Hello and sorry about the echoing silence; we've been mulling. Here's what we think (and apologies in advance if any of the terminology in here is off - as Peachy's response to our RT shows, lots of us here at MNHQ need a bit of schooling in these matters too).
We hear you when you say you want this campaign to be about all people with additional/specific needs, not just the under-18s. Those of you who suspected that we were thinking about the under-18s were right; this is because the thread in question was very much about the behaviour of a young child, and over the years there have been many eloquent posts by parents who are upset or angry about other people's reactions to their children's behaviour.
We're still inclined to make this a campaign about under-18s (although, in the end, if that's not something our posters want, it won't get off the ground and we'll have to think again!) The campaign space is crowded - even in a specific area like disability - and in order to get any traction or attention, you need to think carefully about your angle. Over the years, we've come to believe that we are at our most effective when we campaign on things that are very specific, and which speak to what the media and the public in general expects from us. As a site for parents, we think we could make a fairly big noise in the area of children with additional needs and the perception of their behaviour: it's a very specific issue, one that hasn't been widely addressed, and one that we think could catch people's imaginations.
We also think it has a very specific purpose, which is to get people to consider whether the behaviour they're seeing is 'naughtiness' or something else. Much as this is an idea that's fairly familiar to MNers because of the many debates we've had over the years, we suspect it's a completely novel idea to many in the wider public.
While we can see from the thread that people want a very broad campaign about lots of different aspects of disability, inclusion and perception, in our experience it's much more difficult to get the press and public to take an interest in this sort of thing: without a single, sharp, specific angle, the whole thing risks being written off as a bit vague and unfocussed.
As PolterGoose says: 'I agree with hazeyjane if the campaign is too broad it will become meaningless. There needs to be a reasonably tight focus to mean something to those it is aimed at. To cover the full range of disabilities, plus all ages, plus parents/carers is just too huge.'
That's not to say that the material associated with the campaign couldn't cover lots of the brilliant ideas here (we love the stuff about stats, about language, about the law, about the different conditions and impairments that people can be born with and/or acquire, about challenging 'DLA scrounger' myths, and about equality and respect); we just think we need to be careful about the top-line focus. As we're sure many of you know only too well, many disability awareness campaigns have come and gone over the last couple of decades, many of them without making a big impact.
Anyway, that's our thinking - but it's not the last word by any means. This isn't going to work unless MNers are happy with it. So do let us know what you think.
And we will, of course, give serious consideration to asking Lidl to partner up with us 