long ago. I went into the disabled bathroom/useful store room, (navigating my wheelchair around the usual obstacle course of spare chairs, toilet rolls and mop handles ).
“I was sitting on the toilet for only a minute or two before the door (which I had locked) was suddenly unlocked and opened. The manager of the venue stood there, door wide open, with a large crowd of people behind him peering in at me, and demanded me to hurry up because there was a large queue forming for the women’s!!
“The next time I attempted to use the same ‘disabled’ bathroom, the queue of abled bodied people trying to get in there was so big that I had to use the car park around the back of the club! Upon trying to re-enter the club I was told I couldn’t come back in because it was too busy!! Safe to say I have never returned!!!”
Sometimes you have to wonder if people really get the point of having a disabled accessible toilet. There seems to be no explanation other than stupidity when you hear about some of the incredibly inaccessible ‘accessible toilets’. It can be little things like an out of reach sink or it can be for instance, as Karl told the BBS Bonfire, on our Facebook page, all the NHS hospitals having foot-only operated bins in the disabled toilets. You can almost justify things like that as just an oversight but why are so many disabled toilets downstairs!! Putting a toilet for wheelchair users somewhere you can’t get to in a wheelchair? That goes on the BBS Bonfire. And while we’re here, can we please stop using disabled toilets as storage facilities!
We still can’t believe that these sorts of things happen in Michelin Starred restaurants but they do. We think that if your restaurant is supposed to be one of the best of the best then you should absolutely have to have a disabled toilet and step free access throughout. Unfortunately we can’t strip these restaurants of their Michelin Stars but we can put them on our bonfire.
Boring mobility products are a definite candidate. Mobility products are like shoes or glasses – you can’t go anywhere without them – but for some reason it’s still really difficult to find stylish mobility aids. We’ve dedicated a lot of time to doing just that so we know that they are now out there. This makes us want to get rid of anything dull, grey and clunky forever. Let’s all ditch the NHS grey crutches and start using something a little trendier.
Part of the reason that it has been so hard in the past to find these cool crutches is that too often disabled people are treated in a cold way as if they don’t care about these things. Allyson told us on Facebook that this is something she would put on the BBS Bonfire: “disabled people are humans not invisible objects!!! Whether in wheelchairs, on crutches, with walkers or carers – please do not talk over them or loudly at them as if they do not understand.” Couldn’t agree more!
A couple more things before we head off – firstly something I expect we can all agree on is that hate crime against disabled people is a despicable action and the things we’ve been hearing recently about mate crime are really quite sickening and demoralising. How can people be so awful? I bet there are some people out there who would feel that just putting the idea of hate crime on the bonfire isn’t enough – they may say the perpetrators should go on too! Probably a little OTT but this is a really terrible issue.
Many people might not want to use public transport anymore because a shocking one in four less able people have experienced hate crime on it. On top of that, the access on public transport continues to leave a lot to be desired, particularly on trains and tubes. Why do you seem to need to plan, days in advance, for somebody to turn up at the precise moment you’re going to need a ramp? It’s like trying to plan a military operation – nobody else would be expected to be so overly organised. Bad access on transport is the final item on the BBS Bonfire.
Well, we’ve got to be off now to our local fireworks display so we can put our envelope of grievances onto the fire. Maybe Santa will read it and we’ll get some wheelchair ramps for Christmas. That’s how I always used to send my letters to him anyway – via the fireplace.
Enjoy the fireworks tonight if you’re going somewhere and maybe, if you are, you should add you’re own grievance to your local bonfire!