Music has always been an essential part of the human experience. It gives us the capacity to share stories via rhythm, lyrics and sound.
It also has the power to unite and divide communities. One way we see that happen is through language, especially when racism, sexism, homophobia and disability are involved.
Over the years disability-related slurs have often slipped through the censors as non-disabled people don't see them as offensive. This is despite society frequently resorting to terms such as 'retard', 'freak' and 'spaz' to bully or degrade people who may or may not live with disability.
Earlier this month, disability advocate Hannah Diviney called out pop music megastars Lizzo and Beyoncé for appropriating the term 'spaz', an offensive ableist slur describing people living with cerebral palsy.
Both artists changed the lyrics to their songs, but not everyone is happy about it.
Some have claimed Diviney's actions were a cynical attempt to raise her advocacy platform.
Others have accused her of racism.
Disability rights advocates of colour questioned why Diviney was so quick to call out lyrics by Black artists Lizzo and Beyoncé but neglected to highlight the issue when white artists used ableist words in their songs.
Ola Ojewumi, a double transplant survivor, wheelchair user and advocate for women, people of colour and the disabled, believes Diviney has used white privilege to criticise Black women musicians.
"Many well-intentioned white disability rights activists have yet to reckon with their white privilege and racism," she says. "I don't disagree with Hannah Diviney's statements but I feel the onslaught of criticism for Lizzo and Beyoncé from white disabled advocates is rooted in misogynoir and racial double standards."
Ojewumi believes that Big Time Rush's song Paralysed - which was the subject of debate - was not criticised by white disabled activists in the same immediate and critical manner.
She says when giving people with disabilities platforms as experts, they should take an intersectional approach. "Inclusion is more than just a disabled body. Rather it's our lived experiences and multiple identities," Ojewumi says.
Diviney, who uses a wheelchair, says her decision to call out artists appropriating ableist language has "never been about the person but the slur in question".
"That's why I was just as loud in calling out Eminem a few weeks ago," she posted on Twitter. "Interestingly, I was one of the only journalists to do that."
Why do we use ableist language?
One thing both Diviney and Ojewumi do agree on is that popular culture has a lot to answer for when it comes to society's overall perception of people with disability.
While Diviney has received significant praise from within the disability community for holding the music industry to account, she says others appear "increasingly frustrated" that she's not using her platform to push for changes to more significant issues such as disability housing and employment opportunities.
Yet as much as we all like to think we're careful with the words we choose, ableist language is pervasive and examples in pop culture are everywhere. You have almost certainly used some of them yourself.
Ableist language frequently pops up in the slang we use, like calling something "dumb" or "lame", or making a declaration like, "I'm so OCD".
These might feel like casual slights or exclamations, but they do damage.
It's possible many people are truly unconscious of these biases within themselves and unaware of the ableism couched in their own everyday language.
But discussions about the negative impact of words such as "dumb" — a term originally denoting a deaf person who did not use speech, but which now functions as slang for something brutish, uninteresting or of low intelligence — have been happening in deaf and disabled circles for centuries.
Diviney believes it's an easy issue to fix.
"It doesn't take much effort. We've seen Lizzo and Beyoncé, how quickly they have recorded things and kind of course-corrected," she says.
"I feel like if you change the language around disability, you give people a way into talking about the much bigger, kind of structural, issues."
A Western construct
It is interesting that not all languages have a word for disability.
First Peoples Disability Network Australia chief executive Damian Griffis explains the link between language and disability is bound by Western societal thinking.
"In traditional language, there is no comparable word for disability which is evidence that disability has always been a part of the human experience in Aboriginal communities," he says. "We are thought leaders on inclusion, and would note that disability labels are a Western medical construct."
Ojewumi agrees, saying that "whiteness is so heavily associated with disability that disabled people of colour are often excluded".
She explains that those without disabilities are influenced by how pop culture and the media present disability.
And she notes that Beyoncé has used her platform to foster inclusion for people with disabilities — a point that has been lost in much of the current debate.
"This is why I commend artists like Beyoncé. She's included disabled models … in her fashion campaign and music video. Pop culture shapes how the world views people with disabilities," Ojewumi says.
"Whenever we are portrayed, it's never as the main character or full human beings with emotions, relationships, careers, dreams, and ambitions."
Bigger concerns
Both Diviney and Ojewumi have received abusive messages on social media for speaking out.
For Diviney, an appearance on Q+A to speak out about the use of slurs in lyrics was an opportunity to address online abuse. She says she has faced significant trolling since her initial post.
"I have had people basically sending me photos [and] GIFs of people in wheelchairs being pushed over and pushed off cliffs," she says.
"I kind of take it as a twisted compliment that I'm getting trolled because it means that I'm doing work that is making noise, and that I'm actually making a difference."
While Ojewumi has also received threats for speaking out, she says there are more important things to worry about, noting Canada's medically assisted suicide laws contain insufficient protections for the disabled, or laws in the US that make it legal for disabled children to be administered electroshock therapy in schools.
"I'm more concerned about global disability rights that go beyond language," she says. "We as a community have bigger fish to fry than focusing on the mistakes of two Black women singers who unintentionally used the ableist slurs."
