When shopping for jeans you have a few expectations. One is that they’re sorted out by style and colour (your millennial friend here is still partial to acid-wash skinny jeans). Then you expect they’re organised by size, allocated by weird numbers. And even then, you don’t expect that you will necessarily fit you assume into them because all cut them differently, maybe at the waist, hip, or leg or length. Every day, you expect that the world isn’t cut in one particular way, and that it’s not a case of right or wrong but that different jeans fit different people.

When it comes to disability, however, there’s only a small amount of variation that those without disabilities would come to expect. Perhaps it’s whether someone is neurotypical versus neurodivergent, or able-bodied versus a mobility aid user. We don’t account for grey areas or even those completely left field (aka flare jeans). We want the disability to be visible so we can say yes that person is disabled. We want to see the mobility aids or the prosthetics or meltdowns or crying. 

Most of us hide what symptoms we can though. I’ve never had a bad pain day and thought, ‘You know what this is lacking? An audience. Let’s go to the local shopping centre and start screaming there’. Sometimes this comes from internalised ableism. Sometimes this comes from experiencing ableism. Sometimes this is just personal, not wanting to be any rawer than we have to be. And sometimes we just can’t function on those days to be able to be in public. 

There’s a certain amount of comfort in the idea of being able to categorise disability, though. It helps those without disabilities separate ‘us’ from ‘them’ because they don’t want to be us, and if something can happen silently, then maybe it can happen to them. It’s also easy to limit access requirements, both on a personal but also financial and effort level. But, as much as we all wish it were, it’s not that easy. 

I don’t like emails. To open an email, I have to have support workers and PRN medication available. I hate watching emails, waiting for the one I expect to appear. I hate the anxiety of waiting for my email to be read, and without being able to be clear on the emotion behind it I don’t want to be misinterpreted. This is part of my social anxiety and, strangely enough, I prefer phone calls. Yet this is what is commonly an access requirement for other folks. Competing access requirements are an unfortunate reality. A ramp doesn’t help someone suffering from fatigue, making it further to walk. Some may have issues with bright lights due to migraines, but someone else may need them to be able to see. Some who are neurodivergent are chronically late while some get stuck in waiting mode. There are those with hearing difficulties who don’t know Auslan (hi nanna). Fidget spinners do nothing for my anxiety or hyperactivity, but I think my brother might be using his right now. 

Yet a simple wheelchair icon is given to symbolise access is available when access requirements aren’t universal. Hell, sometimes they even put those when it’s not entirely wheelchair accessible, such as bathrooms. 

When shopping for jeans you never know who the base model is, but we can make steps towards making things more accessible by acknowledging that it isn’t a one size fits all situation and that there are nuances. That putting a wheelchair sticker says nothing about those with other physical or psychological requirements. By listing how one has made space accessible, it gives agency to the individual as to whether that size fits them. Not running an ‘accessible’ night as though access is a singular thing. Opening up who your intended audience is by giving space to talk and listening to the feedback. 

We’re more than numbers or sizes, but also, we are numbers – large numbers not catered to. Disabled people have done their part, screaming into the void about access requirements. It’s now time to listen.

About the author

Ferris Knight is a queer and disabled writer, producer and advocate from Melbourne, Australia represented by Champion Health Agency. Ferris mainly writes about their lived experiences with mental and physical health conditions, as well as queer politics, poetry and fiction. They have also worked with organisations such as Arts Access Victoria, The Dax Centre and Women with Disabilities Victoria. In 2019 they produced their first Melbourne Fringe Festival show LEtGO of Stigma, walking 80 metres across Lego to talk about living with hidden pain and the resilience of those with mental illnesses. In 2020 they were a part of the anthology Closet Cases: Queers on What We Wear from Et Alia Press, writing about sexual harassment.