Foster Care Training

To understand ableism, we must recognize how a profit-based, and in the case of the US, capitalist society is structured to favor able people. Able privilege includes but is not limited to accessibility, language choice, microaggressions, and lack of knowledge, all of which are currently parts of everyday life. Common words like ‘lame,’ ‘insane,’ ‘crazy,’ and ‘idiot’ have roots in medicine and a history of discriminatory use about people with disabilities. This reinforces the idea of disability as a detriment. There are deep historical ties between colonization, revenue, and the devaluing of people with disabilities as ‘burdens’ on a system or as unable to contribute to society. In addition, the lack of understanding, empathy, and support for people with disabilities is compounded by race and age and other social identities. Creating a more equitable and just world begins with us examining our own value systems as well as how we’ve been socialized to uphold ableism and other systems of oppression. During this workshop, participants will review the cycle of oppression with a focus on ableism as a construct of colonialist capitalism. Through group process, experiential activity, lecture, and reflection, attendees will be supported in learning the history, construction, and institutionalization of ableism while also exploring their early learnings and socialization within a larger system of oppression. We will also begin to recognize and examine how unlearning to perpetuate and collude with ableism allows for the people with disabilities in our lives and for our communities as a whole to flourish.