Reykjavík Grapevine - 10.08.2012, Síða 28

THE NUMBER 1 MUSIC STORE
IN EUROPE ACCORDING TO
LONELY PLANET
SKÓLAVÖRÐUSTÍG 15, 101 REYKJAVÍK AND HARPA CONCERT HALL
28
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 12 — 2012
Feature | Accessibility
You
Can’t Always Go
Downtown
Continued
be three hours in advance and costs ex-
tra), so if someone asked Andri to go to
a movie one night, he'd have to pass un-
less somebody else could drive, which
was often a long-shot.
But isn’t that what public transporta-
tion is for? It turns out that the Strætó
bus system is also something of a sore
point. “Strætó says now that they're ac-
cessible but that's bullshit,” Andri says.
Sólveig Ásgeirsdóttir, a customer
relations representative at Strætó, says
that while the f leet of around 80 buses
doesn't have ramps or stairs, it’s not re-
ally a problem. “When the bus stops, it
goes down to the side where people walk
in,” she says. “So it shouldn't be any
problem.” If the bus is too far from the
curb, or if the sidewalk is too low, that’s
when a bus driver (or other passengers)
may have to step in and help, she says.
Iceland Versus The World: Be-
hind The Curve
But where does Iceland stand in com-
parison to other countries? It is defi-
nitely not the worst, but not nearly the
best, says Eric Lipp, executive director of
the Chicago-based Open Doors Organi-
zation.
The organisation earned interna-
tional attention a decade ago when it
released a report that detailed the travel
preferences of disabled people. Through
this nonprofit, Eric focuses on improv-
ing accessibility in the travel industry
and has for instance consulted for the
airline Iceland Express about access.
He has seen countries rebound from
accessibility woes. And Iceland could be
next in line, he says, if it gets its priori-
ties straight.
He says he marvels at the modern
design for buildings in Japan and Swe-
den, which make those countries near
havens for people who use wheelchairs.
“Accessibility is just woven into the fab-
ric of the culture so that design becomes
smarter,” he says. In the legal scheme,
the U.S.’s Americans With Disabilities
Act has been widely heralded as one of
the world’s toughest for 22 years. Federal
officials even sued New York’s famous
Metropolitan Opera last year for failing
to comply with the law.
But people in Iceland, Eric says,
“lack urgency” to make strides with ac-
cessibility. “I sat with people and trained
them and told them stories about me
and my family. The people seem will-
ing. The Icelandic people aren’t against
access at all, but if there isn’t the right
government movement there, it’s going
to be harder to get things done,” he says.
Eric says he still recommends that
disabled travellers visit Iceland for its
landscapes and friendly citizens. But the
trip will not be easy, he cautions. “The
hotels and whatnot aren’t required to
do so much, so without regulation, they
don’t. If someone took the horse to the
water, I think they’d drink,” he says.
For this reason, Eric has hope that
Iceland can remake itself, and appeal
to more disabled visitors and citizens.
He says cities like Rio de Janeiro, which
has used its booming economy to land
a future World Cup, Olympics and Para-
lympics, has doubled down on opening
up access for wheelchair users as the city
has developed.
Reykjavík, too, will see more city de-
velopment after the crash, an opportuni-
ty that shouldn’t be wasted, Eric says. “I
think that if you build it now, people will
come. As you rebuild, focus on building
with inclusion in mind,” he says. “It’s
cheaper than they would expect. The
important thing is that the private sector
takes the initiative, not necessarily the
government.”
We Really Don't Like People
Who Don't Make Fun Of Dis-
abled People
While Andri waits for full access, he
might as well laugh at the situation.
Probably the last thing Andri would
want someone to think about him is that
he's all business, trying to send anyone
who can use two legs on a guilt trip.
Quite the opposite. When Andri isn’t
working at Þekkingarmiðstöð Sjálfsb-
jargar, he devotes his time to a comedy
sketch group with a wheelchair twist
called Öryrki ( “legally disabled”).
For more than five years, Andri and
his peers have been using YouTube and
Facebook as a means to challenge stereo-
types about wheelchair users through
Öryrki. "People always see disabled peo-
ple in the paper whining," he says. "We
wanted to change that image so we went
and made fun of ourselves and did these
ridiculous things."
Among the catalogue of "ridicu-
lous things" Öryrki has done is make a
Facebook page that, like pages advocat-
ing leash laws for dogs, discourages the
presence of people in wheelchairs in
public.
"We made statuses like, 'Oh, I saw a
wheelchair guy in the mall today. That
really offended me,'" he says. In re-
sponse to that one, someone messaged
them saying they knew somebody in
a wheelchair and the status offended
them. “We sent them one line that said,
'Have you ever been bitten by a guy in a
wheelchair? Then you don't know how it
feels,’" he says.
The group’s website (www.oryrki.
is) includes videos from its YouTube ac-
count: comedy sketches á la SNL, but
with wheelchairs. In one such video,
a man haggles with someone for his
wheelchair. Eventually they settle, with
the guy who walked there wheeling away
and telling the man to send him the bill.
"Of course," the man on the ground
says.
Another sketch is Santa Claus in a
wheelchair, unable to spread the Christ-
mas joy as the snow and ice-laden streets
render his wheelchair nearly useless.
"We tried to make the videos black
humour," he says. "Some people don't
like that.
There was a rumour when we start-
ed that we weren't disabled. They never
thought that disabled people would
make fun of themselves."“
“There was a rumour
when we started that we
weren't disabled. They
never thought that dis-
abled people would make
fun of themselves."„
So What’s The Deal With The UN
Convention On The Rights Of Persons With
Disabilities?
Iceland has not yet solidified its commitment to disability issues in the
international realm, delaying its ratification of the UN Convention on the
Rights of Persons with Disabilities after signing it in 2007. The law—the
first human rights treaty of the 21st century—promotes full equality for
the 650 million disabled people worldwide, granting them power to make
their own medical and living decisions. It also pushes states to ensure
full access and gives disabled people employment rights.
More than 110 countries have ratified the convention since the UN
drew it up in 2006, aiming it not only at wheelchair users, but also those
who are blind, deaf, and mentally, physically, intellectually or develop-
mentally impaired. The countries that have ratified the treaty, which
include Brazil, Spain, United Kingdom, Denmark, and the latest, Liberia,
adopt it by passing legislation at home.
Iceland could soon bring its laws in line, too, and ratify the treaty.
Alþingi, the country’s Parliament, passed a resolution last summer to
work out policy recommendations and a disability strategy for 2012-
2014. “The main purpose of the policy program and the action plan is to
harmonize with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Dis-
abilities,” says Minister of Welfare Guðbjartur Hannesson. “We’ve highly
prioritized to be in front on everything about disabled people’s rights. For
us, it is very, very important to implement all the newest agreements, like
the UN convention.”
As part of the policy program working to adopt the treaty, parliamen-
tary committees began working this summer to hammer out details of
new benefits for disabled people, like direct payments for their indepen-
dent living.
MP Guðmundur Steingrímsson says the committee he works on is in
the development stages of working out a system for direct payments. A
group of 40 to 60 people with disabilities could draw form an initial pot of
300 million ISK—a sum that would go to hiring personal assistants.
“This is a simple idea of implementing a system so that disabled
people can gain control over their own lives instead of receiving assis-
tance from an institution. You can control assistance yourself,” Guðmun-
dur says. “They’ll be able to decide where they want to go, but this won’t
eliminate many hindrances.”
“
We will always have a
problem with old build-
ings. The law wasn’t
detailed, so it was easy to
get around.„