Celebrating Disability Pride Month

ITV Pride in conversation with ParaPride

This interview with ParaPride Co-Founder, Daniele Lul, was originally written by Charlie Cooper Henniker, ParaPride Ambassador and Head of Brand Experiences at ITV, for ITV Pride’s ‘Making What Matters’ series. ParaPride is proud to publish this piece with his permission.

First of all, please tell us a little bit about ParaPride.

ParaPride was set up to address the distinct lack of inclusion for Disabled people in the LGBTQ+ community. We need more accessible and welcoming physical spaces for the people who intersect between these communities, and better representation and more body positivity for them too. Given the high percentage of LGBTQ+ people that identify as having a disability, long term illness, and/or caring responsibilities, there is a stark lack of visibility around people who sit in the cross-section of these intersectional communities, and ParaPride wants to change that.

Can you give us an example of a common misconception that you and ParaPride come up against regularly?

There’s a very dominant narrative that only portrays us as a charity-case or as vulnerable people in need of care and therefore incapable of having a sexual identity and indeed a sexuality.

There is so much more to our disability. We are talented, bold, creative, resilient, and empowered.

How do you think the LGBTQ+ community could be more inclusive to disabled members?

More can be done to make LGBTQ+ spaces more inclusive for Disabled people, and in ways that go beyond the physical barriers. People mostly think of step-free access, lifts, ramps, accessible toilets, etc here. Those are all important parts of an inclusive society; there’s no doubt that infrastructural barriers prevent disabled people from being included, but cultural barriers are so deeply rooted in our society are even more difficult to remove.

Talking more about the different aspects of Disability inclusion and relying on the support of non-disabled friends, colleagues, allies to help us share these learnings can contribute to prevent further barriers and promote more inclusion.

Lastly, what will you be doing to celebrate Disability Pride month?

Plenty! We’ve just come from participating in Pride in London and continue to host events, in collaboration or independently, which people can find out about via our website. We’ve got plenty of sponsor activity going on and of course we’re Proud all year round so there’s much more to come - it’s been amazing to create joyous experiences for our vibrant community to connect at, so it feels like one long celebration really.