3/23/06
CITY LIMITS

[Heading] We've Got Issues
[Subheading] Sound Off

This week, a couple of Scene writers vent their spleens, raise their brows or clap their hands about recent Nashville events.

[Headline] Takin' it to the streets

At 11:45 Tuesday morning, as we walked down Third Avenue on the way to hear Al Gore lecture some Rotarians, a massive line of people riding scooters, sitting in wheelchairs and sporting seeing-eye dogs took over the streets. They bellowed chants in a cold, driving rain: "What do we want? Freedom! When do we want it? Now!" And "Our homes, not nursing homes!"

Little did we know that long after lunchtime and well into evening, handicapped people would be blocking intersections and snarling traffic all around the state capitol. Frustrated government employees engaged in shouting matches with poncho-wearing protestors. "You're trapped—adapt!" a protesting man with a bullhorn yelled.

American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today (ADAPT), the national group that led the protest, took an issue no one talks about and turned it into a two-day event that dominated news coverage. Before Monday, the only Nashvillians who had thought anything about health care for the disabled were people who had personal experiences with it. Now, it's a political issue. There's nothing like having someone in a wheelchair show you what confinement feels like to build a little reflective empathy. (Unless you're Phil Bredesen, in which case you just scold them.)

There's a time and a place for direct action, and there's a difference between making a point and needlessly disrupting people's lives. But this is a group of pissed-off people who the rest of us would just as soon pretend don't exist. After all, we quickly avert our eyes from disabled folks on a daily basis, and its not like these people can stand up to meet our gaze or get our attention. Who could begrudge their provocative—though peaceful—tactics? Sometimes you've got to block some traffic to be heard. --John Spragens

Aangemaakt op

dinsdag 23 juli 2013

Geplaatst op

zaterdag 5 december 2020

Albums

• Nashville - Free Our People Hearings, March 2006

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Canon

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Canon EOS 40D

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2013:07:23 14:38:44

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f/11.0