It seems like a majority of people in the mainstream political spectrum are not just ableist in that they hold some unstated biases toward people with disabilities, but militantly, vehemently ableist, in the way that Klansman is militantly racist. (1/11)

I'll loosely define militant ableism as the belief that people with disabilities should be subject to violence, especially state violence, at an abnormal level relative to abled citizens. This means denying them legal and political rights, imprisoning, or murdering them. (2/11)

Many people use the language of disability as a synonym for extreme evil. How many people have you heard call Donald Trump "deranged", psycho", "insane." Trump is none of these things, he is evil. (3/11)

Ask your friends, liberal and conservative, whether they think people with intellectual disabilities should be able to vote. Ask your friends if they think people with disabilities or mental illnesses should be able to own firearms. (4/11)

If they answer no to either of those questions, then they hold the belief that someone's diagnosis should determine whether they are entitled to constitutional rights. Liberals in particular are guilty of this. (5/11)

Most people would probably say they are against people with disabilities being tortured, but how many people even know about the Judge Rotenberg Center? Google it. (6/11)

This is militant ableism. These are not just unconscious biases that people have due to ignorance, this is a dangerous and violent ideology that is mainstream in our society. (7/11)

Authoritarian regimes often wrongfully diagnose their political opponents with mental illness or disability as a way of delegitimizing them, and stripping them of any protections against torture or extrajudicial imprisonment afforded to the abled. (8/11)

Political dissidents would be declared insane and committed to mental institutions that were far worse than any prison. The example that comes to mind is the Suffragists being diagnosed with "hysteria" but there are countless more contemporary examples in fascist regimes. (9/11)

This might be a bit of a stretch, but I see echoes of this when liberals sympathetic to rioters' grievances talk about riots purely as an emotional reaction to injustice, and not as a deliberate tactic undertaken by the oppressed. As if no rational person could riot. (10/11)

I write all of this because I see people, even leftists, justifying the killing of Ricardo Munoz using explicitly, militantly ableist language. As if he was too dangerous to be left alive by virtue of his mental illness. Stop that shit. (11/11)

#ableism #seattleprotests #acab