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   Leth (lethargilistic@kolektiva.social)'s status on Tuesday, 03-Oct-2023 06:08:22 JST Leth

   @darlingofinana Cars are not accessible mobility devices. Someone saying they need a car to address a disability is absolutely no different than someone else saying "I need a car to get to my job because it is far away." Which is obvious as soon as you look at the numbers of people with mobility disabilities who use cars: It is much lower than the abled baseline.

   The problem urbanists are trying to solve is that a world designed for the car is fractically inaccessible for the vast majority of people and even worse for people with mobility disabilities. There is no need for centrism on this. A world that is not designed for the car is categorically better for people with disabilities.

   • Embed this notice
     novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️ (anarchopunk_girl@kolektiva.social)'s status on Tuesday, 03-Oct-2023 06:08:22 JST novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     @lethargilistic @darlingofinana

     "Cars are not accessible mobility devices."

     Maybe not most of the time, but how do you know they aren't for some people? Seems a bit presumptuous to me.

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     Leth (lethargilistic@kolektiva.social)'s status on Tuesday, 03-Oct-2023 06:31:17 JST Leth

     in reply to

     • novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️

     @anarchopunk_girl No, that's the comparison to using them for work. It is an individualized justification, not one based on cars' claimed status as a mobility device in general.

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     Leth (lethargilistic@kolektiva.social)'s status on Tuesday, 03-Oct-2023 06:41:59 JST Leth

     in reply to

     • novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️

     @anarchopunk_girl And, to be clear: if that IS claimed as a personal justification, I don't have a problem with that. But it's usually not and the tendency is to try to universalize it, as (with respect) you have demonstrated.

   • Embed this notice
     novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️ (anarchopunk_girl@kolektiva.social)'s status on Tuesday, 03-Oct-2023 06:41:59 JST novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️

     in reply to

     @lethargilisticI

     Please don't attribute points to me that I never made. I'm not saying that because cars can sometimes be useful for anyone, even in a perfect world with perfect infrastructure, and also be necessary for some few people in such a perfect world, that all cars are necessary or we should stick with car centric infrastructure, which is what it seems like you're attributing to me — but to be honest I'm finding it very difficult to even parse the argument you're making, it's incoherent and all over the place and simply dripping with near illegible levels of condescension.

     What I'm saying is that if cars serve as a necessary mobility aid for some people, no matter how few, not as a result of contingent systemic forces, but in a way that would hold true even under perfect city planning, then they are a mobility aid, and completely abolishing them in some absolutist sense is not only authoritarian and absurd — even on abstract grounds I would utterly oppose any attempt to ban cars or try to force people to not have them instead of Simply providing better options and letting people choose what's more practical and efficient — but also ableist. How is that wrong?

     You're saying that cars may be justified for individuals, but somehow you still get to declare that "cars aren't mobility aids" and no one should have them, so it seems like you are the one that's universalizing something that doesn't make sense to universalize.

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     Leth (lethargilistic@kolektiva.social)'s status on Tuesday, 03-Oct-2023 07:47:58 JST Leth

     in reply to

     • novatorine 🏴🏳️‍⚧️

     @anarchopunk_girl What I am saying is that the argument "I need a car to address my mobility disability" is a PERSONAL argument for ONE individual to own car under their current circumstances. It is inappropriate to go from that to, "therefore, cars must continue to exist because they are necessary as mobility aids in general." The reason that I compare that to "I need my car to get to work" (or, for that matter, to commute rurally) is that those are problems in need of collective solutions for which people substitute individual cars because that is easy under current conditions, and so those arguments are rested upon to say that we must not discourage and (ideally, if unattainably) abolish cars generally.

     These mobility issues should be solved with other solutions. The fact that someone under current conditions feels that they cannot get rid of their car for mobility disability reasons does not imply that cars are a solution for mobility disabilities. And, again, that is clear to the many people with mobility disabilities who do not have the option to use cars and are routinely ignored as people rush to defend cars supposedly on their behalf. Meanwhile, the continued existence of cars falls hardest on people with mobility disabilities generally because alternatives aren't invested in.

     I am not trying to be condescending. I am very serious that it is a mistake to argue in favor of cars on the behalf of people who, as a group, are disadvantaged by their existence.