Reflecting on July: Disability Pride Month
July is Disability Pride Month, a time to celebrate the strength and achievements of people with disabilities. This month also marks the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The ADA is a law that makes sure people with disabilities get treated fairly, no matter what. Disability Pride Month isn’t just about remembering the past. It’s also a time to think about what we can all do together to make things better for everyone in the future.
In 2010, Ann Magill was heading to a party. It was advertised as a celebration of the ADA. The event had music, food, and a presentation that explained the history of the disability rights movement. She expected a time of joy and togetherness, but she was disappointed. The party was held in a windowless basement at her local independent living center. They played the same pop songs over and over, served snacks from plastic wrappers, and the “presentation” was just a slideshow projected onto a brick wall. Ann was upset because it felt like people with disabilities were being ignored just like before the ADA was passed.
Several years later, Ann woke early in the morning and turned on her TV. What she saw shocked her. In Japan, an ex-caregiver broke into a residential home and killed 19 people. All of the victims had some form of disability. The person who did these crimes picked that day for a reason. It was July 26, 2016, the anniversary of the signing of the ADA.
By the time of the evening news in America, there was no mention of what had happened. Instead of honoring their struggles and victories that day, it seemed to Ann like their stories were forgotten all over again. So, she got to work on making all people with disabilities harder to ignore by making a Disability Pride Flag.
Ann’s first design was bright and included lots of colors to show how many different kinds of people are part of the disability community. She put zigzag lines in the middle to stand for the barriers people with disabilities deal with every day. The zigzag also looked like a lightning bolt, which was meant to show the strength and energy of people with disabilities. Ann shared her flag online and asked others what they thought about it.
Right away, people shared their thoughts. First, people with epilepsy told her the zigzag lines could trigger seizures, so she made the lines straight. Then people who are colorblind said it was hard to tell the red and green apart, so she separated them. Lastly, she made the whole design darker so it wouldn’t bother people who are sensitive to bright colors. Instead of downplaying their concerns, Ann listened and made changes so the flag would work for everyone. What they came up with together is this:
Every part of the flag has a special meaning. Each color on it stands for different parts of the disability community:
- Red for physical disabilities
- Gold for neurodiversity
- White for undiagnosed and invisible disabilities
- Blue for emotional and psychiatric disabilities
- Green for sensory disabilities
- Charcoal gray for mourning the victims of abuse, of ableism, and for those who were killed for/committed suicide because of their disability
The colored stripes begin at the top left corner. This is a spot on the flag called a “union”. The colors are borderless and also appear on the Olympic flag. All this is meant to show that the disability community is unified and global.
The gray background of the flag has another meaning, too. Since it goes all around the colored stripes, it stands for the isolation that people with disabilities sometimes feel. Ann wanted to make sure no one felt left out like this, so she made the flag free for everyone to use. This way, anyone can change it to fit what they need. According to Ann, “If I want this to represent the community, it has to belong to the community.”
But the Disability Pride Flag is more than cloth and color; it is a history that has been building on itself for a long time.
In 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote that all people have the right to life, freedom, and the pursuit of happiness. In the 1970s, people fighting for disability rights added that people with disabilities should have a say in decisions that affect them. The idea of “nothing about us without us” was important to how the ADA was created and passed in 1990. Years later, Ann Magill turned those words into action by designing a pride flag made by and for the disability community. When she was asked what Disability Pride Month means to her, she echoed the words of Jefferson, saying, “recognizing that you deserve happiness, even if you’re a marginalized person.”
This idea of happiness through working together is central to the disability rights movement. Because of Ann Magill and her commitment to collaboration, we have a flag that represents that. This July, Disability Rights Tennessee is proud to stand with our community and support everyone’s right to feel proud of who they are.
Happy Disability Pride Month!
This blog was written by Gabriel Tanguay, Disability Rights Tennessee’s Research Analyst. Gabriel holds a B.A. in International Studies from the University of Memphis, where he focused on systemic and interconnected global issues. When he’s not diving deep into a story to get to the heart of the matter, you’ll find him out in nature, reading a book, or making sure his lazy dog, Blitz, gets his steps in.