Note: “You” in this article is anyone who is part of a majority, dominant group. Hearies, for example; non-wheelchair users for another. White people. Men. And so on.

Now and then I get asked to help justify or explain why diversity is a Good Thing. Now, understand, I am all for “diversity.” But you know, sometimes it gets real old being the example, being the one who gets to teach everyone else that they’re being idiots about not thinking about anything other than their own perfect little limited world views.

One of the things that people need to realize is that typically they make everyone else take 100% of the effort to meet them, and hardly make a step in their direction. It’s an unthinking entitlement, the sort of obliviousness that results in things like, “Hey, we’re normal, so it’s up to you to do all the work!” So diversity iis necessary, but not necessarily because “of all the contributions we can make” (although we do that) but more often to teach you guys to actually shut up and listen in the first place! Because, you know, it’s not like we keep our wonderful ideas secret from you guys. We shout out about what’s needed, we complain that these aren’t usable, we point out that this is necessary and so on and so forth. But most of the time, it’s like yelling down a bottomless well.

Most of what I find works in terms of “diversity” is for the non-disabled clods to actually meet with people “who are different” to understand viscerally that we are still just people. It’s crazy that the average person has no clue how to behave around someone who’s blind, in a wheelchair, deaf, or missing an arm or leg. Just gaining that kind of awareness is more than half the battle, actually.

Now, from our point of view the issues are clear and the technology is there, and it’s often a matter of prompting/reminding people Make things captioned, retain text descriptions, don’t go to pure audio or pure visual. But what’s that to you guys? Well hey, captioning benefits everyone, not just us. The guy in the library who wants to go over his video clips? The person whose speakers just died? How ’bout that fellow over there learning English as a second language? The retired navy guy who lost a bit of his hearing on the aircraft carriers? Someone in a noisy environment? The applications are actually endless. The same thing happens for wheelchair access: those lowered curbs are useful for elderly folks. For women with strollers.

So, reframing diversity. Diversity isn’t about “allowing” those poor disabled people a berth on the boat. It’s about meeting us halfway and getting valuable input that is good and useful for everyone.