Advocates and Activists Help Disabled People to Shine
“Take your nonsense opinions elsewhere as I have exactly zero time for your anonymous, ableist nonsense.”
– Adam Pearson replying to an online troll who made a cruel remark about the disabled actor’s presence at the 2025 BAFTA awards
Wonderful things can happen in the most unexpected places.
If you think film awards ceremonies are stupid events where silly celebrities dress up to look down at anyone less fabulous than they are, think again. Just in time for March, Disability Awareness Month, this year’s Golden Globes and British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) awards shows became perfect platforms for actors advocating for people with disabilities.
At the Golden Globes ceremony in January, Romanian American actor Sebastian Stan won the award for Best Male Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy for “A Different Man.” In the dark comedy, Stan plays Edward, a man with neurofibromatosis (NF1), a rare genetic disorder that causes benign tumors to grow on nerve tissue and under the skin. Unhappy because this condition has disfigured his face, Edward accepts an opportunity to change his appearance — after which life hands him plenty of other issues to contemplate.
Stan’s co-star in the film, British actor Adam Pearson, who has NF1 in real life, received rave reviews for his performance as Edward’s alter ego, an outgoing man who navigates life confidently despite the challenge of living with the disorder.
Ignorance and Discomfort Must End
In his acceptance speech, Stan said, "Our ignorance and discomfort around disability and disfigurement has to end now. We have to normalize it and continue to expose ourselves to it and [expose] our children. Encourage acceptance. One way we can do that is by continuing to champion stories that are inclusive. …These films are real, and they’re necessary. We can’t be afraid and look away."
At the BAFTA awards in February, it was Pearson’s turn to advocate for the disabled in response to cruel remarks from a couple of social media trolls. When an online hater made fun of his and Warwick Davis’s appearance at the ceremony, where Davis won a lifetime achievement award, Pearson snapped back, “Has no one learned anything?” He then took the meanspirited individual to task for “punching down at 2 successful actors simply for being disabled.”
Davis, another British actor, is best known for his roles in “Star Wars” and the Harry Potter film series. He has dwarfism caused by a rare bone growth disorder called Spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita (SED). And he is considered the most successful supporting actor of all time.
When another troll tried to ridicule Pearson for showing up among the beautiful people at the BAFTA bash, he zinged the hater with this: “Take your nonsense opinions elsewhere as I have exactly zero time for your anonymous, ableist nonsense.”
‘I’m the Best at What I Do’
In an interview with The Guardian, Pearson, a longtime advocate for the disabled, said, “My disability is the least interesting thing about me.” An interesting thing about his family is that he has an identical twin brother, Neil, whose NF1 has affected him very differently. While Neil has no tumors, he deals with epilepsy and severe short-term memory loss. In 2016, the brothers appeared together in a BBC Horizon documentary titled “My Amazing Twin.”
Always an extrovert, Adam Pearson had wanted to be a standup comic since he was a boy, but he didn’t try for a career on stage or even think about the silver screen. “I didn’t think disabled people were allowed in films, because I didn’t see any,” he explained, noting that only 3 disabled actors have ever won Oscars for playing people with disabilities. (They are Harold Russell, who lost both hands while serving in the military, in 1947 for “The Best Years of Our Lives” and deaf actors Marlee Matlin in 1987 for “Children of a Lesser God” and Troy Kotsur in 2022 for “Coda.”)
In a delightful twist of fate, it was Changing Faces, a UK-based charity that advocates for “everyone with a mark, scar or condition that makes them look different” that helped Pearson land his first movie role in 2013. The group sent him an email to let him know about a casting call for Jonathan Glazer’s film “Under the Skin.” He sent in his cheeky resume with the opening line, “My name is Adam Pearson and I’m the best in the world at what I do,” and before long, the director chose him for a role in the science fiction flick.
Although there’s a long road ahead before disabled actors obtain the full inclusivity they deserve, the tide is starting to turn in their favor. Last month,Variety featured a long article titled “Disabled Performers Advocate for Allies in Hollywood: ‘Inclusion Needs to Be a Movement and Not a Moment.’”
Advocating for the Marginalized
Advocacy is at least as important for people with disabilities who are far from the public eye, wrongfully institutionalized. Even after the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed in 1990 “to make sure that people with disabilities have the same rights and opportunities as everyone else,” too many disabled individuals were still unjustly hidden away in hospitals and nursing homes.
In 1995, a compassionate attorney in Georgia decided to do something about that. Sue Jamieson of the Atlanta Legal Aid Society filed the Olmstead v. L.C. suit that led to a landmark 1999 Supreme Court decision affirming disabled individuals’ right to services in their communities rather than confinement in institutions.
Jamieson was advocating on behalf of Lois Curtis and Elaine Wilson, young women diagnosed with severe mental disabilities who were institutionalized in various state hospitals and private care facilities off and on since childhood, even after healthcare professionals said they were ready to transition to community-based treatment. The Court found that the unjustified segregation of disabled people into institutions amounted to discrimination.
In a 2014 speech at the law school of the University of the District of Columbia, Jamieson spoke about her “Supreme Court adventure” and its aftermath. She explained that prior to the Olmstead case, she and her Legal Aid team had been representing institutionalized people for 15 years. Although Lois and Elaine had suffered abuse in hospitals, Jamieson said their major problem was “the need for a decent, safe community alternative,” the lack of which led to filing the original case in federal court.
“Lois and Elaine both had diagnoses of schizophrenia, developmental disabilities, and ‘behavior problems.’ It was clear that the ‘behavior problems’ resulted from the many years both women were confined in institutions,” she added.
Although situations have improved for many disabled people since Olmstead, problems have continued to arise. In 2023, the federal court for Florida’s Southern District ruled that the state had violated the ADA by unnecessarily placing disabled children in nursing homes rather than providing them with community health services.
“Unjustified institutionalization of individuals with disabilities is unacceptable,”U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks wrote in his decision, as a result of which, the state was advised to help children institutionalized due to lack of community resources return home.
Paying Tribute to More Amazing Advocates
March doesn’t have enough days to salute all the prominent U.S. activists and advocates who have helped level the playing field for people with disabilities. These are a few noteworthy individuals who have made significant contributions.
Ed Roberts (1939–1995) was paralyzed from the neck down due to polio but earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, which initially denied him admission because his iron lung wouldn’t fit in a dorm room. He is considered the father of the worldwide independent living movement of persons with disabilities.
The movement had its roots in the Physically Disabled Students Program that Roberts helped develop. It was run by and for disabled Berkeley students who provided services that allowed them to live in the community. In 1972, Roberts and other members of the program founded the Center for Independent Living, which advocated for ways to give disabled people access to community life. Roberts later served as director of the California Department of Vocational Rehabilitation and lobbied for disability rights around the world.
The independent living movement advocates for people with disabilities to have the same opportunities, choices, and autonomy as others, based on the idea that they are experts on their own needs. “Disability is strength. Our number one issue is still old attitudes toward us,” Roberts said.
Haben Girma, the first Deafblind person to graduate from Harvard Law School, works as a disability rights lawyer and has been honored many times as an advocate for disability rights. She was named the White House Champion of Change, received the Helen Keller Achievement Award, and made the Forbes 30 Under 30 list.
Girma, whose memoir is titled “Haben: The Deafblind Woman Who Conquered Harvard Law,” believes that inclusion is a choice we make every day, and accessibility is an opportunity for innovation. In an interview with SoCal Grantmakers, she remarked, “It’s people that create justice. Communities create justice. All of us face the choice to accept unfairness or advocate for justice.”
Brian Bell lost his right leg in a train accident when he was 10. He’s a wheelchair basketball Paralympic champion who talks about his experience as a Black man, a disabled person, and an athlete. He asks questions like, “How can the Paralympic community support Black Lives?” and “How can individual sports make changes to end racism and support athletes struggling with systems of injustice and inequality?”
“I am an elite athlete and a Black man. I am valued for my athletic ability and skills on the court. But off the court, I am treated completely differently,” Bell says. “The disability community is not immune to racism and everyday discrimination, and it is important that we as athletes take the time to acknowledge that and examine how our individual sports can change that, and how we can change as well.”
He adds, “Black Lives Matter. Black Disabled Lives Matter. We have to make a better future.”
Alice Wong has spinal muscular atrophy and lost the ability to walk around the age of 8. Born in an Indianapolis suburb to parents who had immigrated from Hong Kong, she is a disability rights activist and journalist. She has bachelor’s degrees in English and sociology from Indiana University at Indianapolis and a master’s degree in medical sociology from the University of California, San Francisco.
As founder and director of the Disability Visibility Project, Wong has partnered with StoryCorps to gather more than 140 oral histories of people with disabilities in the United States. Part of the reason for collecting these stories was to bust the myth that being disabled is always either pitiful or inspirational. Appointed by President Barack Obama, Wong served on the National Council on Disability from 2013 to 2015. She has received several awards in recognition of her activism at the local and national levels, including the 2016 AAPD Paul G. Hearne Leadership Award for emerging leaders with disabilities who advocate for the broader cross-disability community. Her work has been published in diverse media including the New York Times and PEN America.
Robert M. Hensel (1969-2019), a leading advocate for the rights of disabled people, always emphasized his talents, not his limitations. “I choose not to place ‘dis’ in my ability,” he said. Born with Spina bifida, a congenital defect that results in lower body paralysis, he was a native of Spain who settled in Oswego, New York. He worked with the county council there to designate Oct. 1–7 as Beyond Limitations Week to highlight the talents and accomplishments of its citizens with disabilities.
Hensel’s creative energy was too expansive to confine him to any one state or country. He became an international poet and writer with more than 900 publications to his credit and, in 2000, was nominated as one of the best poets of the 20th century. He carried the torch at the 2006 Asian Games in Qatar. He held the Guinness and Ripley’s world records for the longest nonstop wheelchair wheelie, which covered 6.178 miles. The point of doing the ultimate wheelie was to raise money for wheelchair ramps in his hometown.
“I'm chasing my dreams straight to the top, into a sky that has no limits,” Hensel said.
Great Prospects Participants Are Their Own Best Advocates
“Nothing about us without us” is a popular slogan in the disabled rights community. Participants at Great Prospects, guided by a caring staff, are outstanding advocates for their own cause, sometimes intentionally and at other times just by being themselves, shopping, visiting the library, going on fun outings, and volunteering in the community.
Therapeutic Day Program Director Tabitha Todle is a firm believer in daily community outings. “I believe these are just as important for the community to see our crew out as it is for the development of our participants,” she said, adding, “When members of the community see our group and how they are emulating independence and self-advocacy, they are more inclined to disregard the harmful stereotypes.”
Participants also enjoy Disability Days that raise and celebrate their differences, and staff members have focus weeks to help them retain life skills. “We focus on helping participants be confident and independent while at Great Prospects, then being able to practice that in real world settings,” Tabitha said.
Great Prospects welcomes highly mobile, continent young adults with disabilities (21-40 or 16-40, depending on the program) who do not exhibit violent behaviors. We’re dedicated to empowering special people to become their best and happiest selves. To find out more, pleasevisit our website or call us at (770) 314-4243.