(Justin) I haven't been posting as much as I should about my work with Kifas. But one thing I do every day is check Twitter for tweets in Turkish about the disabled or wheelchairs. Every day there is a story that is RT'd to raise consciousness about the plight of the disabled. This weekend there were two stories of particular interest:
There was an examination (ÖMSS) for disabled people in order to get jobs as public servants. Over 60,000 people took the exam, but only about 3,000 will be chosen. However, the real scandal was that many of the government buildings where the test was given had multiple stories with no elevators or wheelchair ramps. The news showed people struggling up stairs, or being carried, or worse. The exam apparently allowed about one minute per question but several of the disabled couldn't write that fast. The name of the exam is also offensive to some as the non-politically-correct word for "disabled" (özürlü) is in the title of the exam. It was nice to see the outrage about this on Twitter, at least.
In another story, what one reporter called a "tragic comedy," a walking bridge was built over a road in Trabzon in which one side has an easy-access ramp for wheelchairs and strollers while the other side of the bridge only has a set of steep stairs. The news showed people in wheelchairs being pushed across and carried down the stairs and parents struggling wıth theır strollers. One wonders how the engineers did not think about this.
Daily you read tweets of people in the subways who can't get up because the elevator is broken, etc. It's difficult here. One source of encouragement is the growing number of advocacy groups harnessing social media to unite around causes and network together. The government and a large number of local charities also show increasing concern. But there is much work to be done.
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