I’m going to have to strongly disagree on this one. Unless you consider the laws of physics/mechanics/etc. to be part of the a non-handicap accessible world, there absolutely are times that a disability makes a task or goal or achievement more difficult to achieve. It simply is more difficult/time-consuming for a person with certain disabilities to achieve certain tasks, no matter how they are treated by others in the world. If your condition makes you sleep 20 hours a day, then achieving the same the things as a person who sleeps 8 hours a day in the same number of months/years will be more impressive because of that because that disability will an impediment to said achievements.
It’s complicated. With or without the ALS, he’d still be one of the greatest minds ever in the field of semiclassical gravity. In fact, without it, he’d probably have been even better, because any thinker gains value from discussing ideas with their peers, and that was a much slower and more difficult process for him.
But on the other hand, how many people have even the first clue of what semiclassical gravity is, or would understand what it meant if told? How many can have any actual appreciation of his scientific work? If it weren’t for the ALS, he’d still be just as much of a somebody, but he’d be a somebody that far fewer people had heard of.
This sentence is strange to me, especially as relates to Hawking. One of the articles I read was that, with his state-of-the-art-wheelchair, he could communicate one word a minute. How do you set up the world to be more handicap-accessible such that the struggles society creates for him are removed?
Most folks communicate at about 160 words per minute (this is professional speeches–other numbers I see elsewhere are around the same). What I can say in five minutes took Hawking an entire day to say.
Yes, yes, there are going to be advantages to this impediment: he had to choose each word carefully, and he had plenty of time to think about how he wanted to structure his sentences. But it’s very difficult for me to buy either that his paralysis didn’t present impediments to him, or that those impediments were based on society, not on his ailment.
I am reminded of something I read by a deaf-rights advocate, a long “what-if” story about a day in the life of a person wherein various situations made ASL the superior communication choice (skydiving, talking through a window, at a club with loud music, etc.). I thought, okay, sure, but most days I don’t encounter a single one of those situations. Overwhelmingly humans choose vocal speech because, when speaker and audience are both hearing, it’s a more convenient, flexible, and useful medium.
Certainly society is not set up for folks with disabilities. But putting everything on society, not on the physical traits of the disability, seems very bizarre to me.
Semi-classical gravity was one of several areas he was significant in, he’s also one of the most significant figures in general relativity, being the key figure (with Penrose) in reviving and revolutionizing the study of it in the late sixties and early seventies and also in his day he was one of the most significant figures in quantum gravity, though the study of it has moved on and in different directions since then.
Isn’t it more than just, “he’s free of the wheelchair”, though? I mean, ALS is more than just about having to use a wheelchair – it is one horrible disease. Would people have objected to a cartoon or artwork of Lou Gehrig in a baseball pose, next to his wheelchair?
So it’s not just being “out of the wheelchair” – that was only one aspect of his condition. He’s also no longer suffering from it, I think is what some people are trying to say.
Some conditions are worse than others – it’s not just, “oh, so and so no longer has to use a wheelchair!” In a case like Hawking’s, there’s a hell of a lot more to it than that.
Thank you for your post, it made me realize I didn’t articulate myself accurately. I did not mean to suggest that the entirety of a disabled person’s struggles making it in the world is the fault of society. In this sense, the ‘isms’ are not exactly the same. I was wrong in my previous post. But if you ask just about any wheelchair user (I say wheelchair because it is what I have the most personal knowledge and experience with) what has been more of an obstacle for them doing what they desire with their lives, the physical reality of their disabled body or the social reality of living in a world that isn’t equipped for them and isn’t seemingly interested in regarding them with equality, I wholeheartedly believe the majority would say the latter. But the original point I was making still holds. Success in the world by anyone who faces a higher level of social barriers is noteworthy and deserving of respect.
Being out of his wheelchair is fucking irrelevant. I have never once in the 18 years looked at my chair as anything but a neutral tool I use that enables me to live my live with a chronic injury. My wheelchair is the best part of my injury. It allows me mastery of movement, I’m fluid with movement despite being paralyzed from the waist down. It’s the injury that deserves any negative emotion. Now, I guess I could understand someone (possibly new to the injury) who focuses that anger/sadness at their wheelchair but in my opinion that is a mistake and the mark of someone not totally adjusted to their physical reality. IMHO of course.
I’m not sure I would call anyone a significant figure in quantum gravity, at least not yet. The field itself is still too half-baked.
I absolutely agree. I clarified my point above in the thread. I didn’t mean to say it was entirely the fault of a non-accessible world that held the handicapped back. And for the sake of the discussion, I’m going to stick to wheelchair users, because they are pretty much the most visible of disabilities and the only disability I feel I can competently use to relate to this discussion. But that physical difficulty they face from their disability usually is compounded, even overshadowed, by the societal difficulty that physical difficulty creates. It’s more complicated than a black person or woman succeeding despite social obstacles, it’s why I do make a distinction between ableism and all the other ‘isms’. With disabled people they not only have the social barriers, they have physical barriers as well (barriers both related to their personal limitations physically and the societal barriers that non-accessiblity creates).
That all makes sense to me; thanks for clarifying!
You’re right - some things are obvious, or at least obvious enough, exactly as you described.
I can give at least one example of a difficult case in terms of ableism: a person who has a mental or neurological condition that makes some kinds of ordinary tasks difficult for them, but whose appearance gives no clues that they are not average.
I’ll try to think a little more and maybe come up with something else.
One thing that has come up in slightly different ways already but bears repeating:
Assumptions can be true, but they can also be false, sometimes in unexpected or weird ways.
Asking an honest question about whether a person can (or wants to) do a certain thing is always OK, and probably even welcome - as long as it’s not one of those questions where “None of your business” is the obvious answer. 
Well that’s what I meant – it’s not about the wheelchair itself, but the condition that makes said wheelchair necessary. Like I’m sure for Hawking, having to use a wheelchair was probably not the worst part of having ALS. But it was the most visible symbol of his disease.
One thing I’ve noticed as a spin off to this “Hawking is free”, is an #ILoveMyDisability movement, and that one just pisses me right off. I don’t love my disability. I hate it. There is nothing good, or wonderful, or worth celebrating in my disability. If I search really hard, I could tell you that it has taught me about the capacity of a person to endure with the right incentives. I do celebrate those few tools that I have found that ameliorate my situation. Not a wheelchair, but I can understand that.
I find I understand those images of Hawking not in terms of him being “free” of his chair, but in terms of him being free of his disease. I am uncomfortable with that only because he, himself, once said he considered the disease a blessing of a sort. It pushed him to use his mind, instead of slacking off. In the end, I cannot judge the happiness or worthiness of his life. I get the impression that he, himself, was largely satisfied. I do understand why people wish him peace from pain and suffering.
As far as society and how they see the disabled, well, they’re not very good at it. I might just smack the next disabled person who tells me that I should “love” mine. We are not all the same. They are judging me with the same lack of insight as everyone else.
ETA: Hey, there you go. Disabled folk aren’t magically perfect either.
Right.
Incidentally, there are many people who direct their rage, fear and depression of their disability at the medical evidence they live with 24/7 that they cannot escape from. Be it a wheelchair, a hearing aid, crutches, etc. It’s very understandable as to why these might become targets for a disabled person’s negative emotions towards their disabilities. Sorry, kind of a non sequitor
I dunno… I feel like that’s just asking to get some extremely snappish response along the lines of “no of COURSE I can’t surf for fuck’s sake”. It’s one thing to not assume that I know what limitations a disability does or does not present. It’s another to pretend it doesn’t exist at all.
And I’m sure it varies person-to-person. If your choices are (a) sometimes make assumptions and the disabled person can correct you and point out that yes, they can in fact do X, vs (b) make no assumptions and the disabled person can point out that they can not in fact do X, vs (c) repeatedly ask “are you capable of X”, when it’s extraordinarily unlikely they’d be capable of X; well, I bet that the approach that would be most appreciated depends on the person, and the context, and the person’s mood, and a zillion other things.
See, in my experiences, in the majority of times, regardless what the activity/action is, the able-bodied person will never or at least rarely ask if the disabled person can do X, in fear of insulting/hurting them. So the situation never gets broached and minds are never enlightened or changed at all. So it goes on.
Another funny fact, in the 3 years I’ve been dating my current girlfriend, I’d say 75% of the time we’ve been out at a restaurant and finished our meal, the waiter/waitress will bring the bill and set it directly in front of my girlfriend and not me. How many able-bodied men can honestly say they have had similar experiences?
Look on the bright side, you are striking a blow for respecting women!
Fuck that noise. This is my money bro. 
totally kidding