I had planned to write about the conclusions proposed by the Leveson Inquiry which had been commissioned by UK Prime Ministerf David Cameron to look into the culture, practices and ethics of the British press after the News of the World debacle.
When my neighbour lacks what is rightfully his or hers then I lack what is rightfully mine: my human dignity- Fr Joe Borg
The Leveson Report, published on November 29, showed that not all is well in the state of Newsland. Forty seven recommendations were put forward including the statutory underpinning of a system of self-regulation.
It has since been announced that at a breakfast summit in central London the editor of every significant English newspaper gave their assent to 40 of Leveson’s 47 recommendations.
This paves the way for the creation of an independent regulator with powers to levy fines of up to £1 million and the operating of a low-cost tribunal system to handle libel and privacy claims.
The editors, however, did not approve the setting up of a statutory body that would audit the work of the regulator. Although Leveson probed the British media practices, we could learn a lesson or two from his conclusions.
Last week I addressed a seminar organised by the National Commission People with a Disability on the occasion of its 25th anniversary so I will postpone comments on the Leveson Inquiry to a later date.
As was to be expected, during the seminar there were several references to the rights acquired by people with disability during the last 25 years. All this was right and fitting. But such talk makes me very uneasy. I am similarly uneasy, for example, with similar talk about what are described as women’s rights.
As soon as one uses such terms – women’s rights or the rights of people with disability – one tends to undermine one’s argument and potentially imperil one’s cause.
Such talk tends to turn these issues into issues of interest only to the minority. In one case the losers are women themselves. Ironically enough women, who are a numerical majority in the world’s population, are assigned minority status from the point of view of society’s power structures.
The debate on women’s rights tends to be pitched as a debate of greater interest to women as will benefit from the acquisition of such rights.
In the other case, mainly the debate about the rights of people with disability, the corollary is a debate that interests people with disability.
Such a way of thinking is totally fallacious. Disability issues, as well as women’s issues, are not and should not be issues just (or mainly) attracting sectarian interests. (The same can be said, for example, of immigrants and gays).
These are not minority issues but majority ones. Whenever in a society there is a group that is denied its rights, then it is the whole of society which is being denied such rights.
We are networked and entwined together. Our solidarity should be ontological not only, or mainly, tactical or political.
When my neighbour lacks what is rightfully his or hers, then I lack what is rightfully mine: my human dignity. I cannot enjoy to the full my human dignity if there is even one person – let alone a sizeable group – who is denied the enjoyment of its basic rights.
Whenever people with disability are treated like objects, viewed in a paternalistic way or looked at as people in need of compassion, then I am treated like an object, viewed paternalistically or deemed as someone who should be treated with compassion.
A society that emarginates or stultifies the development of any of its individual citizens is a dysfunctional society. It is like a society living on one lung only. A society which shuns minorities is like a garden that prides itself of just one flower. It becomes an impoverished and a monotonous society.
Society is a coalition of minorities. From time to time, it happens that a number of minorities find a unifying cause and they then become a majority. This happens during elections but more importantly also on the cultural and socio-economic dimension.
It is a pity that the resultant majority forgets that its roots are minoritarian and foolishly denies the rights of minorities that do not form part of the cultural majority then in existence.
The way forward is exactly the opposite; the role of every minority for the furthering of the welfare of the whole should be nourished. A society which negates the welfare of any of its parts, particularly its vulnerable members, is a cruel society which has lost its heart and its dignity. This is a society that undermines its very humanity.
The question we should be asking ourselves is not whether people with disability are respected enough that they have been given their rights. The basic question is whether our society respects itself enough that it jealously guards the rights of all the minorities that constitute it. A lot has been done.
Every positive evolution in society opens up new vistas and visions. Rights are dynamic not static. Our legislation is providing our society with the tools needed to respect itself by respecting people with disability.
Much more needs to be done particularly on the socio-cultural level as the mindset of most Maltese is still a paternalistic one. The victim syndrome characterised by the use of the word ‘miskin’ is the dominant one. A paradigmatic shift can be expedited only if more and more people with disability challenge the disabling circumstances created by society over and about the limitations imposed by their impairment.
During the seminar, a video was shown, showing the life story of several people with disability who managed to overcome these restrictions. They are not heroes and should not be treated as such.
Like the rest of us – the non-disabled or people with different abilities – they had to struggle and strive. I salute them all.
• “If I regarded my life from the point of view of the pessimist, I should be undone. I should seek in vain for the light that does not visit my eyes and the music that does not ring in my ears. I should beg night and day and never be satisfied. I should sit apart in awful solitude, a prey to fear and despair. But since I consider it a duty to myself and to others to be happy, I escape a misery worse than any physical deprivation,” –Helen Keller, the first deaf-blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.
joseph.borg@um.edu.mt