Á undanförnum misserum hafa orðið breytingar í umræðunni um jafnrétti þar sem áhersla
er lögð á jafnrétti allra í stað þess að beina sjónum fyrst og fremst að jafnrétti kynjanna.
Þrátt fyrir þessar breytingar hefur fatlað fólk, og þá sérstaklega fólk með þroskahömlun,
áfram verið jaðarsett í íslenskri jafnréttis- og hagsmunabaráttu. Þar sem konur með
þroskahömlun hafa verið meira áberandi í hagsmunabaráttu fatlaðs fólks er mikilvægt að
beina sjónum að því hvernig hægt er að virkja karla með þroskahömlun til vitundar um
jafnréttismál og þátttöku í jafnréttisstarfi. Í greininni verður fjallað um aðgerðir tveggja
karla með þroskahömlun í þágu jafnréttis sem fóru fram í miðbæ Reykjavíkur sumarið
2016. Aðgerðirnar voru liður í verkefninu Jafnrétti fyrir alla sem styrkt var af Jafnréttissjóði
og Rannsóknasjóði HÍ og hafði það að markmiði að skoða viðhorf karla með þroskahömlun
til jafnréttismála og leita leiða til að virkja þá til þátttöku í jafnréttisstarfi. Aðgerðirnar
voru í anda skærulistar (e. guerrilla art) sem sköpuð er í leyfisleysi þegar enginn sér til
og felur í sér ádeilu á ríkjandi menningu og samfélagsskipan. Tilgangurinn er að vekja
almenning til vitundar um samfélagsleg málefni. Í greininni er aðgerðunum lýst og hvernig
þátttakendur sköpuðu sér rými í miðbænum þar sem þeir höfðu skilgreiningarvaldið
og trufluðu gangandi vegfarendur sem stöldruðu við til að skoða veggspjöld, lásu falin
skilaboð eða skrifuðu í ferðadagbækur. Aðgerðirnar voru liður í samvinnurannsókn þar
sem karlar með þroskahömlun og ófatlaður háskólakennari unnu náið saman og allir
aðilar voru virkir þátttakendur í rannsóknarferlinu. Samvinnurannsóknum er ætlað að vera
valdeflandi og gefa fólki með þroskahömlun tækifæri til að hafa áhrif á það hvernig fjallað
er um líf þess og reynslu. Það takmarkar hins vegar valdið að hafa ekki raunverulegan
aðgang að fræðasamfélaginu. Ráðstefnur eru gjarnan haldnar í óaðgengilegu húsnæði,
ráðstefnugjöldin eru há og fyrirlesarar nota óþarflega mörg og flókin orð, og hið sama á við
um nefndarstörf. Það er því mikilvægt að leita annarra og óhefðbundinna leiða til að gera
sig gildandi innan fræðasamfélagsins og jafnréttisbaráttunnar, en skærulistin var einmitt
liður í því.
People with intellectual disabilities have been marginalized within the disability
movement and not had access to ideas on gender equality or equality work
(Björnsdóttir and Traustadóttir, 2010). This has led to an overemphasis on traditional
gender roles within the special education and support systems where gender/sexuality
has been normalized in the lives of people with intellectual disabilities (Björnsdóttir,
Stefánsdóttir and Stefánsdóttir, 2017). It has been recognized that disabled women are subject to multiple discrimination and are at greater risk of violence and abuse
than non-disabled women or men (Snæfríðar- and Gunnarsdóttir, and Traustadóttir,
2015). Consequently, there has been more focus on the lived experiences of disabled
women within the academic fields of disability studies and gender studies than on
the lives of disabled men. However, research suggests that men with intellectual
disabilities are denied opportunities equal to others to develop their gender and
sexual identities and are often considered to be asexual eternal children or sexual
predators who need to be managed and controlled (Björnsdóttir, Stefánsdóttir and
Stefánsdóttir, 2017). In January 2016, two men with intellectual disabilities were hired
by the University of Iceland’s School of Education to work on a research project
which aims to explore the access of men with intellectual disabilities to ideas on
gender equality and equality work. This article discusses the actions of two men
with intellectual disabilities who performed guerrilla art, in downtown Reykjavík, in
the summer of 2016, in their quest for equality. Guerrilla art is created anonymously,
performed without permission and critiques the dominant culture and social order.
The purpose is to raise public awareness about various social issues. The article
describes the actions and explains how the men are both contributing to equality
work and disability activism. In recent years equality work in Iceland has expanded
from a strict focus on gender equality to broader notions of diversity and human
rights (Þorvaldsdóttir, 2014). The guerrilla project was initially focused on gender
equality but developed into a broader notion of equality where disability, gender, and
other categories of oppression intersect. The men are, therefore, not in the role of
self-advocates per se, but rather as activists demanding equality for all. The article
describes how the men carved out space in Reykjavík’s city centre for their activism
where they had the power to define intellectual disabilities in relation to equality. Their
presence and their actions in the city centre were disrupting; pedestrians stopped and
looked at their posters, read hidden messages in library books, wrote their thoughts in
travel journals and shared their experience on social media. The French philosopher
Michel De Certeau (1984) distinguishes between place and space. The dominant
social groups strategically organize places of order and stability. An example of a
place is the University of Iceland, the campus with buildings, offices, classrooms and
laboratories, departments and programs managed by the staff, laws and regulations.
Strict rules state who have access to university life, academics and activities. Another
example of a place is downtown Reykjavik where the guerrilla art was performed.
There are buildings, streets, sidewalks and walkways and we are supposed to walk
along the sidewalks and cross streets on walkways. De Certeau (1984) called it “tactic”
when people would use the place wrongly, for example by walking on the street. The
guerrilla art was their tactic and the men used it to carve out space where they had the
power to disrupt the existing social order. They are disrupting by asking pedestrians
to stop and reflect on their society. Who are welcome? Who have access? What is
equality? The disruption transformed the place into a space for equality work. The
guerrilla art project is part of an ongoing inclusive research where men labelled as
having intellectual disabilities collaborate on research with a non-disabled university
teacher. In inclusive research, people with intellectual disabilities are not viewed as
passive research subjects and they have opportunities to participate in the research
process and often take on valued social roles as co-researchers. Inclusive research
is supposed to be empowering for people with intellectual disabilities since they get
an opportunity to contribute on the discussion of disability and acquire control over
how people with intellectual disabilities are presented in research (Walmsley and
Johnson (2003). However, barriers to full inclusion to academia, the place of research,
are oppressive. Conferences are often held in inaccessible buildings, conference
fees are expensive and speakers commonly use an excessive number of complex
words and the same applies to committee meetings. It is, therefore, important to
look for other non-traditional ways to make their presence felt within academia, and
the guerrilla art event was part of that. By collaborating on this academic article we
are also carving space within academia where people with intellectual disabilities
are recognized for their contribution to the generation of knowledge about equality
and disability. However, we also fear that this article has reduced the empowering experience of creating guerrilla art to something different, a traditional academic
construction which is consequently inaccessible to most people with intellectual
disabilities. We have been funded by research funds and are obligated to produce our
research outcomes and hopefully we are also disrupting academia by sharing this
collaborative knowledge production.
