I JUST WANNA HELP

After reading the assigned readings for week 7, I feel like I have changed my attitued towards disabled people. I think I will be more hesitated to help a disabled person when I encounter one. In the reading it states that disabled people are often perceived as in need of help or assistance, and they do not like that (OF COURSE NOT...). I do not even remember when it started, or who taught me such thing, but I always think disabled people are in need of help and that they are not capable of helping themselves. But what was said in the reading makes me feel like that is no longer a correct thing to do, because this offer of help might be perceived as looking down on the disabled people. However, something really struck my attention. One of the reading explains that if the disabled people (such as the blind and the deaf) are doing things normally like the abled people do, such as shopping, reading, watching TV, and etc, then why should they be considered and be labeled with the word "disabled?" Putting myself into their shoes, if I were a deaf person and I were just as capable at completing tasks as all the other people, I am sure I will be disliking the label "disabled" and will be thinking that I do not deserve to be called as such.
This is related to the idea of Social Model of Disability. The Social Model of Disability is "a way of thinking that understand disability as a function of the interaction between an individual and society." In other words, disability is not really definied by the physical conditions of an individual, but how "others" in the society perceive such physical conditions. As mentioned earlier, if a deaf person is capable of doing everything just like all the others, then why should this person be consiered as disabled? On the medias such as NEWS and some TV shows, the acivities of a group of disabled people that are being broadcasted are always titled "The something something of the disabled people" and their physical inadequate conditions are usually pointed out by the reporters. An example would be a group of people on wheelchairs in Taiwan performing the square dance. Their dance was almost the same as the dance performed by the abled people, however, their performance was not title "The Square Dance Show" or something, instead it was titled "The Wheelchair Activity ---Square Dance." I think this is really pointless and unfair to not only the people on the wheelchairs, but all the other "disabled" people with different physical conditions.

here is a title of a wheelchair dance performance video: Youtube- Wheelchair Dance Sport

sites:
AOF: page 359-362