Douglas Baynton Disability And The Justification Of Disability

Lyle de Vitry
Griffith
English 802
5-6-14
Homosexuality- A Disability?
In Douglas Baynton’s Disability and the Justification of Inequality in America, he draws attention to the fact that, historically, people used disabilities as a justification for the discrimination of minority groups in America. He uses examples of certain societal groups who faced discrimination not simply because they were disabled, but because they did not pass for “normal.” Noting that being abnormal has been historically categorized as being disabled, he details how the mere “concept of disability had been used to justify discrimination against other groups by attributing disability to them” (Baynton 33). Utilizing historical references of such phenomenon within the social context of racism, sexism, and immigration status, Baynton emphasizes his point that if we are ever to better the way our society treats these groups we must first come forth with a much improved historical understanding of how disability was used to justify such discrimination. Spoken of defective individuals and defective races, “both were placed in hierarchies constructed on the basis of whether they were seen as ‘improvable’ or not capable of being educated, cured, or civilized. Whether it was individual atavism or a group’s lack of evolutionary development, the common element in all was the presence or attribution of disability” (Baynton 35). In other words, historically speaking, our society has chosen to categorize and label people using preconceived notions of disability to justify discrimination of persons due to their race, gender, or being that of a minority group.
An additional minority group that Baynton did not discuss, but has great relevance to this concept, is an...

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...ognized that heterosexual, as well as homosexual individuals engaged oral and anal sex (Gay and Lesbian Rights, 49). For many years it was thought that people who were gay had some sort of mental disorder, and there are still plenty of individuals who believe this. Texas has yet to repeal laws condemning persons of sodomy, as well as three other states (Gay and Lesbian Rights, 49). This is evidence that certain individuals in Texas still believe that sodomy is a crime. Many are set in their ways, that the bible states clearly the stipulation that a man with a woman is the only correct and moral pairing of human beings. With knowledge of the overlying historical ideology of justification for discrimination that Baynton discusses in his essay, the egregiousness of this historical and current oppression of those with ‘abnormal’ sexual preferences becomes even clearer.