When international disability consultant Peter Torres Fremlin started the Disability Debrief newsletter 2 years ago, he was trying to tame his insatiable thirst for disability-related news by sorting it tidily into topics.
The pandemic had just begun, disabled people’s rights were being neglected at scale, and it turned out the idea of gathering up reams of disability news and making it easy to skim-read was a popular proposition among his colleagues. Soon, Peter added in-depth interviews with disabled people working in the international disability field to the mix. The newsletter’s readership also began to widen beyond the international disability bubble to include disabled people from all walks of life as well as non-disabled people keen to learn more about disability.
Being a disability news fiend myself, I subscribed to the newsletter early on. With much respect for Peter’s work and his experiences across cultures, I interviewed him on my podcast disability Crosses Borders last year. We kept in touch after that.
As Disability Debrief expanded further and attracted more financial backing, Peter recently invited me to contribute a monthly segment covering pretty much anything about the intersections of disability and climate change–or as I like to refer to the planet-cooking phenomenon, climate breakdown.
So far, I’ve covered why framing disabled people as vulnerable when facing climate impacts is problematic, Bristol’s disabled-led plan for a green and accessible future, and lots more.
I’m committed to using this space to explore how disabled people are fighting for climate justice, and what climate justice even means. For instance, in order to dig down to the roots of the systems that need an overhaul to halt climate breakdown, we need to understand that colonialism is a key driver of climate change.
So, go ahead and subscribe to Disability Debrief. Dispatches from Peter or I will land in your inbox a couple times a month.
If you or your organisation has the means, we also really appreciate your support for the newsletter. It is reader support that gives me the means to contribute regularly and with more of it, we can continue exploring under-reported disability-related perspectives and bringing them to everyone free of charge.
Áine Kelly-Costello (they/she) is a former ENIL volunteer. They are a multiply disabled story-teller, consultant and campaigner. Twitter: @ainekc95
