Claire Molloy (top) and Jeremy Bentham (bottom) |
An unknown deadly virus,
misinformation, fear and uncertainty about the future.
No, amazingly I’m not talking
about covid, but the AIDS crisis in the 1980s.
It’s LGBT+ History Month
and I’ve just watched Channel 4’s most
binged series of all time - It’s a Sin. It beautifully chronicles
the lives of gay friends living in London during the ’80s, with humour and
humanity at its very heart. It’s a rare series that is as full of love for its
colourful characters as it is sick with anger at the society that failed them.
If you are still to watch it, keep your box of tissues close to hand.
I remember this decade well
and the awful government AIDS adverts featuring an apocalyptic volcano erupting
under a darkened
sky and the words ‘Don’t die of ignorance’ chiselled onto a tombstone.
These ads were deliberately meant to strike fear into the hearts of the
nation, but they also fuelled prejudice and stigma in an already homophobic society.
I joined the NHS in the early 90s and my very
first job was working in a GUM sexual health clinic where one of the teams
I worked with supported people being tested for the virus. I remember very
caring and committed colleagues who were doing a good job, but you could still
feel a sense of judgment.
It’s interesting looking back 30 years later
and remembering that the main focus then in the service was on contact tracing
- a ‘track and trace’ style programme as we now have with covid. I remember
much less attention on the psychological impact of testing positive for HIV, which
would have been such an enormous and distressing thing.
It’s a Sin expertly depicts how shame, nurtured
by a homophobic society allows the virus to flourish and intensify the crisis. It was even labelled the “gay plague” and
this cast a large shadow on that community, meaning that many people
suffered in silence especially in their last days of life, as shown in the
series. Heart-breaking and hugely sad.
Fake news, false facts and conspiracy
theories weren’t invented recently. They ran riot with AIDS in the 80s.
It feels as if things have
thankfully moved on, but as with so many things we still have a way to go. I still see
some of the same prejudice and bias now, especially for the transgender
community as there is still such a lot of ignorance amongst us.
The theme for LGBT+
History Month is mind, body and spirit and it's an opportunity to increase the
visibility of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT+) people, their
history, their lives and their experiences. It’s so important we celebrate the
wonderful diversity of the human race, but critical that we reflect when we
have treated people poorly so we can change what we do in the future.
And still on the subject of excellent TV programmes and
highlighting prejudice, I was also hugely impacted by The Truth about
Disability Hate Crime.
This heart-wrenching BBC documentary tells
harrowing testimonies from a group of disabled people who face name-calling,
physical violence and intimidation in their daily lives.
It was distressing and depressing to hear their stories,
from a wheelchair-bound former nurse being abused relentlessly after she was
accused of being a benefits cheat to a blind woman
made homeless after becoming a 'target' for muggings in the local
area. We also heard from Andrea who faced unprovoked verbal and physical
attacks as a result of her dwarfism. She said it was 'rare' for her to be
able to leave her home without some form of abuse and that, “every day when you
get dressed you don’t just have to put your clothes on, you have to put your
wrestling tights on as you have to prepare for a battle.” I can only imagine how exhausting and stressful
this must be.
The programme also featured a young man with autism who was left with suicidal
thoughts after being a victim of mindless brutal assaults. I was
shocked by the routine aggression and abuse they have to face and we clearly
need a widespread change in attitudes.
We launched our learning disability strategy
yesterday and this focuses on the way we support and see people with learning
disability in our society, and aims to maximise their potential. I’m therefore
so pleased that Jeremy Bentham, who heads up our learning disability services,
has kindly done a guest blog this week.
While disability is, undeniably, a personal issue, it
is also a societal one. We need changes in our society to allow everyone
to feel a valued part of it and to be the best they can be. We are all
different and we all have things that make us unique, but we all fundamentally
want to fit in. To have friends, to be loved, to be valued and to be able to
live our lives without feeling fear from others.
This is
all of our right and we need to stand back and
think about the sanctity of human life; and about the type of society needed to
protect everyone.
There is no greater disability in society
than the inability to see a person as more.
*****************************************************
Guest blog – Jeremy Bentham, learning disability directorate manager
It’s the early 90’s and having just secured
an ‘ology’ on the banks of the Mersey, I was on the lookout for employment.
As they do, an opportunity popped up through
a friend to work with three people with learning disabilities living together
in Middleton. The job brief was pretty straight forward, as a support worker I
was asked to get to know them and help them enjoy the things they enjoy.
Similar to many of our career pathways this
was the start of a road that wasn’t driven by ‘burning ambition’, it was simply
my gentle introduction to the lives of three men living on a back road in
Middy.
All three of these people had ambitions of
their own, which ranged from falling out of a club at 2am, finding friends
to getting a job. Throughout our time together and despite some persistent
challenges, these reasonable ambitions didn’t waiver.
Following a trial and failure, failure,
failure approach, we eventually shared the joy of rising for work at silly
o’clock and leaving the Carlton club at 2am using the escalator, also known
locally as ‘escalator to heaven’. It was really the small things that made a
difference in the end to their lives, the bouncer who knew queuing was anxiety
provoking and let us straight in, the patience of the bar staff, the friend who
knew how to listen and when to leave and the employer who didn’t mind a late
start (as long as the hours went in).
In comparison to the absolutely awful life
experiences these men had endured characterised by decades of
institutionalisation, isolation and abuse, the small inroads we made together
might seem insignificant. I like to think that these and others experiences
made a difference within that space and moment in time, however I can’t
honestly guarantee that they did in the long run. I can only really attest to
the impact meeting these people had on me.
Their resilience and refusal to compromise on
personal ambitions inspired me to see what else I could do, as a result I’m all
trained up and pretty much in the same job 30 years on. Sadly the Carlton has
now closed.
This month we launch our Pennine Care
learning disability plan. We have developed our plan from listening to people
with learning disabilities, colleagues, self-advocates and families.
To some our ambitions may seem modest,
however they reflect the modest ambition of most people with learning
disabilities to have an life experience free from stubborn inequalities. Our
plan is really about the whole of Pennine Care, not just the bits we might
usually think of when discussing how we support and care for people with a
learning disability.
Our plan needs momentum, as a starter for 10
it would be great if everyone, both corporate and clinical, took 5 mins to cast
an eye over the plan and consider ‘the small things that might make a
difference in the end’.
*****************************************************
Best wishes
Claire
You can follow me on Twitter @ClaireMolloy2
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