The Women’s March on Washington comes against a president who lost the popular vote by 3 million votes and who walked into the White House with the lowest approval rating of any president in history. Donald Trump has been admonished on both sides for his carnival of conflicts of interests, and it’s been bandied about that he’s in cahoots with Russian President Vladimir Putin. People are angry. They are protesting, marching in the streets to show their displeasure with our newly seated POTUS.
The Women’s March on Washington is not fully inclusive. And to help include those who may not be able to join their sisters in arms at the march, Disability March has organized a virtual way of joining the protests.
The Disability March was put together by “a small ad-hoc group of writers and organizers including Sonya Huber, Sarah Einstein, Andrea Scarpino, and others.” The website includes a form for joining the virtual march, and the organizers are urging people to include photos along with their entries. Names, photos, and participants’ reasons (if included) for joining the January 21st march will be posted on the website.
As an all-volunteer effort, the Disability March is organizing protest activities as participants allow. The stakes are high. As the Republicans have shown, they are hell-bent on repealing the Affordable Care Act (though they are still unsure how to replace it). With cuts being thrown around for the Department of Justice—as well as other protective government agencies—the disabled are more vulnerable than most to the ramshackle shifts in policy the Republicans are promoting.
As reported by Mashable, organizer Sonya Huber had this to say:
She also reiterated that the disabled are not a “peripheral community.” They deserve respect as much as anyone else does. Let’s hope our new president can realize that.