Reflections on International Day of Persons with Disabilities

As we celebrated the International Day of Persons with Disabilities last week—on December 3rd—I’ve been thinking a lot about what this day represents, and about the awareness we still need to cultivate. It is a day meant to highlight inclusion, dignity, and equal rights, yet for many of us who are disabled, the conversations surrounding these themes don’t always reflect our lived realities. So often, people speak for us with good intentions, but without including us in shaping the very conversations and decisions that affect our lives.

As a blind woman, I feel that gap deeply. It isn’t that I dismiss the intention or the values behind days like this; I understand why they exist and the hopes they are meant to represent. But I often struggle to align myself with them because I rarely see these symbolic gestures accompanied by real, systemic change. Awareness days can generate sentiment, conversation, and visibility, yet the systems, structures, and environments around me continue to be built without disabled people meaningfully in mind. There is a profound difference between acknowledging disability and committing to the kind of transformation that makes inclusion an everyday reality.

When I say “nothing about us without us,” I’m not invoking a slogan—I’m stating a fundamental principle of equity. Disabled people are not passive observers of our own lives. We are experts in our experiences, and our insights are essential to creating communities that work for everyone. Inclusion cannot happen if disabled people are somewhere in the background, consulted only after decisions have already been made. Our presence must be woven into leadership, planning, design, and policy from the start.

And it’s important to emphasize: this expectation of inclusion does not apply only within disability organizations or advocacy spaces. Disabled people exist in every community, every field, every industry, every cultural and civic environment. We are artists, engineers, parents, educators, clergy, students, voters, entrepreneurs, and neighbors. Our perspectives are not “specialized” contributions reserved solely for disability-specific work—they are essential to shaping the larger systems and cultures we all participate in. When disabled people are included only in conversations about disability, it reinforces the false idea that disability is a niche issue instead of a fundamental part of human diversity.

True inclusion means ensuring our voices appear everywhere decisions are made—not only in committees labeled “accessibility,” but in city planning meetings, workplace leadership teams, school boards, boards of faith communities, cultural institutions, public policy discussions, and all spaces where collective futures are shaped.

Representation is not optional or symbolic. It is structural. It means disabled people are part of every stage of creation—deciding how programs function, how environments are shaped, how communal life is imagined. It means we are not tokenized or brought in for inspiration, but valued as thinkers, contributors, and leaders. Our community cannot claim to be inclusive if disabled voices are missing from the rooms where power and planning reside.

One of the most persistent misconceptions is that accessibility is about accommodating disabled people within existing systems. In reality, most systems were never built with us in mind at all. Accessibility is not an afterthought or a retrofit—it is a way of designing the world so that everyone can participate. Physical spaces, digital platforms, community programming, educational institutions, religious environments, workplaces, social structures—all of these should be created with disabled people, not adjusted later to fit us in. When disabled people are part of the design, the result benefits everyone.

Inclusion is not a gift to disabled people; it is a responsibility that communities hold. It requires asking hard but necessary questions: Who is missing from this space? What barriers—visible or invisible—have been created that prevent someone from participating? How can those barriers be dismantled in partnership with the people who experience them every day? Inclusion is not accomplished through statements of support but through shared decision-making and structural change.

The International Day of Persons with Disabilities should not be the one moment when our voices are elevated. Instead, it should remind us that disabled leadership, disabled expertise, and disabled presence are essential year-round. My experience as a blind woman is not something for others to interpret on my behalf—it is knowledge that deserves a seat at the table. Disabled people do not need others to speak for us; we need collaborators who listen, learn, and work alongside us.

A more equitable world isn’t built around disabled people—it is built with us. And embracing that truth is how communities move from awareness to genuine inclusion, from good intentions to transformative change.

Written By Michelle Friedman

Michelle Friedman is the board chair of Keshet in Chicago, a member of Disability Lead and has been a disability advocate for 40 years. She has written two children’s books and is a frequent speaker for elementary and high school-age students. #AllInForAllAbilities