健常者と障害者という恐れるべき両極的な図式がある。障害者印のハンコはどなたが押すのだろう。その人、アキメクラじゃないのか。一体この両者を隔てる境界線はどこに引かれているのだろうか。身体的障害者や知的障害者と、障害者も様々だが、同時に世間では思いやり障害者や想像力障害者が健常者として幅をきかせている。狭い歩道では無神経な自転車放置が車椅子の通行を阻み、盲人を危険な局面に追いやる。駅前広場では放置自転車の山が災害時の人的被害を広げるべく待機している。
これらの現状は全て影の障害者達によるものである。障害者は劣った、面倒をかける、役に立たない存在と考えられがちだ。健常者は全てにおいて優れていると思われがちだ。健康な精神は健康な肉体に宿るなんて、とんでもない既成概念が横行している。真っ赤な嘘である。福祉現場でも真実に気がついていない人々がある。常識の嘘が壁となっているのだ。つまらない常識が、どれだけ様々な可能性を剥奪していることだろう。
真実は全ての人間に無限の可能性と価値を与えている。そこに光あふれる二十一世紀を開く鍵が秘められているのではないか。常識のスポットライトの影になっている可能性の全てに光を与える仕事。この原稿で、あえてそれを自分のライフワークと位置付けしてみたい。
AI translation, cross-checked between two models.
There is a troubling dichotomy that divides people into those without disabilities and those with disabilities. Who is it that stamps someone with the label “disabled”? Isn’t that person the one who sees yet fails to understand? Just where, after all, is the boundary separating these two groups drawn? Disabilities take many forms, including physical and intellectual disabilities; yet at the same time, society is full of people “disabled in compassion” or “disabled in imagination” who wield influence as supposedly able-bodied people. On narrow sidewalks, carelessly abandoned bicycles block wheelchair users and force blind people into dangerous situations. In plazas in front of stations, piles of abandoned bicycles stand ready to increase human casualties when disaster strikes.
All of these conditions are caused by these “disabled people in the shadows.” People with disabilities tend to be regarded as inferior, burdensome, and useless. People without disabilities, on the other hand, tend to be regarded as superior in every respect. The outrageous preconception that “a healthy mind dwells in a healthy body” remains widespread. It is an outright lie. Even in the field of welfare, there are people who have yet to recognize the truth. The falsehoods we accept as common sense have become a wall. How many different possibilities have been stripped away by such petty conventional wisdom?
The truth grants every human being infinite possibilities and value. Might that not contain the key to opening a twenty-first century filled with light? The work of shedding light on every possibility left in the shadows cast by the spotlight of conventional wisdom. In this piece, I would like to go so far as to define that as my life’s work.
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