What is ableism and how can we spot it in the Wedding Industry?
Recently I was asked some questions for a guest blog interview with the fabulous Ellie over at The Wedding Enthusiast. I’m really delighted to able to share it here. You can find the full blog on the Wedding Enthusiast Website.
Kathryn - How and why did you get into weddings?
For weddings particularly, there is just something magnificent and humbling about being involved in creating an experience, a moment, a memory for people who, despite all the cynicism and challenge in the world want to come together and make promises to each other. Humans have been marking important milestones by gathering people around them for thousands of years. I’m honoured to be part of that.
Being a celebrant is a fabulous job for someone like me, who could be described as professionally nosey - or as Mr Celebrant Kathryn puts it - someone who is ‘always making friends on the bus’. I love the process of creating a ceremony - getting to know a couple, creating a unique ceremony just for them, weaving everything they care about into it. Advocating for them sometimes if they are struggling to have their choices heard.
Your ethos is feelgood, fabulous, fully accessible weddings (love!) Why is this something you feel so strongly about?
Well the feelgood, fabulous bit is because I think all celebrant-led weddings can be exactly that. As they are so personalised and unique to each couple this gives every couple a real opportunity to have a ceremony which isn’t ‘the bit that happens before the fun, personal touches start’ It kicks off the day by being completely personal and fun. My ceremonies are created to make sure by the end, everyone is feeling fabulous.
The fully accessible bit is about making disabled couples who are planning a wedding more visible. It could be one or both people consider themselves disabled). Shock horror! disabled people have relationships, fall in love and get married or have a civil partnership.
In my experience, some of the ‘standard’ wedding expectations, traditions and ‘should-haves’ actually create barriers for people planning weddings if either (or both) of them consider themselves disabled, have a physical or sensory impairment, disability, long-term health condition, are neurodiverse, or struggle with their mental health. Here’s the thing - my view is that no one should ever feel they have to compromise their access, inclusion, psychological safety, comfort or empowerment on any day. EVER. Least of all their wedding day!
The beauty of a humanist celebrant-led wedding is that they are completely flexible, none of those ‘should haves’ need to apply. I work with couples to make sure that their wedding ceremony is fully accessible to them.
A light has started to be shone on the wedding industry as a whole, rightly so, around diversity and the lack thereof. The lack of visibility, representation and acknowledgement of disabled people, couples and suppliers in the industry was noticeable to me when we were wedding planning and has noticeably not improved now, that I’m a supplier years later. (It’s, of course, important to note that not all impairments are visible)
On top of the lack of representation, ableism is still prevalent in the wedding industry - not by all suppliers of course - but I have both experienced myself and spoken to engaged couples who have experienced horrific treatment from individual suppliers when it becomes evident they are disabled. There is too prevalent an attitude that the Disabled Person can’t expect a fun, beautiful experience and should just be grateful for what they can get. There are equally lots of suppliers and wedding businesses who would never be actively ableist, who at the same time don’t feel able or confident to proactively reach out or be inclusive, being ‘open to everyone’ isn’t enough, there’s no point being open if we think we’re not invited to the party.
I can’t change the industry as a whole, but I can make sure my business is proactively inclusive to anyone with any access requirements or additional needs. My background in inclusion means I’m highly skilled at this, though the couple or person involved will always be the expert in their own experience and needs.
I should reiterate that the flexibility of a celebrant-led ceremony means they are a perfect fit for every couple and I create ceremonies for lots of couples, not just those who identify as disabled!
Can you tell us a bit more about ableist language, and the effects it has?
Well I suppose we need to start with what is Ableism… One definition (from Scope) is: “Ableism is discrimination against disabled people in favour of non-disabled people.”
Essentially, at its heart, ableism is rooted in the assumption that disabled people require and want ‘fixing’ or ‘normalising’ (*shudder*) so that we can access the world ‘as is’ instead of seeking to flex society and remove barriers that prevent inclusion.
I think it’s really interesting and quite frankly terrifying how much ableist language is used in a really mainstream way. Very few people (I hope) would say openly ‘Ha! that TV show was so bad it was like someone with cerebral palsy!’ But they may not think anything of calling that same TV show ‘lame’.
How often have you heard the phrase ‘no one in their right mind’, heard someone refer to an idea as ‘dumb’ or heard someone refer to someone as a ‘little OCD’. Similarly, I have heard a lot of people describe what we lived through in 2020 as ‘crazy’, but I doubt people would openly say 2020 was ‘as bad as someone struggling with their mental health’. They’re more likely wanting to say it was ‘overwhelmingly unusual and challenging’ which has no connotation to the disabled community.
This kind of language ultimately derives from the idea that being disabled/having a disability or long-term health condition is inherently a ‘bad thing’ that we are somehow ‘less-than’ and need or want(!) to be ‘fixed’ or made whole. I’m in no way pretending that some people wouldn’t sometimes want their impairment or disability to be gone. At the same time, that’s usually a result of the systemic barriers that exist. If we focussed on removing those barriers instead and saw disabled people as equal then things would be different.
With that in mind, what should we all be aware of with our words going forward?
Language is ever-changing but it’s really just about being mindful of the words we choose and the impact they have. I absolutely know that some people may read this and think - oh I might say those words but that’s not my intention.
Intention is a tricky thing. Of course, it’s understandable that with so much of this language now being commonplace and mainstream these words may get used innocently enough. However, ‘meaning well’ cannot be a catch all excuse for not considering the impact we are having. Using these types of words, churning out ‘inspiration porn’ and expecting disabled people to be grateful for not being turned away are constant microaggressions.
Using ableist language and not meaning it is no more acceptable than using racist language but ‘meaning well’ - which even as I type it, sounds so awful that I think highlights the issue.
We can and should interrogate the language we choose, what does that word actually mean, what is it rooted in? We’ll all continue to make mistakes but we should call each other in, graciously and receive that call gratefully.
Do you have any suggestions or starting points for how we can empower disabled people not only with our words, but in the industry at large as well?
Well as a proudly Disabled Person myself, from my perspective, it comes down to representation and proactively seeking to make changes and identify barriers that do exist. These barriers can be physical, environmental or attitudinal. It’s important for me to highlight my own privilege here. I’m a white, cis-het disabled person and as such will face far fewer barriers than anyone at any other intersection of identity.
We need to represent a diversity of disabled people in the wedding media in a way that recognises that many disabled people hook up, date, have sex fall in love, get married, have a civil partnership, choose not to get married and none of this is unusual and definitely none of it is inspirational! (or at least no more inspirational than anyone making a relationship successful). We also need to ensure that those representations are of the widest range of disabled people.
We need to reflect and represent that disabled people can, do and should work in the wedding industry as suppliers. It’s a fantastic industry to work in and the more perspectives that are part of it the better - and the more inclusive and representative it will become.
We need to make sure that when disabled people are accessing wedding services, they are receiving a service that is equitable to the one non-disabled couples receive, yes it might not be possible to remove every physical barrier in every situation, but treating people with dignity and looking for solutions that make people feel welcome and celebrated are always possible. No one should have to accept a wedding experience that makes them feel any less than fabulous.
