I’m stuck between sadness and anger. Sadness because people who acquire a disability or terminal illness sometimes (or perhaps often) seriously consider committing suicide; anger because there is a growing number of folks encouraging them to do so.

It is certainly a trend. Spanish director Alejandro Amenábar’s 2004 film “The Sea Inside,” which I admit I’ve never seen, tells the true story of a ship mechanic turned quadriplegic who campaigns for the legalization of assisted suicide and when he doesn’t succeed, kills himself with cyanide. You know, because who would want to be quadriplegic and still live? That same year, the Oscar’s Best Picture, Million Dollar Baby, seemed to tell us that when a person is faced with paralysis, society’s aversion to suicide should become null. If quadriplegia is terrible, who could reasonably imagine living with paralysis?

If you get a chance to watch Pratchett’s documentary, don’t let the pro-assisted suicide language fool you. They’ll use words like “choice.” They make it look like they are not arguing life is worthless with a severe disability or illness. They say it can be worth it, that it’s all about the individual’s choice, all about whether life is worth it to that individual. But to let an individual make that choice instead of stopping them or trying to stop them is to agree that the choice is a valid one. And they, the pro-assisted suicide advocates, only consider it valid in the case of disability or illness. Indeed, that’s why they attempt to legitimize legalization of assisted suicide by assuring there would have to be some sort of “safeguards” to protect against rampant, non-justified suicides, as opposed to suicides that are justified, that is, the suicides committed by cripples.

Another word is “dignified,” indicated by the very name (Dignitas) of the Swiss institution that legally helps people commit suicide. “To live with dignity – to die with dignity” is the slogan of this non-profit suicide clinic. It may sound good, brave even. But it’s obvious to nearly all disabled people (at least those who blog) that the slogan implies you cannot live with dignity with a disability or illness. Simple as that; don’t let them explain it away as if it’s not clearly implied.

Another aspect of the documentary that struck me was the quite normal quality of the featured Dignitas’ clients’ disabilities. As I’ve noted before, normal doesn’t mean good or healthy, so I don’t mean to say the Dignitas clients were being wimpy. However, they suffer from maladies like motor neurone disease and MS. Those are some of the worst illnesses, and I don’t blame the clients for wanting to die. But many people have these diseases and keep on living with the emotional and physical support of their families. You would think assisted suicide, if it were morally acceptable, would only be acceptable in the most severe cases of excruciating pain.  Peter Smedley, the man in the documentary with MND, was arguably healthier at the moment right before his death than I am, even though the progression of his disease would eventually have taken an uglier course. Stephen Hawking’s MND has taken that course for 50 long years. Should he have considered killing himself a long time ago? Pro-assisted suicide advocates would have said, “Yes, as long as it is his decision,” never expecting him to have lived this long or better yet to have continued so well in his work.

Let’s think about the “safeguards” mentioned earlier. Certainly, not all should have access to assisted suicide, so the death advocates say. If a man with MS or MND can legitimately commit suicide, can a man with spinal muscular atrophy or muscular dystrophy do the same? If Terry Pratchett can commit suicide because he’s losing his mental capacity to Alzheimer’s disease, what other types of mental illness onset should be acceptable reasons for killing yourself?

In making those decisions, we would be officially passing judgment on the worthiness of all disabled people’s lives. We would be saying that, if you have SMA, feel free to kill yourself; you have good reason to. If you will soon suffer from mental retardation, feel free to hurry up and end your life while you can still give informed consent. You don’t have to, but you can.

One day earlier this week I suddenly had this feeling. I felt… ready. I felt like I finally knew enough to call myself a web designer and start doing something about it. I don’t know why it took that long, but it just did. In case you missed it, I started a blog about month ago that is meant to journal my progress in creating Spinning Wheel Studios. While I unfortunately still can’t give out too many details, suffice it to say that Spinning Wheel Studios is my diabolical plan to be a web designer, make some money, and not lose the precious disability benefits that I receive that actually make it possible for me to work.

I’ve written before about how well intended government policies fail at enabling and motivating people with disabilities to work. The thing is, people with disabilities are good workers. They’re smart. They’re creative. They have to be creative. It’s how they get by. Someone told me the other day, people with disabilities aren’t anything if they are not creative. Of course, I’m not talking about artistic creative or design creative, necessarily. I’m talking about problem solving creative (which, if you want to be all hip and cool, is what design is really all about). Whatever the case, I know now that I cannot work for a big bureaucracy doing a monotonous job while trying to stay under a certain salary limit so as not to lose my benefits. I didn’t graduate from the MBA program at Mississippi State to start a career which I know can never progress past a certain point. I’m just too ambitious for that. What incentive is there for a person with a disability who needs benefits (e.g., caretakers) to work when they know they can’t make over a certain amount of money no matter how good their work is? My answer to that question is “not much.”

Not to mention that if Medicaid changes one of its regulations, I could find myself suddenly making too much money in my job. Or what if I was offered a promotion with a salary increase that would put me over my income limit? Do I decline it? No. I’m not going to put myself in a working environment where I might have to decline a raise because I would make too much money. That’s absolutely ridiculous. I would rather keep my benefits and just do charity work.

So that’s why I’m going to go it alone. I’ve talked with a lawyer, and there is a (legal) way that I can establish Spinning Wheel Studios such that I will not lose any benefits. Now that I have secured a method by which I can be a freelance web designer, and have subjectively “decided” that I am now “ready,” I have been a lot more inspired to get things off the ground.

That brings me to my latest project. This past week I’ve been reading a lot about WordPress themes. Actually, for the past two or three weeks I have been thinking about WordPress a lot in general. I know, I’m a nerd. It’s just that WordPress is becoming a very powerful and affordable (free) system on which to build websites. Of course, just about anyone who knows anything about WordPress already knows this. But for the past year, WordPress sort of dropped off my radar as I was preoccupied learning other things. But now I’m bringing back attention to WordPress, specifically the new 3.0 upgrade and the concept of the theme framework. And so I have decided to build a premium theme for WordPress. I’ve built themes before, but this is going to be a bigger task. The idea is that the theme should be good enough to sell (that’s usually what a premium theme is). I haven’t totally decided whether or not I am going to sell it or just offer it for free. It’s really more of an experiment to figure out whether I am even capable of making a theme good enough to sell and if I would even like to do make themes on a more regular basis.

I should mention that there is some money to be made in the premium WordPress theme business. Some people have had great success by selling their WordPress themes on their own websites. Others have had success by selling their WordPress themes on a marketplace, where a percentage of each sale goes to the marketplace (usually a hefty chunk, 30 to 60 percent at one particular marketplace). I don’t have much of an audience so I don’t know if I could bring enough exposure to my theme on my own. If I do end up selling the theme, I will probably go with the marketplace option just because of the exposure. But you never know. I might be all hip and cool and support open source and the WordPress community by releasing the theme for free (as in freedom and price).

So my goal is to at least have a working version of the theme in two weeks. That is, Friday, August 27, 2010. On that day, I plan to install the theme here at “I hate stairs.” I am planning to keep a daily log of my progress at www.blakewatson.com. Honestly, I am somewhat of a procrastinator and if I can actually do this in two weeks, I will be proud of myself even if I don’t make any sales.

Cheer me on. Maybe I’ll give you a copy of the theme for free. :-)

SA should have disability group

http://media.www.reflector-online.com/media/storage/paper938/news/2009/02/17/Opinion/Sa.Should.Have.Disability.Group-3632850.shtml

The Student Association traditionally includes a cabinet position called Students with Disabilities Affairs (SDA). In recent years, SA presidential candidates have run on platforms that have included reducing the size of the cabinet. To achieve this, Students with Disabilities Affairs was combined with Student Health and Wellness (SHW). United Students, a student organization made up of students with disabilities on campus, has since proposed this was not an appropriate combination. This essay will explain why United Students members and friends disagree with the combination of SDA with SHW.

Students with disabilities share similar experiences, concerns and challenges. In the disability community, this is known as disability culture. Just as members of the Indian Student Association share a culture different than the majority of MSU students, students with disabilities also form a minority group on campus. This is the way students with disabilities see themselves. While having a disability does involve physical or mental impairments, people with disabilities see their way of life as the central characteristic of having a disability. Indeed, people with disabilities may have innumerably different impairments and conditions, but many find common ground in their culture.

Understanding how people with disabilities see themselves – as a minority group with its own culture – is important to understanding why they would not want disability concerns to be addressed under the banner of student health. As unintentional as it may be, the inclusion of disability programs under SHW seems to portray disability as a health issue more than a culture issue. As such, it seems to the members and friends of United Students that a combination of SDA with Minority Student Affairs would be a more appropriate combination.

Better still, the SA could keep the Students with Disabilities Affairs position. With the right person, this position has the potential to be very beneficial to the SA and the university. There are more than 200 students with disabilities at MSU. Pushing for accessible events and an accessible campus should be a priority of the SDA. It should plan creative awareness-building events that help bring down the social divides. Mississippi State University is known, even by its in-state competitors, as the state’s most accessible, disability-friendly university. Students have played a significant role in achieving that status. The SA should do now what it has done for many disabled students past: empower them.

This semester is my last. If I can get through my last seven hours, I will be graduating with an MBA in May. The choice is where I want to go after that. As it stands now, I see that I have two options. The first is to go back to Jackson and apply for a job at our Apple Retail Store or Cellular South, and live at home. The second is to get a job on campus at Mississippi State University and live in an apartment right next to campus. There are pros and cons to both.

My primary reason for staying on campus is my level of independence. It is much greater here on campus than it is at home. For example, I can leave my apartment anytime I want and go to the bookstore or library or the coffee shop—I’m connected by sidewalk. Although I could make more money in Jackson (well, the surrounding areas), I would lose my level of independence, which I have come to enjoy over the past six years.

Another reason to stay on campus is that my potential job would be in a Web-related field (Web Content Producer). I believe I would enjoy that more than an IT or sales job. I’ve applied for the job on campus, with no word back yet. If I were offered the job, I would have to do somewhat of a feasibility analysis to make sure I could get the required attendant care. Also in the mix is the idea of getting a Ph.D. If I work on campus, I can take six tuition-free hours a semester. That’s not a bad deal.

The only problem in my plan to stay on campus (actually it may be one of several) is that, at its core is the assumption that I would be offered the Web Content Producer job. So right now, I feel like everything is on hold. I imagine what will happen is that I won’t hear anything back for a while, and I’ll have to make a decision with incomplete information.

Thinking about it now, I guess there is a third option. There’s always the off chance that Vocational Rehabilitation would pay for me to get a PhD. I’m not really sure why, the taxpayers of Mississippi have already invested a lot in me. I almost can’t stomach requesting for even more.

To add to the uncertainty, I have a friend who uses a power wheelchair and has been trying to get into an accessible apartment for a while now. She has more or less been waiting for me to graduate. She jokes about me needing to go ahead and graduate and not stay around, but I’m not afraid of her evicting me any time soon. But I don’t think that I can live in this apartment unless I knew that she would be able to get another accessible apartment. Of course, I don’t know at this moment if I’m even going to be in this apartment on campus. Unless I’m a student, I must live off-campus (I think).

So this is the craziness that I am facing right now. It’s a free-for-all battle between my hopes, my wants, my potential, my opportunities, my disability, bureaucracy, and reality.

Ron Paul, his supporters, and like-minded individuals have gathered in Minneapolis today amidst the Republican National Convention to “rally” behind the idea of a free America. The Rally for the Republic has come at a crucial point in United States history. Many voters I know are students who are going to be voting for the first time. And they don’t know who to vote for. One candidate promises change, but proposes policies that furthers federal government control. The other candidate promises to not raise taxes, but plans to keep investing in an American empire all over the world, including a possible conflict with Iran.

Today, 10,000 people came together in Minneapolis to say “enough.” Those who could not be there, are with them in spirit… and watched the live video at Ron Paul’s Campaign For Liberty.

I was one of them.

As of only a few days ago, I knew not for which candidate I would vote. Today I am proud to say that my vote will not likely go to John McCain or Barack Obama. I have not yet decided whether I will vote for the Libertarian Party candidate or the Constitution Party candidate. Or who knows, I may write-in Ron Paul. But whoever it is will share my beliefs about the economy. I fear we are headed for a depression as bad or worse than the Great one.

Ron Paul has addressed problems with our economy (e.g. inflation). He has plans to cut federal spending by not letting the federal government overstep its boundaries, set forth in the Constitution. The government’s involvement in healthcare has helped to drive up medical costs while putting more red tape between doctors and their patients.

I’m tired of beurocracies. I’m tired of government waste.

I want an America that doesn’t rely on the government to fulfill all its wants and needs. Power should lie with the people.

I was inspired to read this book, which I actually bought last year, because my student organizations disability awareness event(s) are coming up in October. Had I known that this book would help me clarify my perception of disability and awareness of it, I would of read it the day I bought it.

Johnson begins the path to understanding by helping the reader “unlearn” the things he or she “knows” about disability awareness days—and disability in general. Johnson introduces a largely unknown, but not new, way of thinking about disability awareness. Her ideas are not the result of a mere “gut feeling.” In Disability Awareness, Johnson looks to civil rights movements in the past, research from universities, and insight from disability activists to shed light on disability, awareness of it, and how disability awareness events should be approached to achieve optimal results.

Johnson bases much, if not all, of her ideas on the social model of disability. Since I entered the disability blogosphere just two and a half months ago in June 2008, I have been trying to understand the social model of disability as opposed to the medical model.

The social model divides the term “disability” into two parts. There’s the impairment, which is the actual blindness, muscle weakness, paralysis, disease, or other loss of function. Then there’s the disability, which is the extent to which the person with the impairment is “disabled” due to society’s failure to accommodate him or her (e.g., no ramp onto a sidewalk). To better understand this idea, let’s look at a real-life example.

Before McCool Hall, a building on campus, was renovated and expanded, I had one completely accessible entrance. There was a level, automatic-by-motion-sensor door in the back of the building. Freeze. My impairment is my Spinal Muscular Atrophy. My disability was the fact that I could not enter in the front of the building because the fully accessible entrance was in the back of the building. Continue.

McCool Hall underwent renovation and expansion. The building expansion resulted in the once-accessible entrance being covered up by the add-on, which itself did not have an accessible entrance. In the days right after the building reopened for the new semester, there was no accessible entrance. I missed my first class. Freeze. My impairment? Still the same. My disability, however, had changed for the worse—I was not able to attend class because there were no accessible entrances to the building. While a handful of accessibility concerns remains, McCool is now more accessible (at least to people using wheelchairs) as it includes three accessible entrances.

Considering this social model of disability, Johnson helps the reader clarify and understand the goal of a disability awareness day. She provides tips on how to get the intended message to the target audience while avoiding any “unintended consequences.”

“Disability Awareness—Do It Right!” is a must-read for anyone involved in planning an effective disability awareness day that focuses on change. Thank you Mary Johnson. Thank you.

I’m going to do some market testing with a product idea that I hope will not destroy the readership this blog is suppose to serve. About a month ago, my brother and I stumbled upon an idea. It was funny. To us. Then we thought, “There’s millions of people like us.” Could we sell our idea? It was so crazy it just might work. We brainstormed for a couple of hours and came up with about fifteen to twenty funny, edgy lines about disability to be printed on t-shirts. We put them through our own critiques and narrowed the list to about nine. We want to pick about three to print, and then we’ll go from there.

So this is a good time for my disclaimer. It’s possible that some of our shirt ideas could be offensive to some people. We mean the best. Really. And a lot of these shirts could potentially be ice-breakers to help get past social barriers. But we want to know which ones will cause laughing-induced snorts and which ones would best be put to rest. So if one does offend you, let me know. If you can’t continue reading because you’re laughing to hard, wait a second, take a deep breath, and let me know which one was awesome.

Okay. Now that we’ve put that behind us, let us continue. I’m going to give these images title attributes, so I think screen readers will be okay. Someone let me know if I’m wrong there and need to type each caption in the text.

Since I’m a little biased, many of these shirts are meant for wheelchair users (although there is a good one for people who are blind). So I find it helpful to imagine an unsuspecting able-body person and a disabled person (probably in a wheelchair) approaching each other on the sidewalk. The disabled person is wearing a shirt that says:

Now you know where that silly blog name came from. :-)

Great t-shirt ideas? Or greatest t-shirt ideas? Let me know in the comments, would ya?

I’m receiving insurance and healthcare benefits through Medicaid. While there is at least one Medicaid program that would allow me to earn a moderate salary, all Medicaid programs I have found out about share one financially damaging caveat. I can only have $2000 in savings (more accurately, resources, which include savings, property besides home, extra vehicles, etc.). Furthermore, I was told by a Social Security employee that Medicaid’s policies change from year to year, and I could possibly find myself suddenly uneligible. So there I would be, with only $2000 in savings and no health insurance. And if I were to get a raise or promotion, I might be put over the salary cap.

It is possible that if I had a high enough salary, I could pay my attendants out of pocket. And I may be able to get insurance through my job. The problem is that it takes about sixteen hours of attendant care per day if I were to live completely independently (as I do in college). If I stayed at home, I would need four to eight hours a day. The expenses add up. How can I pay an attendant a decent wage when I may be only making a decent wage myself?

The problem is that the same support I need to get through college, I will need when I get a job. But the programs I rely on now either cease after school or will limit my career opportunities. There’s no transition. Not being able to move forward, should I simply stay unemployed and continue living with full Medicaid benefits?

I believe the solution lies in a compromise of transition. A program by which people with disabilities can work without financial caps, giving them full access to any career opportunities. But it could also minimize the cost of benefits the state would provide. Here’s how it would work. Let’s assume I get a job and I am able to get insurance through my employer. I would have a counselor who determines how many hours of assistance I need (a counselor would also be helpful for making sure people don’t abuse the system). Then, the counselor would take my yearly (or monthly) income and run it through a formula that would result in the amount of financial assistance I would get. It would be assumed that I could personally cover the rest. That’s it. Simple.

It’s a win-win. I get to work and take advantage of any career opportunities, and the state will save money. I would be paying taxes and covering some or most of my attendant costs.

If only I could imagine this program into existance.