Will Australia ever celebrate the disability community the way it celebrates the queer community? 

As World Pride wraps up in Sydney, Hireup’s Briana Blackett speaks to long-time gay and disability rights activist, Dr David Abello.

I have been watching with absolute delight the spectacular that is Mardi Gras this year as Sydney hosts World Pride.

Seeing the joy and energy of the street parade, I marvelled at how far the LGBTQI+ movement has come since that first street march in 1978. What began as a peaceful protest calling for better treatment of LGBTQI+ people, ended with mass arrests and harrowing accounts of police brutality. The violence of that first Mardi Gras threw a spotlight on the treatment and struggles of Australia’s queer community. 

In the 45 years that have passed, and with fierce determination from activists and allies, Mardi Gras has evolved from something on the fringes of society to something embraced by the mainstream.

As a mum of two disabled kids with disability, who are no strangers to life on the margins, I wonder if the day will ever come that the disability community will be celebrated in a similar way.

Who better to speak to about this than Dr David Abello, who was at the first street march in 1978 and joined the 2023 Mardi Gras as one of its celebrated OG members. Arbello is also a former Board president of People with Disability Australia (PWDA), so I was keen to hear his insights into the struggles and achievements of both communities.

I began by asking him if, back at that street march in 1978, he ever thought decades on that he’d be celebrating, and celebrated, like he is today.

Abello: "No, never. You know, the thing about social movements is you can never predict the outcomes. Not in my wildest dreams did I think we'd be here now. 

Blackett: At the first Mardi Gras, we had people being arrested in the streets. And now, 45 years later, we have people dancing in the streets. Do you ever think the Disability Pride movement will ever reach the same point?

Abello: That's a hard question. We didn't know what was going to happen after the first Mardi Gras. If the police hadn’t attacked us then perhaps there would not have been a Mardi Gras in 1979, there may never have been another one. So that's how it works. 

When we marched [in 1978 and ] had our little parade, we had a permit for 200 people. About 2000 people turned up. The police didn’t know what to do because there weren't many of them. 

It was terribly violent. They were ramming people by their heads into the side of [paddy] wagons. They were throwing people into the doors and smashing the doors shut on their legs, all sorts of stuff like that. People hid if they could under parked cars. People tried to get into cafes that were open. But after the dust settled, all the wagons went off to Darlinghurst police station, so we followed. We kept a vigil because they were beating people in the cells. And some of them got terrible, terrible injuries that lasted for many years. So it was a full on event. 

I suppose it was a game changer for us. We showed people how brutal the police were to us. And while there were no outside broadcasts in those days for television, there was a bit of radio and I have since heard some of this audio and it [sounds] even more scary than [it was] being there, in a way. I think we got a lot of sympathy from people about the brutality, and I suppose it was the beginning of a change. 

Blackett: So, perhaps, as the broader public learned what was happening to the LGBTQI+ community, it started to turn the tide. Do you think the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of disabled people plays a similarly important role in change-making in Australia?

Abello: Definitely, definitely. I think queers have a different set of concerns sometimes than people with disability, and sometimes they are the same concerns.

Blackett: Can you tell us about the importance of understanding the intersectionality between disability and the LGBTQIA+ community?

Abello: You've got these two ideas, which are very different, but they really intersect around young people becoming sexual. So in both cases, there's a push back from family and community against people's sexual rights and freedoms. And I think that's part of the intersection.

That intersection happens around individual people. [In the late 1990s] I launched a group called Access Plus - Spanning Identities. We were active around all sorts of issues particularly interested in sexual rights and freedoms of all people with disability - not just queers - and that was our position. That was a group that came out of the disability movement, not out of the lesbian, gay etc communities. Some very highly respected members of Access Plus came out of the disability movement.

Blackett: You’ve spent your life at the vanguard of social change. What did you learn from being a successful advocate? 

Abello: Part of [my success] is about being respected in the movement and then respected for my individual and group achievements. 

But you find opponents everywhere. One of the things we were doing in the 90s was talking about sexuality and supported sexuality. And then when the NDIS came along, that produced a different kind of discussion and we started making demands around that. We never argued that people should get money to pay for sex workers, [but] we were represented like that. We were also accused of supporting the international sex trade, and all sorts of ridiculous things. We never said public money should go to people having sex with somebody.  [It was] more about help with personal grooming, help with dressing, help getting to a place, that sort of stuff. 

We had some extraordinary family activists. One woman used to drive her son to the brothel and wait at the front until he was finished and then drive him home because people in his residential service wouldn't help him in any way to do that activity. So, this smacks of the old thinking [of disabled people as being] the eternal child, the eternal innocent, you know, that we're not sexual. We can't be trusted to be sexual.

Blackett: What would your advice be for up and coming advocates?

Arbello: There's a lot of literature around. In fact, me and a couple of other people put together a book which came back from the printer a week ago, called “Voices from 1978”. 

Also, I would encourage people to join an advocacy organisation like People with Disability Australia (PWDA). And there are always ways [to get involved], [such as] reference groups and membership groups, to participate in the governance of an organisation at that level below the Board. 

There are things to get involved in [that develop] advocacy skills and knowledge. Know the knowledge of the nature of oppression, how it operates on people and how it damages them. There are all sorts of queer groups, sporting groups, community groups, environment groups. There are all sorts of things you can do to get a start. 

And there are all sorts of rewards for activism. You don’t always get the crap beaten out of you.

Blackett: So, basically people should put themselves out there, get involved, get educated and just be ready for the long haul.

Abello: Yes. Yes, and you can be surprised in the end. I’ve experienced that a lot. Walking down Oxford Street, in front of the Mardi Gras, it’s a very emotive thing to do.

Blackett: Tell me what it’s been like this year? 

Abello: I actually walked in the parade [even though] it nearly killed me. It was worth it though as I really wanted to interact with the crowd. I walked along the edges, getting kisses and hugs and handshakes and hearts on us and all that sort of stuff.

I cried. I’ve just been overwhelmed by the good cheer and the regard of the crowd." 

It’s this good cheer and regard that I hope my kids will one day feel instead of the marginalising and stigma they face today. And while David says change for the LGBTQIA+ community happened due to a confluence of events - from that first violent mardi gras in Sydney, to a new state government and a growing global gay rights movement - I’m heartened to know that social change on this scale is possible. 

I’m looking forward to the day my children not only have a seat at the table but are dancing on them, perhaps on the back of a truck going down Oxford street, cheered on by thousands of people embracing the beauty of human diversity.