Make Them Go Away: Clint Eastwood, Christopher Reeve and the Case Against Disability Rights (Paperback)

by Mary Johnson (Author) "In the spring of 2000, actor Clint Eastwood took on the 10-year-old Americans with Disabilities Act..." (more)
Key Phrases: bad cripples, disability rights laws, accessible society, New York, Christopher Reeve, Supreme Court (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist
Imagine an African American's voting rights withheld until he or she proved 100 percent African American descent, or a woman having to sue her employer to get a women's restroom in the workplace. Outrageous as those scenarios seem, their like is commonplace in the lives of the disabled, Johnson says, because of widespread misinterpretation and misapplication of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). She points out numerous flaws in the law, beginning with its title (she prefers that of the British analog, the Disability Discrimination Act) and including the fact that it is enforceable only via lawsuit, putting rights seekers in an adversarial position, and that it contains an escape clause permitting noncompliance if accessibility causes a business "undue hardship." The disabled person's difficulties aren't, however, confined to the law, and the roots of conflict over disability rights reach deep into personal prejudices and national values. Bit-by-bit Johnson deconstructs arguments against disability rights from the likes of Clint Eastwood as well as more ordinary folk, and she constructs powerful reasons why we all benefit from inclusion. Donna Chavez
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"By exposing the case against disability rights . . . Johnson has improved the odds that we may take disability rights seriously." -- Mainstream magazine online

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Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: Advocado Press; 1 edition (January 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 097211890X
• ISBN-13: 978-0972118903
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #456,711 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book , November 9, 2004

By	General Pete (SC) - See all my reviews

Like all books regarding social activism it can come across as a little preachy but that is really not the point. Point is that the ADA is a useless bit of legislation and the entire act needs to be revisited and firmer classifications need to be established and keep in mind that this is person with a disability talking. The points raised in this book are totally valid, please read with an open mind before you judge it. I say that the issues are exactly the same as other equal rights movments of the past. Good job authors.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good book with some serious questions, September 29, 2005

By	Robin Orlowski "political activist" (United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I too personally have experienced what Mary Johnson documents in her well-researched work.

Social antipathy against people with disabilities is so mainstreamed in America that progressive activists who rush to condemn other forms of bigotry, engage in bigotry against people with disabilities. We are time and/or money consuming entities that are still honestly not perceived as contributing anything to society let alone being recognized as social equals.

This inequality then leads people to interpret the ADA as a burden on them as opposed to considering the greater burdens which unjust discrimination places on both the recipient and the nation.

However, I have one minor suggestion to ensure that this book gets to those most needing to read it.

Change the title to more accurately reflect that this book is a critique of how society handles disability instead of something itself which opposes the disability rights movement. Because the disability rights movement is acknowledged as seeking liberation of stereotypical attitudes and laws, it aids Mary Johnson's case.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I Won't Go Away!, November 15, 2006

By	Tysyacha Dvukh (Decatur, IL) - See all my reviews

Quick! Who made the following comment:

"I think it's important to realize that treating all disabled
people as equal--with equal rights and responsibilities--is absurd.
Many of the patients that come through any rehab hospital are there
because of their own ignorance, negligence, stupidity or criminal activities."

A member of a supremacist group? Nope. It was Dr. Kenneth Lefebre
at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago. How about this?

"The legal requirement that 'the handicapped' be 'mainstreamed'
is damaging to 'the normal child'."

That was written by Eileen Gardner, appointee to the Reagan
Education Department, in one of her policy papers.

One more, and this one is the real shocker because the
commentator has a disability herself:

"Deny as we may want to, at the point when a person can not be
totally independent physically from others, one is no longer
equal in body. I do not want to be treated equally. I can still
think, but for the life of me I can't think of a way to get rid
of the wheelchair. Therefore, I am not on the same ground I used
to be on. To me that makes my way not equal...How can we bury our
heads so deep and say we are equal to the able bodies around us?
We are not. That's why it is called a handicap, because it is."

Comments like these only bolster the viewpoint Mary Johnson is
fighting against in her perception-shattering book, "Make Them
Go Away: The Case Against Disability Rights". She argues that
people with disabilities are a minority just as women and people
of color are nowadays. Disability, she posits, is a social and
cultural idea, and not merely a "medical problem".

Because people are perceived to be disabled, they are perceived
by society to be unable, incapable of doing much for themselves
or others. Johnson theorizes that the case against disability
rights is strong right now because of this philosophy. It is
also strong because "a disabled person's role in society was
not to criticize it from a minority perspective--for they were
not a true minority--but to work at becoming normal, to be
rehabilitated if not cured."

That, and there have been several lawsuits about the ADA, or
Americans with Disabilities Act. Nobody likes lawsuits, so...

...no wonder most of society still thinks, "Make Them Go Away"!