8/6/26 - Medicaid, who speaks for us, and disabled animal virality

Hello!

Three links for a Thursday ...

In letter to cousin RFK Jr., health advocate warns of threats to disability care

Daniel Wu, Washington Post - August 3, 2026

"The letter by Tim Shriver joins a recent outcry from lawmakers and disability advocates who have warned that the June memo, which called for reinterpreting a key Supreme Court ruling on disability rights, could shrink access to home- and community-based care services that hundreds of thousands of Americans with disabilities rely on to receive care without being placed in institutions ..."

California Does Medicaid Home Care Well. They’re Being Punished For It.

Julia Métraux, Mother Jones - July 29, 2026

"'The whole assumption that growth means fraud is absurd,' Dickman said, 'especially given all of the investments that the state has made to actually intentionally grow the program in order to benefit its disabled population and to support people living at home.'"

There are at least two interesting things to think about with these two articles. One is the subject itself, the looming human, policy, and political crisis set in motion by Medicaid cuts in the Big Beautiful Bill Act. Whatever direct damages this will bring are likely to be further compounded by the fiscal squeeze that Medicaid cuts will put on states, which may then turn to cutting their home care and other community services for disabled people. Both of these articles in different ways do a good job of explaining the problem, and why home care is so important to disabled people.

The other question is less about the "what" of these articles, and more about the "how" they are assembled. One of this newsletter's subscribers noted on Facebook that the Washington Post article isn't written by a disabled person, and doesn't quote any disabled people either. It's possible that the Post reporter tried to get comments from disabled people but couldn't. But it wouldn't be unusual for an otherwise accurate and substantive article on disability policy to feature no disabled voices, either as experts, advocates, or just people affected by the issue being covered. The second piece is written by a disabled reporter, who regularly covers disability-related stories for Mother Jones. But the question remains. Would both of these articles work better with a more personal story or two added? Home care stories especially benefit from a dual perspective, including experts and politicians, and people who actually use home care. And both kinds of sources carry extra credibility when that are people with disabilities. We need our issues to be covered. We also need our voices to be heard and centered as much and as often as possible.

What's up with the internet's fascination with disabled animals?

Citizen Cane - July 29, 2026

"As with a lot of internet trends, this fetishization is widespread, but difficult to trace to a single source; there are Buzzfeed articles, photo sets with varying degrees of context about the photo subjects’ disabilities and—-of course—-lots and lots of “inspirational” coverage of humans who have saved animals with various disabilities (but WHO SAVED WHO?). So why is the internet obsessed with disabled animals? My take is that the various “inspiring” stories about disabled animals provide a way for nondisabled people to talk about and engage with disability in a facile way. If one is constantly gawking and aww-ing over pictures and stories about animals with disabilities, then they don’t have to spend time thinking about actual disabled people, or the ableism against disabled humans that still exists."

This sub-genre of "inspiration porn" is particularly insidious because for most people, it's so much fun. How can anyone object to cooing over an adorable disabled cat, dog, or squirrel? Of course, most disabled people understand why these sorts of viral images aren't entirely harmless or wholesome. But it's hard to communicate to people why such seemingly wholesome images sometimes make us cringe, or at least roll our eyes.

Disability Thinking Weekday is a Monday-Friday newsletter with links and commentary on disability-related articles and other content. You can help promote Disability Thinking Weekday by forwarding it by email or posting on your social media. You can also comment by sending me an email at: apulrang@icloud.com. Collected comments are shared on the first of each month. A free subscription sends a newsletter to your email each weekday. Benefits of paid subscription include:

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