Reclaiming Feminist Spaces with Disability at the Forefront
Fifteen years ago, a group of feminist comrades and I launched Feminists with Disabilities for a Way Forward (FWD) in response to the lack of disability inclusion in mainstream feminism. We wanted to create a space where disabled voices could be amplified and where the intersections of disability, gender, and other marginalized identities could be explored. Despite the challenges we faced, including harassment and dismissal from those in positions of power, FWD had a profound impact on disability feminism and feminist thought more broadly.
Today, as I embark on co-founding a new feminist media collective called The Flytrap, I’m once again driven by the belief that disability justice must be at the heart of our work. In a media landscape that often treats disability as an afterthought or a problem to be solved, we are committed to ensuring that disabled people are not just represented, but that their lived experiences, perspectives, and identities are central to the conversations we facilitate.
Centering Disability in Feminist Media
The Flytrap is not a disability-specific publication, but rather a collective that explicitly engages with disability from the start. This is a revolutionary act in a media landscape that has long marginalized disabled voices. As someone who has navigated the challenges of being a visible and outspoken disabled person in the media, I know firsthand the importance of creating spaces where disabled people feel seen, heard, and valued.
One of the key reasons I was drawn to co-founding The Flytrap is the opportunity to return to what I do best: getting disability all over your feminism. Disability is a feminist issue, and you cannot have a truly intersectional feminism without the voices and experiences of disabled people. From conversations around the gendered and racialized nature of caregiving to the impact of prenatal diagnoses, disability is a core component of the human experience that is often overlooked or treated as a separate concern in mainstream feminist spaces.
Dismantling Ableism and Centering Disability Justice
At The Flytrap, we are committed to dismantling ableism and centering disability justice in our work. This means not just including disabled writers and artists, but also ensuring that our editorial practices, content, and community-building efforts are grounded in the principles of disability justice. We understand that disability is expansively diverse, with the lived experiences of disabled people varying tremendously. Our aim is to create a space where basic facts about disability are not up for debate, where we can have nuanced and complex conversations about disability identity and culture without having to constantly justify our right to exist.
Disability justice, as pioneered by activists like Sins Invalid and the late Leroy Moore, is a framework that challenges the medical model of disability and instead sees disability as a site of community, culture, and radical joy. It recognizes the intersections of disability with other marginalized identities, such as race, gender, and class, and calls for a holistic approach to liberation that addresses systemic oppression in all its forms.
Building the Media Landscape We Want to See
The Flytrap is part of a larger shift in feminist media and culture, one that is informed by the work of trailblazers like Flavia Dzodan, who famously declared that “my feminism will be intersectional or it will be bullshit.” We are rejecting the narrow, exclusionary version of feminism that has long dominated mainstream discourse and instead embracing a more expansive, inclusive, and justice-oriented approach.
By centering disability from the outset, we are not only challenging the status quo, but also creating the media landscape we want to see. We are demonstrating that it is possible to build sustainable, worker-owned collectives of people working in solidarity with each other and the communities they serve. We are rejecting the harmful practices of traditional media, such as access journalism, both-sidesing, and the myth of “journalistic objectivity,” in favor of a model that prioritizes care, community, and a commitment to the whole of human experience.
The Power of Collective Action
The Flytrap is the natural successor to the work I began with FWD all those years ago. It is a testament to the power of collective action, of refusing to be silenced, and of insisting that our stories, our perspectives, and our very existence are worthy of attention and celebration.
As I reflect on the journey that has led me to this moment, I am reminded of the words of the late, great Leroy Moore: “Disability justice is about the collective. It’s not about the individual.” In building The Flytrap, we are not just creating a space for our own voices to be heard, but for the diverse and vibrant disability community to be seen, amplified, and empowered.
Through our work, we hope to inspire others to follow in our footsteps, to build the media collectives, the independent publications, and the cultural spaces that reflect the full breadth of human experience. We are here to write what we want to see, to challenge the algorithm, and to insist that disability justice is a core feminist issue that cannot be ignored.
So, if you’re ready to join us in this revolutionary endeavor, I invite you to become a subscriber to The Flytrap. Together, we can create the media landscape we deserve, one that is rooted in disability justice, feminist solidarity, and a deep commitment to the transformative power of storytelling.
