User:Julianhuerta/sandbox

The relevance of the intersectionality of both the disability and LGBTQ communities, historically, came about mostly in the 1960s and the 1970s with the surge of advocates in the midst of the vocal liberation and civil rights movements. These communities individually are topics of numerous deliberations regarding validity, however they also often overlap in significance. The significance of the developments however, began to build momentum and gain legal recognition in the 1980s with the growth of the lesbian and gay movements. It was from this age of advocacy that the intersectionality of these two minority groups came into clearer focus, though it is one continuously growing subject of discussion. It was only in 1974 that the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from their list of mental disorders. Forty years later in 2013 that the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) changed the listing of transgender to “gender dysphoria”.

One of the most notable circumstances where the case of these two minority rights overlapped was the court case In re Guardianship of Kowalski, in which an accident that occurred in 1983 left a thirty-six year old Sharon Kowalski physically disabled with severe brain injuries. The court granted guardianship of her to her parents who refused visitation rights to her partner of four years, Karen Thompson. The court case spanned over a decade and was resolved by granting Thompson custody. Recognition for this court case prompted Thompson to become the featured speaker at the first Disability Pride Parade in Boston, Massachusetts in 1990. This was seen as a major victory for gay rights and was believed to call to attention the validity of legal rights for those who identified under the queer and disabled spectrum. Numerous support groups emerged to create safe spaces for those identifying in these specific minority groups such as the founding of the Rainbow Alliance of the Deaf in 1977, the Lesbian Disabled Veterans of America group in 1996 which then became the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Disabled Veterans of America, and the San Francisco Gay Amputees group in 2006.

The American Public Health Association had concluded in a 2012 study that disability was more common in gay, lesbian, and bisexual individuals when compared to heterosexual peers in the study. It was also shown that the gay, lesbian, and bisexual group with disabilities were noticeably younger in age than the heterosexual group. There was a significant difference in the prevalence of mental and physical health between the study groups, a higher statistic of those with queer identities having issues health wise than those straight identifying, reportedly due to the weight of social pressure and discrimination of minority sexual identities.

Though these minority groups do not always intersect, the way they handle their own discrimination, can be compared in similar ways. Being that both the LGBTQ rights movement and the disability rights movements have been defined as minority discrimination movements, it has been said that they are a direct contrast to society normalizing the dominance of heterosexuality and able-bodiedness in its majority population. It is also a large topic of discussion to say that both groups have to undergo the same kind of ‘coming out’ process in terms of their sexual identity, gender identity, and disability identity because of the lasting social stigma

In more recent years, recognition was brought forward in the media when American model, Nyle DiMarco, won the 22nd season of the television dance show Dancing With the Stars while being the shows second Deaf contestant and the first contestant to participate in a same sex dance routine. DiMarco, who identifies as ‘fluid’ in his sexual orientation, also heads his own non-profit organization which was created in 2016 with the mission statement to improve life for Deaf children and their families