Step into the irreverent world of disabled cartoonist Crippen aka Dave Lupton, who has been in the vanguard of disability arts movement for more years than he cares to mention. His work has appeared in mainstream press, on TV and film and is now probably the best Disabled cartoonist in the world!

Crippen gives a heads up about the up-coming D.A.N demonstration

5 June 2010

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On Wednesday the 16th June the Disabled people's Direct Action Network (D.A.N) will take to the streets in solidarity with the National Day of Action against the dismantling of the Welfare State. D.A.N demonstrations will be taking place in Manchester and London and will welcome all people who identify, or who are regarded as disabled, whatever their background or impairments. For those of you who have never been on a D.A.N demo it's important that you know that D.A.N. uses the strategy of...

Comments: 2

Crippen looks at the offer for schools to change their status to that of an Academy

26 May 2010

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Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, is writing to all primary and secondary schools in England inviting them to become Academies and therefore independent of local authority control. This could mean thousands of schools leaving local authority control. Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT (Teachers Union), argued that it was wrong to stop local authorities from having a say in proposals for new schools,  and that [the proposal] represents a costly and unnecessary solution to a...

Comments: 4

Crippen receives a request for a labelling cartoon from Australia

19 May 2010

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I've recently received an email from a Disabled equality trainer in Australia asking if she could use some of my cartoons about labelling within her courses. She hadn't come across the concept before and felt that it might help her to get across the equality message to both non-disabled and disabled Australians. "No problem" I replied, and then began to wonder if other readers of this blog in other parts of the world were as ignorant of this concept as she was. With this in mind I've...

Comments: 7

Crippen shares some thoughts and poetry from Deaf Bitch

13 May 2010

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I’ve had some correspondence recently with a colleague known in crip circles as Deaf Bitch. Her shared insights into Deaf culture have helped me to understand a great deal about the many forms of oppression that Deaf people face within our society.  Here’s some of what she wrote followed a recent programme about children having cochlear implants. “I was watching a programme about a one year old boy who was about to have a double cochlear implant. "During the...

Comments: 5

Crippen looks at coping with the copers

4 May 2010

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Crippen is currently in the UK meeting up with his many contacts in the world of cripdom and gathering fresh material for this cartoon blog and other projects that he has underway. He'll be back with us next week, and in the meantime has left us with one of his typical 'us and them' creations! FaceBook Our hardworking Editor Colin has been on a drive to get membership of dao's facebook group site increased. He's just got another 30 members to join in the past couple of days - so we're now up to...

Comments: 6

Crippen discovers a very non-social model gender identity process

26 April 2010

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By coincidence I've had a couple of messages from Disabled people who are going through the gender identity process. One is at the stage of applying for an operation and the other is attempting to get the gender on her birth certificate amended. Both of these people have described to me a process that is so medical model orientated that it makes me want to beat the various consultants and medicos over the head with a large hammer labelled 'social model understanding'. Why this issue has been...

Comments: 5

Crippen revisits his earlier postings regarding user-led involvement

21 April 2010

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Following the news relating to Local Authorities being advised by the Department of Health to give preference to tenders for services from User-Led Organisations (ULO's) it got me to thinking about the groups and organisations that have traditionally gone after this work. These are, of course, the organisations 'for' disabled people, those charitable concerns that have been doing it to us crips for a very long time and who have established the status quo that effectively maintains our role as...

Comments: 3

Crippen receives disturbing news from Northern Ireland

17 April 2010

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I have been getting some rather disturbing messages from Gay Disabled friends in Northern Ireland in relation to a recent conference promoting 'conversion therapy'. This is the process where people can be 'cured' of their homosexuality through prayer. The conference, which was held back in February was organised by Core Issues, an evangelical Christian group in Northern Ireland which promotes this so-called therapy and claims to have 'saved' numerous homosexual Christians. The star speaker is...

Comments: 4

Crippen takes a cynical look at the change of language

5 April 2010

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Has anyone else noticed that having adopted our social model language, the big charities and government departments have started to twist the wording around so that the 'problem' is back with us crips?! For example, a recent press release from the Department for Work and Pensions contains the lines: 'It is clear that the current assessments are failing to pick up on people with major barriers to work' (this refers specifically to Disabled people). Now we could be charitable and say that this...

Comments: 11

Crippen exposes the first hurdle in the tendering for social care process

31 March 2010

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All this business about opening the tendering process for Social Care Commissioning to groups and organisations of Disabled people has brought in some interesting mails from fellow crips who have started to enquire about the process. As the powers that be have included the words 'fully accessible' in the information explaining about the process, one would be forgiven for thinking that applying to tender for any of the services would be a completely barrier free experience. Think again. In one...

Comments: 6

Crippen takes a look at the forthcoming general election

27 March 2010

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It's that time again and Disabled people are being asked to consider who we think will actually commit to an effective strategy regarding access and the removal of those barriers within society that still disable us. It's a bit of a no-brainer when considering the track record of the conservative party (Tories) and I can't imagine anyone would fall for their current rhetoric and the dubious charms of Mr 'just call me Dave' Cameron! OK, the Labour Party haven't actually covered themselves in...

Comments: 4

Crippen looks at the access being created for the Olympic games

21 March 2010

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I've created so many cartoons over the years regarding the bottomless pit called the 2012 Olympics. Bottomless insofar as any and all available funding is being systematically sucked into its gaping maw, with nothing of any long-term substance being generated for Disabled people within the UK. OK, it's great if you're one of those who enjoy participating within the spectacle know as the Para-Olympics with all of its associated terminology about achievement and overcoming adversity etc. But if,...

Comments: 3

Crippen looks at the changes of attitude being made towards User led Organisations

7 March 2010

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Sometimes when an old cynic like me thinks we are not making any progress and there’s too much of the same-old, same-old, I get a dig in the ribs and a reminder that us crips do occasionally have some influence. This nudge was another example of how we have penetrated the portals of policy and power.  Thanks to years of background work, solid research, lobbying, persuasion, arm-twisting and hard, under-funded graft by crips, disabled people’s (and carers´) organisations...

Comments: 9

Crippen looks for a cartoon about 'Normality Training' for Disabled people

5 March 2010

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Every now and then something catches my eye and I think, I've got a cartoon about that ... somewhere! It was the same with an article that I was reading in a local paper someone had sent me from the North of England. In it the writer was telling her readers that if disabled people wanted to fit into society more easily, they should concentrate on looking more normal .... I kid you not! I'd looked through my computerised cartoon catalogue (I've now got over a thousand cartoons in it!) and I...

Comments: 3

Crippen looks at how people can become invisible when disabled

2 March 2010

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I thought we'd go the route of a little light relief this week, especially having lifted the lid of the so called 'assisted suicide' or 'mercy killings' again last week. I often get asked for cartoons about specific situations, but it's rare that I get given an idea to develop as well. The other week a member of the Skegby Methodist Church, Alison wrote to ask if she could use a couple of my cartoons in an article she was writing as part of her course at University. No problem ... and I sent...

Comments: 3

Crippen continues the debate around assisted killing (Mercy Killing)

20 February 2010

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"I just received a furious message from actor Nabil Shaban, best known to the public for playing Sil in Dr Who. Nabil is better known amongst activists as a ferocious advocate against war and for disability equality, in particular the right to live in equal status to others". This is how Clair Lewis started her journal last week, and follows on ... "Nabil Shaban ACCUSES the British media, and that includes the BBC, of pursuing an identical propaganda exercise as Doctor Josef...

Comments: 10

Crippen looks at the continued horror of life for disabled people in Afghanistan

15 February 2010

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My on-line work takes me to areas all around the world where I'm asked to create images of disabled people facing oppression in all of its many forms and manifestations. Most of us in the West may be faced with limited access and be struggling to live on a reduced income. However this is a walk in the park compared to some situations I hear about concerning our disabled brothers and sisters in the third world. Take Afghanistan for example. The rights of disabled people in that country are not...

Comments: 4

Crippen looks at history in respect of the Assisted Suicide debate

1 February 2010

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Unsurprisingly Assisted Suicide is still in the news with another ruling that let a mother who aided her daughter to end her life, walk away from a murder charge. Why the daughter who had ME was 'bed ridden' for over 17 years, was just one of the issues that wasn't addressed during the recent court appearance. The author Terry Pratchett, who was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer's has also come forward to advocate changes in the law that will make assisted suicide legal. He has also recommended...

Comments: 10

Crippen looks at the reality of life in a residential home

25 January 2010

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Disabled activists, who campaign to raise awareness of those disabled people who are currently incarcerated in one of the many homes run and controlled by the big disability charities, are often asked, "but surely in this day and age, no one is kept in these places against their will?" In answer to this, I want to tell you about John (not his real name), who resides in a Leonard Cheshire home for young disabled people. We've exchanged emails a couple of times and I've sent him a copy...

Comments: 8

Crippen looks at poverty amongst disabled people with the assistance of Dan Pitt's blog

14 January 2010

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The following is taken from the blog of 17 year old Dan Pitt who has very kindly agreed that I can post it along with my latest cartoon. 'Despite nearly 15 years of new legislation, the results of a new survey reveal that disabled people in the UK are facing rising levels of poverty and discrimination. Yet many disabled people believe things are getting better. What explains the contradiction? Disabled people are twice as likely to live in poverty as non-disabled people. Leonard Cheshire...

Comments: 6

Crippen looks at patronisation of Disabled people

7 January 2010

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Hi folks. I'm starting 2010 as I mean to go on; gloves off and more in your face then ever before! And my first question for this decade is: 'How much longer do we have to beat our heads against the wall of discrimination that exists in the UK?' I don't know about you but I'm getting pretty pissed off about the lack of any real progress regarding public perception of us crips and our role in society. It's still mainly those over paid non-disabled parasites who run those big organisations that...

Comments: 7

Crippen is asked to look back over his work during 2009.

23 December 2009

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Our esteemed Editor Colin has invited the dao bloggers to look back over the past year and highlight some of the events that have crossed our keyboards. Never one to stick to a brief and usually finding ways to expand the boundaries (Ed: Tell me about it!), I delved into my back-up hard drive, clicked on the folder marked 'the beginnings' and came across the original cartoon that had started me on my career as Crippen. I've redrawn it several times since then, adding colour, altering the...

Comments: 5

Crippen looks at what Cast Offs has done for Disabled people in the UK

20 December 2009

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Most of you will have either seen it (or heard the audio description)  or will have read about it. Either way, you'll have realised just what an impact the new Channel 4 series Cast Offs, starring REAL disabled people in the roles of the disabled characters has had on the disabled community. Fed up to the back teeth with non-disabled actors playing disabled characters, crips around the UK have voted a resounding YES! for this pioneering piece of television comedy drama. The episode that...

Comments: 8

Crippen posts his favourite christmas card cartoon

15 December 2009

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This time of year I'm often asked to produce cartoons for christmas cards for the many groups and organisations of Disabled people throughout the UK. This year however, there's been a noticeable reduction in these requests, mainly due, I'm told, to the fact that many of these organisations are just too strapped (lacking funds) to be able to afford to have cards printed and posted this year. So, in the spirit of good will and co-operation that exists at this time of year I thought it would be a...

Comments: 5

Crippen has a few things to say about BBC's Children in Need

25 November 2009

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Unfortunately, due to problems with t'internet I'm a bit late with this cartoon which was intended to come out during the recent Children in Need event on BBC Radio and TV. Still, better late than never ... and the idea of a Trojan Pudsey rather tickled me! Needless to say, us Crips are still campaigning against this charitable farce. Our message is loud and clear and asks why do Disabled children still have to rely on this type of humiliationathon AND have to appear sufficiently grateful in...

Comments: 3