Girls Using Walking Sticks

[Arran2024]

I saw a post about this on X this morning. Apparently it is a trend.

Anyway, I went into town this afternoon and sure enough, I saw a number of young women with walking sticks. None of them looked like they were leaning hard on their stick, just kind of walking along like it was a big umbrella.

Is anyone else seeing this?

I think you thunked wrong on this one.

Disabled people have plenty enough issues from the general population, culture and physical environment making their lives difficult.

Policing other people’s claim on disability just isn’t a thing, much as you’d like it to be.

A significant change in behaviour of a vulnerable group, particularly one heavily influenced by online behaviour, is always worth flagging up. Safeguarding is important.

It may be something or (hopefully) may not. But raising concerns is the right thing to do.

But you’re completely missing the point here.

Where there are more people using mobility aids and making a noise about it, that typically leads to more provision being put in place to accommodate disability.

I for one would absolutely LOVE every person to have to be on cutches, or to use a wheelchair, for, say, one week every year, so they would have some tiny idea of how vulnerable, annoying and time consuming it is to have to deal with life through that lens.

Bring on this army of young blue haired stick waving women. I’m here for it!

Thinking of the social contagion thing more.
I mentioned my neck fan earlier. I had wanted one for a while. Heat has a massive effect on me as it means my nerves really struggle to get messages through to my muscles (I mentioned previously one widely used test for Myasthenia is to put an ice pack on the ptosis and see if the eyelid springs back up).

I wanted one, but I felt nervous about how I would feel about using one in public. So I held off, even though they had been widely recommended on my Facebook groups for Myasthenia

Then I saw a mum at sports day using one. And that gave me the confidence to order and buy something that I knew would help but was worried I would feel self conscious to use.

Theres a positive social contagion at play

Yes, this. And the availability of less obviously medicalised mobility aids has made a huge difference for young people particularly.

There’s a world of difference between an ugly grey NHS “elderly” walking stick vs a glittery red version.

Mobility aids reinvented as fashionable accessories is not a new thing - and its most welcomed as giving more choice and style for those who have to use them.

It’s not disimilar to the rise of fashion frames for glasses. Young women wear plain lenses in those frames in order to get the look of a visual aid, even though they don’t need them.

See also plasters for kids with pictures of superheroes on them. Kids who liked to wear them just because does not devalue the fact they’re nice for those who needed them as an option.

Yes this too.

My daughter has a favourite shop and I didn't used to be able to take her shopping before I got my wheelchair because I got ill so swiftly. I love taking her shopping there particularly since the shop keeper noticed my struggles to get round it and rearranged the layout to make it much more accessible.

In a similar way, my children have allergies and I am so grateful to all the people who are gluten free /vegan as a lifestyle choice as it has massively increased the number of food options available to my children.

Exactly, yes! You can tell really quickly when a shop or service has experience of using mobility aids because they accommodate it without being asked.

I’m all for more young people brandishing sticks or crutches and asking for seats. For a very long time I’ve struggled being the weirdo non elderly person needing a seat, and frankly I’d love some company and the extra noisy advocacy to get more seating made available.

So this thread is now completely hijacked by people talking (informatively) about people with disabilities.

It is a great conversation but completely misses the point.

This is the FWR sex and gender board.

You, of course, and clearly know huge amounts about disabilities invisible and otherwise.

But that is not the point. The issue here is young, vulnerable girls identifying into disability and the potential issues with this.

This is a thread about disabilities and anyone who wishes to can contribute as they wish. It's a discussion thread not an echo chamber

There have been lots of relevant points made. If you don't see them as a relevant that's fine, it doesn't make them any less relevant

And I am so glad there is such a good range of sticks available.
If I have to have a lifelong condition I don't see why that means I should be limited to NHS greige for all mobility aids.

In fact, I need to start a campaign for shower stools in colours other than grey as all the ones I have seen so far are pretty bleak looking

The issue here so far is the unevidenced assumption that young women with mobility aids are “identifying into” disability as opposed to experiencing disability.

The thread title is “Girls with walking sticks” so it’s not unreasonable for female Mners who know about this topic to join the conversation.

And you don’t get to chase us all off because you’d rather be using this as yet another excuse for pearl clutching about trans people.

Disability affects women disproportionately and has a lot of impact on the amount of misogyny and sex discrimination they face. We’ve as much right to be here on FWR as you do.

Hell yeah! Let’s hope cool shower stools will be the next big thing for edgy teens. Extra demand massively encourages stores and manufacturers to create and sell this stuff, so the more mainstream it goes, the better.

No the thread isn't about disabilities.

It's about girls identifying as having disabilities .

Just because you think that points are relevant doesn't mean you aren't missing the point.

Nope- it's about people concluding people are identifying as having disabilities with very limited evidence beyond the fact they aren't visibly disabled.

I'm trying to imagine what a nice shower stools would look like and failing! Maybe sparkly, or rainbow coloured ....

No it's worrying that a social contagion is moving in a different direction.

It's great that women here are swapping positive ideas for girls with disabilities. So I'll bow out and leave you to it.

But I do think it was good the OP raised it.

And given that I have worked with girls that have broken their own fingers and arms, ingested god knows what (including batteries, razor blades and screws), starved themselves, sliced themselves, tried to gouge their eyes out, tried to strangle themselves.... I don't think that trying to disable themselves is 'hypothetical'.

I have to say, working in the field I do and back when I worked in psychiatric hospitals, fantasising and acting on it, about being an amputeee or deaf/blind etc is not as rare as people may think.

Final dip back in! It really isn't. I don't think people appreciate the levels some will go to to elicit care. And how powerful social contagion can be.

And yet there is also social contagion that works the other way too, making people feel more comfortable to use mobility aids they actually need.

This interesting PhD thesis makes the point that “a pathological fascination with becoming disabled has been noted within the clinical literature since the late 1800s”.

Among other things, it uses the ecological niche theory of transient mental illnesses, developed by Ian Hacking, to help explain the phenomenon.

ore.exeter.ac.uk/rest/bitstreams/177145/retrieve

I’m wondering why you think that some people go gluten free as a “lifestyle choice” rather than because they have a genuine intolerance and are attempting to alleviate their symptoms? Isn’t this exactly the same thought process as the one that you are criticising on this thread?

And yet equally, women are often accused of things like this only to find out there is a very real physical cause.

Oh absolutely I know that and I dropped that in there to see if anyone would take the bait

I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make. You clearly haven’t looked at the link.

So long as they’re not that awful off-white I’ll take it.