Podcast: Download
Show Summary:
(Transcript Below)
Dr. Amy Kavanagh was fed up with the grabbing, pushing, polling from the cited community when she adventured out into the public sphere. All to knowing that the adventure itself was challenging in it’s own right, the unsolicited touching nearly kept her from stepping out of the house. Taking to her Twitter feed, Amy talked about the incidences and created the hashtag #JustAskDontGrab.
People started to respond and began using the hashtag #JustAskDontGrab and soon request came in for her to speak on radio and television shows. Meanwhile, her Twitter feed blew up with responses, requests and others chiming in and using #JustAskDontGrab.
Amy is quite passionate about her message and shares what led up to the #JustAskDontGrab campaign. Amy wants the message to be a tool and an opening for conversation on how to help someone who may appear to need help by asking and not just doing what they think is best.
Join Dr. Amy Kavanagh and Jeff Thompson as they sit down in the Blind Abilities Studio to bring more awareness, education and a teaching moment to the hashtag #JustAskDontGrab.
Stay tuned for the next episode in this 3-part series with Amy Kavanagh and her introduction to the white cane and getting on the list at GuideDogs.UK. And the 3rd in this series on Amy’s journey and revolations when she accepted her blindness.
You can follow Amy on Twitter @BlondeHistorianand follow her blog, Cane Adventureson the web.
A very big Thank You to Chee Chau for your beautiful music!
Thanks for listening!
You can follow us on Twitter @BlindAbilities
On the web at www.BlindAbilities.com
Send us an email
Get the Free Blind Abilities App on the App Store.
Get the Free blind Abilities App on the Google Play Store
Full Transcript:
Just Ask Don’t Grab – Meet Dr. Amy Kavanagh, Blogger, Activist, and Volunteer with a Message – #JustAskDontGrab
Amy Kavanaugh:
We deserve the right to decide who touches us.
Jeff Thompson:
Dr. Amy Kavanaugh.
Amy Kavanaugh:
The message is really simple, just ask, don’t grab us.
Jeff Thompson:
Bringing awareness, education, and teaching.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Yes, we need to talk about the serious side of it and the impact on well-being, but we also need to tell people what to do. They don’t know what to do. That’s why they’re doing it. That’s why they grab.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Bridging the message and the conversation into the sighted community.
Amy Kavanaugh:
By giving people a route in to talk to people, making it pleasant for them is going to approve our experience and our inclusion in the world.
Jeff Thompson:
A huge message in just four words.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Hashtag, just ask, don’t grab.
Jeff Thompson:
Welcome to Blind Abilities, I’m Jeff Thompson. Today we’re talking to Dr. Amy Kavanaugh . She’s a blogger, an activist, a volunteer, and she started campaign that has lit up around the world, hashtag, just ask, don’t grab. We hope you enjoy the first part of this three-part series on Dr. Amy Kavanaugh titled, “Just ask, don’t grab.” Stay tuned for the second part of this three-part series where Dr. Amy Kavanaugh talks about accepting using a cane and getting onto the guide dog UK waiting list. Then the third part in this three-part series on Dr. Amy Kavanaugh , her journey, and the revolutionary changes that accepting your blindness can bring. We hope you enjoy. For more podcasts with the blindness perspective, be sure to check us out on the web at www.blindabilities.com. On Twitter @BlindAbilities and download the free Blind Abilities App from the App Store and the Google Play store. Check out the blind abilities skill on your Amazon devices. Without further ado, I’d like to welcome Dr. Amy Kavanaugh .
Amy, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy day and coming onto Blind Abilities. How are you doing Amy?
Amy Kavanaugh:
I’m very well. I’ve just been having a snack. I was a little packaged. I’ve been so busy today I didn’t have lunch yet.
Jeff Thompson:
Well you go ahead and eat. We’ll do the interview between chews. Could you tell our listeners a little bit about your campaign and I’ll say it, “Just ask, don’t grab.”
Amy Kavanaugh:
The campaign we sort of an accident. I love my Twitter and I’d used it for a few years. My previous life I was an academic and I used to use it for a lot of academic networking. I became a [inaudible 00:02:30] cane user a year ago, exactly a year ago. I loved it, I loved the independence it gave me, but I had this downside that was I got touched a lot, every day by strangers. I was really surprised, and I started to share it on social media, I said, “You know, people keep grabbing me, for want of a better word.” Loads of people came back to me and they said, “Yeah, me too. I’m blind. I use a wheelchair. I have an assistance dog. I use a walker. I have a walking stick. I get grabbed. I get pushed. I get pulled.” I was like, “This is not just me. This is happening to disabled people, not only all over the UK, but all over the world.” Lots of people in America, Australia, Germany, France, everyone was saying, “Yep, this is part of my lived existence.”
Amy Kavanaugh:
I thought this isn’t on, this isn’t okay. We deserve the right to decide who touches us. I sort of came up with the hashtag kind of jokingly, I said to someone, “The message is really simple, just ask, don’t grab us,” so the hashtag was born, and I started using it, tracking every time I had an incident of the grabbing, or the pushing, or the pulling. I tweeted it with the hashtag. People picked it up, they ran with it. They used it when they had incidents, and gradually it started to get more and more attention and some media attention. About two months later, I now don’t have time for lunch.
Jeff Thompson:
I read that it even took to the streets. People are posting stuff and it’s getting a lot of awareness.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Yes, it is. This morning I was doing some filming with a street artist and activist called, “Dr. D,” he’s slightly anonymous, because he does do street art and he doesn’t want to get told off. I did a radio interview, I recorded it a while ago and it was broadcast on BBC Radio [inaudible 00:04:32] in the UK on Tuesday evening as part of a program they have, which is specifically for people with visual impairment. It’s called “In Touch.” When it was broadcast, he told me he was driving in his car, just had the radio on, he was off to pick up his kids from scout group and heard the interview and apparently, he had his hand on the steering wheel, and then was writing the hashtag on his hand as well. Not the safest driving, I think. Not that I know much about driving anyway.
Jeff Thompson:
That’s kind of a form of texting isn’t it?
Amy Kavanaugh:
A little bit. He searched the hashtag, he found me on Twitter. He sent me a message on Tuesday evening. I was in the middle of my women’s group pop quiz and he was like, “I want to do this street art for you.” I replied on Twitter and said, “That would be amazing.” I looked at what he did, and he said, “Where do you want me to put it?” And I said, “Well, these are the big train stations, public transport areas that I use. It’d be great to have some around there.” Then by Wednesday mid-morning, these chalk stencil messages were all over the pavements in London. Then this morning, another news channel picked it up and we did an interview, Dr. D the artist, and myself, did an interview all about the campaign and all about what he does. Really nice guy, it was just saying, this is a great way to raise awareness of a good cause. He does lots of different sort of bits of this art activism as well as running a business through it.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Just a really nice guy and wanted to make a difference and saw the idea of having it on the street, on the pavement, or sidewalk, right in front of a train station entrance, or right by a big road junction. It was perfect, because as people as they’re walking, they’re going to see this message, which reads, “Want to help a disabled passenger? Hashtag, just ask don’t grab.” They’re going to be intrigued by it. I saw it today, he did one today for the camera. The minute he put it down, people were looking at it, people were stopping, people were taking photographs. He said, “Actually, that’s the funny thing. This has come off social media as the reason he’s done it.” He said, “The way that it will actually spread is that people will get back on social media, that they’ve seen this thing in the physical real world, it’s been taken to the streets, and re-share it.” It’s kind of like a cool circle that way.
Jeff Thompson:
Oh yeah. It’s spreading across the United States too, so that art and your message, the hashtag just ask, don’t grab, it’s really something that digs in deep with people who have become blind or are blind or visually impaired, because every one experiences it. That grab, that sudden jerk to your arm or something like they’re going to grab you like a sack of potatoes and do what they think is best for you. How did you get to that point? You’ve made it all the way downtown, you’ve made it all the way to the point of your destination. Where was this person when you left your home, you know?
Amy Kavanaugh:
Somebody said to me, “Do they think we beamed down from outer space and are suddenly at the top of a set of stairs?” Like how do they think we got there? I think in all honesty, it’s been a difficult and it’s ridiculous and annoying to say this, but it’s been a difficult message to kind of get the tone right. Unfortunately, a lot of people who are non-disabled do see disabled people as incapable, vulnerable, unable to do things. We’re slapped with that label. They think in some ways that it’s their right to intervene and help us and that if we resist that we’re ungrateful. We’re rude. We’re not allowed to disagree with their intention to help us. Actually that’s a really damaging message in my opinion. That says to me, that disabled people don’t have the right to have consent. I think taking this a step sooner, considering the political situation, especially in America at this very moment, by saying a whole group of people don’t have the right to consent who touches them, is not okay. We all have a right to say who touches us, when, and what terms. It’s really important to me that people understand that this isn’t just about being nice or being kind. It’s also about respecting independence, respecting autonomy, and respecting people’s bodies.
Jeff Thompson:
That’s a great point, because so many people out there feel like they’re going to go get their Boy scout merit badge and pin it on their thing, like their good deed for the day.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Yeah. I’m sure you’ve had … people say it to you, don’t they? “Oh, you’re my good deed for the day.” You think, “Piss off.” How dare you. I’m a human being. I’m not sticking coins in a charity box. I think that is what is frustrating, but like I say, I’ve had to handle it carefully, because if you come off like that, angry, cross, either in the moment or on social media through the campaign, no one’s going to listen. They’re just going to be like, “Oh, it’s just this angry blind lady.” The real delicate handling of it has been, and the truth of it has been, giving people the instructions, the guidance, and the information to do what they want to do, right? They want to help and it’s educating, exactly. They want to help. That’s really important. We do need it occasionally. We’ve all had that moment where we’re in the train station, we’re in the supermarket, where we made a wrong turn, got disoriented and turned around, and we need someone to just let us take their arm, go across the road, find that cereal box in the supermarket, whatever you’re doing, do need some help.
Amy Kavanaugh:
It happened today. Today, I was going to meet the filming crew and I was at a road, I don’t know this road, I don’t use it very often. It’s not what we call a controlled crossing in the UK, meaning that it has the pedestrian button box, and the lights, and the walk, don’t walk signal that we have, and I can cross those independently buy myself. In the UK they either beep when you can cross safely, or they have underneath the button box, a little spinning cone that you can feel, and it turns when you can walk.
Amy Kavanaugh:
There’s a little button box normally. This road didn’t have one and I was waiting at the crossing, it was busy, it was unfamiliar. I was listening for the traffic, but I wasn’t feeling confident to be honest. A lovely chap comes up to me and says, would you like a hand crossing the road? I said, “Absolutely, yes please.” Took his arm, said, “Can I take your arm?” He said, “Yes.” He was great. He said, “Right, we’re going to go now. It’s safe. We’re walking across. Here we are on the other side.” Textbook perfect assistance. It made a huge difference. I was feeling anxious. I was a bit worried about crossing that road. He did it perfect and it was lovely. He asked, didn’t grab me, it was great.
Amy Kavanaugh:
I think for me; the message has been really strong in the campaign. This is not about discouraging people from offering help. That is the opposite of what I want to do. I want people to offer to give help. Do offer, do check in. “Are you okay? Do you need a hand? Can I offer some assistance?” That’s great, because it gives me, other disabled people the choice to say yes or no. What I’m discouraging is people just assuming, instantly intervening with their hands, pushing you across a road, pulling you into a train. Doing the opposite of their alleged intentions, which is helpful, actually can end up being disorienting, frightening, painful, and can injure people, damage their mobility equipment.
Amy Kavanaugh:
I’ve had countless wheelchair users tell me that their wheelchairs are not designed to be pushed by other people, right? They can move their wheelchair themselves. That’s the wheelchair they’ve chosen. That’s what they want to use. Often, these kind of wheelchairs, they have little small hidden handles that fold away and when people can’t find the handles that they expect on a wheelchair, what do they do? They push the person in the back. Can you imagine if you’re a wheelchair user who may have joint pain, who may not have the bodily integrity of someone who is able bodied, for example you have a spinal injury, and someone pushes you in the back. It’s so dangerous. When you push someone in a wheelchair in the back, you can push them out of the chair.
Amy Kavanaugh:
It’s just so frustrating and dangerous. When you cry out in pain, because someone’s grabbed you, frightened, and then you get the, “I was just trying to help.” Then you think, “Why didn’t you ask me? Why did you just jump in there and hurt me or frighten me and then when I’ve given you that truth of my response, you’re telling me off.” You’re saying that I’m being ungrateful when you never ever checked what I needed. It’s so annoying.
Jeff Thompson:
That’s kind of the public’s limited expectation that they have upon people that have disabilities. This was just something like you said, it started accidentally, you just voiced your opinion and you came up with the hashtag and boom. I bet you’ve had responses from a lot of people telling their personal stories as well.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Loads of responses, loads. Positive and negative. The best really. What helped launch the campaign was a British Paralympian, wheelchair racer, who is now a baroness, she’s in Our House of Lords, which is the second chamber of government in the UK. Her name is Tammy Gray Thompson. Some people in the US might have heard of her, she’s a pretty famous Paralympian. I think she’s like the third most decorated Paralympian in the UK. She followed me on Twitter and she responded, and she said, “Yep. That’s happened to me. People have pushed me out of my wheelchair. People have pushed me in the back, it’s really painful.”
Amy Kavanaugh:
Then the other issue that she raised was that people who do ask, and then you say, “Oh no, I’m fine,” and especially for a wheelchair user, they travel the world differently. The way that wheelchair users navigate spaces, inclines, and doors, is different to an able-bodied person for very obvious reasons. She says people just don’t listen. They don’t trust her to know, so they’ll say, “Oh, I’ll push you.” She says, “No thank you, I can manage myself,” and then they just go ahead and push her anyway. They ignore that resistance to the help and you do have to be firm. We’ve all done it, you have to be firm sometimes, because people will ignore you.
Amy Kavanaugh:
I’m sure as another visually impaired person, you know sometimes you’re like skipping off trying to escape people, because they’re chasing up on you to try and get you. I’ve been half way down a set of stairs, this is always my favorite, I’m sure lots of visually impaired blind people have experienced this one. Halfway down a set of stairs, right? You’re on the stairs, you’re using your cane, or your with your assistance dog, and you’re halfway down that set of stairs, and someone starts shrieking at you, “Stairs. There’s stairs. Let me help you on the stairs.” You’re like, “I’m on the stairs, guys. I’m on the stairs. I know about the stairs.” You could get halfway down a set of stairs and somebody would be like, “Oh heavens, where am I? What’s this? I’ve never experienced stairs in my 30 years of life.” Start yelling back at them, “Yeah, stairs stairs. Where’d these come from?” Then they start grabbing you and you’re on the stairs. You think, “Did you not think through how dangerous that is?” Stairs is where I get really frightened if I’m honest. That’s where I quite often can’t manage to be polite and I probably do a couple of swears.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Escalators in the UK, in the underground tube stations, the metro that we have, there are a lot of escalators. People really panic when they see a blind person going towards an escalator. As we know, they are very loud. You know when you’re near an escalator, because it’s clanking away. Like most people, who have had orientation and mobility training, I know how to use an escalator safely. One of the worst grabs I ever had, that was one of the early ones that got the hashtag going, was I was walking towards an escalator and a woman was like, “Do you need any help?” I said, “No, thank you,” but quite quickly, because I was focusing on feeling my cane, feeling the vibration, and crucially feeling for that edge of the step, that ridge in the metal that lets me know where the steps are going to part when they move.
Amy Kavanaugh:
She’s grabbing at me, while I’m trying to do this, as I’m stepping onto the moving escalator. I am pulling back and pulling back and saying, “Please can you not,” like that. She’s not listening to me and I feel myself start to totter, really wobble. I’ve not got a secure footing. I have no idea where the step is going to part. It is an incredibly steep high escalator. I thought, “I’m going to die. This woman’s going to push me down this escalator and I’m going to die.” I just screamed at her, “Get off me. Stop touching me. Get off me.” Luckily, she did, and I managed to grab the handrail and I was okay, but honestly the adrenaline that I had from that lasted for about a week.
Amy Kavanaugh:
People don’t realize the impact, do they? They don’t know. They don’t think how it feels to be suddenly dragged across a road into traffic. Sometimes I wish I could … although this is not an accurate representation of my vision, but it is for many people, I want to put a blind fold on them or simulation specs or whatever. Then touch them without telling them and drag them across the road, and be like, “How does that feel? When you were pulled into that road that you could not see? Then imagine being told off for not wanting that experience?” It’s unbelievable, frankly.
Jeff Thompson:
It is. Amy, this isn’t isolated to people out there who aren’t showing confidence, that have poor skills. It transitions, actually people with great skills, people with utmost confidence, people who are in their daily routine, doing the things they do. They’re at the stop light to cross the road and it can happen to them, so it’s not just a sector of the visually impaired or blind. It’s just because you’re wearing that scarlet letter B. They just see you and it happens.
Amy Kavanaugh:
I think that’s the thing that I worry about as well and certainly has been part of my journey. When I first started using my white cane. I’d barely been leaving the house for a year and was not confident. That’s why it had such a big impact on me, and because I was learning to use it, a few times a day, I just didn’t want to use it. Didn’t want to use the cane, even though I knew it was going to make me more safe. The jeopardy of the grab made me not want to use it. Even now, I feel like that. I feel like, “I can’t cope today. I haven’t got the energy to deal with this away. Maybe I’ll just bumble along. I probably won’t fall over.” When I say that to people, they’re so horrified that I feel like abandoning my mobility aid, just to avoid being grabbed. That I would actually put myself at more risk to avoid it is horrific.
Amy Kavanaugh:
That is the impact. That is what I want people to understand. That your behavior, you know there’s a particular route that I just avoid now. I have to change my life and my routes and where I go, because I don’t want to be grabbed. That person doesn’t realize the impact it can have on your confidence. I think about individuals with additional needs, who may have a learning disability as we say in the UK, who would be very lacking in confidence or the ability to communicate conventionally that they’re not consenting to that intervention and how traumatizing that can be for different parts of the disabled community. For example people who don’t communicate conventionally, who might be deaf or use sign language. They can’t necessarily communicate back in a way that people are open to. That they don’t want this interaction.
Amy Kavanaugh:
That opportunity to give and withdraw consent is completely denied to them by lots of people. That really bothers me. For all the people who are frail or feel confused, or feel anxious about going out and about, that if they’re being grabbed and manhandled, these actions are achieving, and this is what I keep saying, it’s achieving exactly the opposite of the intention. First defense, as I said, is, “I’m being kind. I’m being nice. I’m helping. I’m helping.” What you did is you just helped that disabled person stay at home today, because they were too frightened to go out. Or you really helped that person feel like they can’t use that bus route anymore because of how much people put their hands on them when they do it. That can be the impact and that’s why it’s serious.
Jeff Thompson:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). It’ just four words, hashtag, just ask, don’t grab. It’s a book, you could write a whole book on this.
Amy Kavanaugh:
I know, right? Blog post interviews, podcasts, TV segments, every little bit contributes, the message grows. The importance grows and that’s really important to me.
Jeff Thompson:
You’re putting it out there. Everyone’s gone through it. Everyone talks about. It’s always talks about, but you put it out there on social media and everyone’s grabbing onto that.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Yeah.
Jeff Thompson:
They’re doing the big ask from you, to talk more about it. I’m so glad that you came on Blind Abilities here to talk about it, because we’re going to get this out there. I hope more people start using the hashtag, just ask, don’t grab.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Me too. Please do use it. Share your experiences and the most important thing I will say is, share your experiences that are negative and positive. That’s what I do, because if you just complain, you’re not educating people. Yes, you’re raising awareness of the issue, yes, we need to talk about the serious side of it and the impact on wellbeing, but we also need to tell people what to do. They don’t know what to do, that’s why they’re doing it. That’s why they grab. We can go into all the complicated ways that disability is viewed in society, but probably don’t have time for that, but that impulse to grab is coming from a place of instinct to want to intervene for whatever agenda. Now, if people feel the urge to intervene, sometimes it’s not appropriate. However, we can make it the pleasant intervention possible by encouraging them to ask. Also, importantly, to start conversations with disabled people.
Jeff Thompson:
That’s great.
Amy Kavanaugh:
In the UK, one out of four adults, actively avoid conversations with disabled people. That was a survey done by a charity organization here. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the same in different parts of the world. Disability frightens people. They see it as different. They don’t understand it. They are so frightened of allegedly offending us, they won’t even talk to us. By giving people a route in to talk to people, and making it pleasant for them, is going to improv our experience and our inclusion in the world. When that person makes that offer to you, in that moment that you need it; when you’re feeling a bit worried or if you need a little hand with something, it can make a huge amount of difference. People who are feeling isolated, people who are struggling, that offer of help will mean the world.
Amy Kavanaugh:
It also means that the non-disabled person who’s gone into help with you can start a conversation, can have a positive experience, will definitely go and tell all their friends about it, because they may slightly problematically want to celebrate what a good job they did, and they might tweet about it and they might put it on Facebook. Then more people think, “Oh, disabled people aren’t these scary different things. They’re just humans like all of us.” Newsflash. It will make people feel more included. You know what else it helps with? You see a disabled person not able to access something, right? The ramp isn’t there at the station. The button’s in the wrong place. The announcements aren’t clear. There’s only visual information. The more people engage with assisting us, against barriers of inaccessibility, the more they notice those barriers. That’s when they can campaign. That’s when they can come join us fighting for those rights of access that we deserve.
Jeff Thompson:
That’s great. That’s a big, big, bigger picture to look at.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). It’s got wings, I’m telling you.
Jeff Thompson:
It has been. Creating hashtags is not your only occupation.
Amy Kavanaugh:
No. Though it feels like full-time at the moment.
Jeff Thompson:
Oh yeah, it’s great. You have a blog and I saw your “Cane Adventures” blog and I was reading on it, which is a great blog. I love your reading. I got hooked up on this one about guide dogs. Can you explain about the guide dog situation that you’re in-wait, aren’t you?
Amy Kavanaugh:
Yes, I’m on a waiting list. Cane Adventures is a blog, kind of developing it at the moment. I might need to do a little bit more writing for it, because I’ve been campaigning, and writing, and volunteering, and socializing, everything else. I have more blog posts that I’m going to add, but it’s a blog about mainly my experience of being a visually impaired person. The title comes from the hashtag that I used when I was first learning how to use my cane and started documenting how suddenly being a cane user, changed my experience of the world, and how people interact with me and how I interact with the world. A recent post that I did, which is really important to me actually to get that message out there, is all about my experience with Guide Dogs UK.
Jeff Thompson:
Great. They’ll be able to see that on part two of this three-part series. Amy, thank you so much for taking the time and sharing all your stories, your journeys, and your experiences with us on Blind Abilities. Thank you.
Amy Kavanaugh:
Thank you, Jeff.
Jeff Thompson:
It was such a great time meeting and talking to Dr. Amy Kavanaugh. Be sure to tune in for the next two parts of this series, this three-part series where Dr. Amy Kavanaugh will talk about her introduction to the cane, her signing up at Guide Dogs UK, and in part three, her journey and the revelations she found when she accepted her blindness. Be sure to check out her blog at caneadventures.blog. Follow her on Twitter @BlondeHistorian and remember, if you’re out in public and you get grabbed, pushed, or shoved, share it on Twitter and use the hashtag, just ask, don’t grab. A very special thanks goes out to Chee Chau for his beautiful music and you can follow Chee Chau on Twitter @LCheeChau. Once again, I want to thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed and until next time, bye-bye.
[Music] [Transition noise] -When we share
-What we see
-Through each other’s eyes…
[Multiple voices overlapping, in unison, to form a single sentence]
…We can then begin to bridge the gap between the limited expectations, and the realities of Blind Abilities.
Jeff Thompson:
For more podcasts with the blindness perspective, check us out on the web at www.blindabilities.com, on Twitter at Blind Abilities. Download our app from the App Store, Blind Abilities. That’s two words. Or send us an email at info@blindabilities.com. Thanks for listening.