July is Disability Pride Month. Disability Pride started as a day of celebration in 1990 held in Boston following The Americans with Disabilities Act being passed in that same year. Since then, the celebration of disability has progressed to a month and is now celebrated in various cities across America and more recently the UK. It is an event that celebrates disabled people and those with long-term conditions. Disability Pride, similarly to LGBTQ+ Pride, is all about celebrating and reclaiming visibility. It is a response and counteraction against ableism and social stigma.
In 2013, Chicago’s Disability Pride parade defined their mission in three principles: “To change the way people think about and define “disability,” to break down and end the internalised shame among people with disabilities, and to promote the belief in society that disability is a natural and beautiful part of human diversity in which people living with disabilities can take pride.”
Disability Pride Flag
The Disability Pride flag was created in 2019 by Ann Magill to help increase the community’s visibility. The flag was re-designed in 2021 to become a more accessible version.
The black background: represents the disabled people who have lost their lives due to not only their illness, but also to negligence, suicide and eugenics.
The five colours represent the diversity within disability and our experiences (Mental Illness, Neurodiversity, Invisible and Undiagnosed Disabilities, Physical Disability, and Sensory Disabilities). The colours stand for:
- Red: physical disabilities
- Yellow: cognitive and intellectual disabilities
- White: invisible and undiagnosed disabilities
- Blue: mental illness
- Green: sensory perception disabilities