Being Truly Welcoming to People With Disabilities

Is your agency publicly welcoming to people with disabilities (PWD)? Does it hire such individuals? Does it post on social media about disability awareness months? If so, you may think that your workplace is inclusive of PWD. Your office may be if it includes those individuals in meaningful ways instead of just tokenism and treats them with respect and dignity instead of forcing them to conform.

It is not sufficient to just “talk the talk.” Agencies must also “walk the walk.”

Unfortunately, all too often, offices are outwardly accepting of PWD although in reality, they are not. If your agency experiences this contradiction, then it may be conducting virtue signaling. Helpfulprofessor.com defines virtual signaling as “actions that are more about posturing and impression management than actual action.” According to the website, this behavior routinely occurs in the era of social media. The site also says that “liking photos or posting comments on social is convenient for political positioning but lacks substantive action.”

Virtue signaling is also “performative allyship.” When agencies focus on appearing to be allies of people with disabilities instead of being true supporters, they avoid criticism. Autistic researcher Becca Lory Hector wrote, “Performative disability allyship breeds non-inclusive workplaces and endorses ableism.”

You may wonder how that could it be. Wouldn’t an agency that publicly supports PWD treat its employees and other PWD well? Not necessarily. Employment lawyer David Jones wrote that even “employers with a public profile for their neurodiversity initiatives” mistreat their neurodivergent employees.

Virtue signaling for PWD is unacceptable. While these actions seem to show appreciation and support for PWD, they are empty actions. Offices may think that they care about people with disabilities merely by posting on social media or taking similar actions. However, they should realize that virtue signaling conceivably may make situations worse. Although employers supposedly care about PWD, they do not truly want to make life easier for those individuals. Neurodiversity advocate Kerstin Schomaker referred to virtue signaling of neurodiversity, a type of disability, as “exploitation of disabled people.”

Virtue signaling is somewhat similar to microagressions. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines a microagression as a “comment or action that subtly and often unconsciously or unintentionally expresses a prejudiced attitude toward a member of a marginalized group.” An example of a disability-related microagression is saying, “You’re so resilient, despite your disability you’ve achieved something.”

Entities committing both virtue signaling and microagressions may not have bad intentions. They may think that they took positive actions. However, they actually caused harm.

To meaningfully include PWD:

• Communicate from leadership that everyone, including PWD, is valuable and welcome.
• Ensure that all of your agency’s website, publications, resources, events, and work are accessible to people with a variety of disabilities, and show PWD in your resources.
• Make sure that your physical office is accessible and welcoming to PWD.
• Train staff on inclusion and disabilities.
• Refer to PWD using their preferred language. For example, do not assume that an autistic person wants to be referred to as a “person with autism” just because people learn to use people-first language. Most autistic people prefer to be called “autistic.”
• Use the word “disability” instead of euphemistic words, such as “special” needs. People with disabilities have the same needs as everyone else.
• Hire PWD and let them work to their full potential.
• Include PWD in meaningful ways.
• Accept PWD for who they are, and do not force them to conform.

Truly include people with disabilities. Don’t just say you are, while doing the opposite.

Miriam Edelman, MPA, MSSW, is a Washington, D.C.-based policy professional. Her experience includes policy work for Congress. Miriam’s undergraduate degree is from Barnard College, Columbia University, with majors in political science and urban studies. She has a master’s in public administration from Cornell University, where she was inducted into the national honorary society for public administration. She has a master’s of science in social work (focusing on policy) from Columbia University. She is a commissioner of the DC Commission on Persons with Disabilities. Miriam aims to continue her career in public service. She is especially interested in democracy, civic education, District of Columbia autonomy, diversity, health policy, women’s issues, and disabilities.

Photo by Marcus Aurelius