Crip's Column
View from my wheelchair - Victoria Brignell on life as a disabled person.
Physical challenges
- Posted by Victoria Brignell
- 05 April 2007
Being disabled hardly keeps many people from beating records, engaging in extreme sports and completing other equally notable feats
Life’s a funny old business, isn’t it? Consider the following paradox. As my friends will testify, I am a complete coward. The most dangerous activities I carried out during my former able-bodied existence were playing hopscotch and messing around with Yo-Yos. I never did anything out of the ordinary which could potentially have jeopardised my physical well-being. Nevertheless, here I am at the age of 30, one of those wheelchair-using crips who drinks through bendy straws because I can’t hold cups. In contrast, Top Gear presenter Richard “the hamster” Hammond gets into a jet-powered car, has a dramatic crash at 300 miles per hour and sustains a serious head injury, yet six months later he’s walking around seemingly completely unscathed. I just love the irony of this.
Although I have absolutely no intention of undertaking any task more daring in my life than travelling along the A40 to work, there are numerous disabled people out there who are keen to indulge in extreme physical challenges. Indeed, there are plenty of disabled people around who are bold/daft enough to share Hammond’s passion for speed.
The current holder of the world land speed record for blind people (yes, there is such a thing) is Mike Newman from Greater Manchester. He drove at 167 mph in 2005 at Elvington Airfield near York, which incidentally is where Hammond’s famous accident took place. Mr Newman had hoped to break the 200 mph barrier but was thwarted as he ran out of room on the track. For those of you who are interested in cars (personally my eyes glaze over at the first mention of engine sizes and gear boxes), Mr Newman drove a specially-made 507hp BMW M5.
Another world blind speed record breaker is Billy “The Whizz” Baxter, who broke the blind land speed motorbike record in 2003. With two guiding bikers riding either side of him and giving him directions through a three-way communications system, he reached 165 mph down the runway at Boscombe Down Airfield in Wiltshire.
Some disabled people aren’t content with racing on dry land and decide that only speeding on snow will suffice. In November, Kevin Alderton from Kent set the world’s first indoor blind skiing speed record. He reached a speed of 56 mph at an indoor slope in Holland. He had already achieved the outdoor skiing world record for a blind person with a speed of 100 mph. Mr Alderton skis with the assistance of a guide who gives him commands via a radio link.
When disabled people aren’t trying to come down mountains as quickly as possible, they’re trying to get up them the hard way. Norman Croucher has two artificial legs and has climbed more than 80 mountains all over the world, including the Eiger and Mont Blanc. His false legs are made of aluminum with plastic “feet” that enable him to fit mountain boots or crampons. For abseiling he relies on his knees protected by padding because if the artificial legs don’t have weight above they can easily fold up.
And if high-speed driving, skiing and mountain climbing don’t appeal, there’s always the attraction of water. Graham Hicks, who is both blind and deaf, is the first person to complete a jet-ski journey from England to Holland and back. A pillion passenger directed him by touch on the 290-mile round trip. Two years ago Hilary Lister, who like Alderton is from Kent (what is it about people from Kent?) became the first quadriplegic sailor to cross the English Channel. Using mouth controls to navigate her boat, she set a record for the world’s longest solo sail by a quadriplegic. In June Mark Threadgold entered the record books as the first blind diver to reach a depth of 100 metres. Then, last September Alison Dunn achieved the feat of becoming the first blind person to sail solo around the Isle of Wight. She was aided by the crew of a guide boat who gave her directions and warned her of obstacles.
At this point I’m sure two questions have come into your mind: Why would anyone want to sail solo around the Isle of Wight, anyway? And what motivates some disabled people to embark on such mad – oops, I mean daunting - ventures? (The emphasis in that sentence is on the word ‘some’).
Some of them do it to raise money for charity – if you examine these news stories, there is often a “good cause” involved. Some of them have been accused (partly in jest, partly seriously) of experiencing a mid-life crisis – Mike Newman, Ken Moss (the previous blind land speed record holder) and Graham Hicks were all 41 when they broke their records. But there are some universal motivations.
Most of them hope to inspire other disabled people by demonstrating what it’s possible to achieve. Mrs Lister wanted to “encourage everyone to pursue their dreams”, in the same way that Mr Alderton remarked “it’s a great thing if I can inspire somebody to take up a sport”. Almost all of them aim to counter negative attitudes towards disabled people. Mr Alderton said he had shown that “disability is no barrier to achievement” while Mrs Lister commented that her actions would make people “rethink their views on disability”.
It’s also possible that those disabled people who find themselves surrounded by able-bodied individuals keen to over-protect them might be tempted to rebel by going in the opposite direction and pursuing extreme sports.
However, my guess is that most of the disabled people who undertake these pursuits do so for exactly the same reason that able-bodied people do. In other words, they want the satisfaction of setting themselves a challenge and proving to themselves and the rest of the world that they are capable of achieving their goal. No doubt they also want the pleasure of knowing that their name will be recorded for posterity in the record books.
Like a number of my disabled acquaintances, I’m rather bemused by this desire to perform death-defying stunts. I’ve never been able to understand why a normally rational human being would choose to hurtle down a mountain or plunge 100 metres into the sea. While I’m fond of travelling on ferries, you would never persuade me to emulate Hilary Lister even if you paid me a lot of money or promised me a peerage. But, although some disabled people criticize these ventures for reinforcing the stereotype of the “plucky super-crip”, I have to say that any disabled person who does these challenges has my backing. To clumsily paraphrase Voltaire – I may not perform such activities myself but I will defend the right of other disabled people to perform them.
Nevertheless, I can’t help feeling uncomfortable about the way in which the media avidly reports these daredevil antics by disabled people. As you can see from the long list of examples in this column, journalists fall over each other to cover the exploits of folk like Newman, Alderton and Lister.
Partly this is because these stories have a strong “feel-good factor” – what better way to end a news programme full of doom and gloom than with an upbeat item about a disabled person succeeding “against the odds”? But it’s also because journalists assume that there is something unusual and quirky about crips wanting to risk life and limb. Whenever I see such stories on the news, the reporter often seems only one breath away from describing the subject as “brave”. Well, they are brave but no more or less brave than an able-bodied person undertaking the same challenge.
It’s interesting that while the media laps up such stories with great zeal, newspapers and broadcasters hardly ever feature reports of disabled people earning a fortune in the business world, scaling the heights of academia or obtaining a high-powered role in the professions. These achievements are as great as (some would say greater than) climbing a mountain or sailing across the Channel but they rarely get a mention in the press.
Is this because these people don’t exist or because it would be regarded as patronising to report such stories? If it’s the former, then journalists ought to be doing more to analyse why disabled people are not managing to achieve such distinctions – but such articles are not thought as “sexy” as a blind man driving at 160 mph. If it’s the latter, then it follows that it’s equally patronising to report that a man with artificial legs has climbed a mountain.
I hope there will come a time when the media report far fewer of these stories – not because disabled people are no longer embarking on these physical challenges but because no one thinks it’s strange or surprising that a crip should want to drive ridiculously fast like Richard Hammond.
Post this article to
We want to encourage people to comment on our content and to exchange views with other readers and hope this will be done on a courteous basis. However, if you encounter posts which are offensive please let us know by emailing comments@newstatesman.co.uk and we will take swift action where necessary.
