The Differences in Equality

The Differences in Equality

What is your feeling like when someone insults or discriminates against you? You

may dislike it or feel depressed or be angry. One thing for sure, you do not appreciate it.

You do not want this situation to happen any time. However, people with disabilities

often suffer from this problem. The word “disability” which we use to refer to them has a

negative meaning. Sometimes we do not intend to hurt or discriminate against people, but

the word itself has a negative impact on people with disabilities. This negative word does

not encourage people with disabilities to overcome their physical defects. It will make

them feel that they are useless and always have to depend on others for help. That seems

to shut out their opportunities to have a career in the society. There are still many traits

inside a person with a disability that we do not know. So, we should change our negative

attitude and negative language we use with disabilities people because they may have

more abilities than the language lead us to believe.

Our society consists of a huge number of disabled people. Texas council for

development disabilities found that about 49 million Americans or one out of five, that

have disabilities (1). People who have physical defects from accidents, mental health

diagnosis, or brain injury, they are known as people with disabilities. Our common sense

lead us to believe that these people have lesser ability to learn, understand, respond or

control themselves. From the negative word we refer to them, we devalue and disrespect

them as they are not equal to non-disabled people. The negative images portray them as

helpless and dependable on charity for care. So, we should use positive word every time

we refer or call people with disability in order to respect, inspire and motivate them to

become stronger.

Language is a reflection of how people see each other. So the words we use can