大象传媒

Katie: 鈥奌ello and welcome to Adapt the World where we are asking the question, if you were to rebuild the world tomorrow, what three things would you change to make life fairer and easier for disabled people? I'm Katie Thistleton from Radio One's Life Hacks, and I've got Social media superstar India Sasha co-hosting with me.

India: Hello. Yes, I'm India, and you might know me for going viral around TikTok, particularly doing a couple of wee cheeky pranks here and there where I prank people with my disability, which is having no fingers on my left hand. In every episode, we're gonna be speaking to a different disabled person about three things they would do to adapt the world and make it more inclusive for them, big or small.

And so joining us on the show today is Fats Timbo. She's a comedian, a model, and was born with Dwarfism but she prefers the term little people. Fats. Welcome to the podcast.听

Fats: Hey guys, how are you?听

Katie: Good, so听 good to have you on with us.听

Fats: Thank You for having me.听

Katie: First of all, Fats before we get to the three things that you wanna change about the world, which is, you know, it's pretty big, isn't it? Just three things to change about the world. Yeah, no biggie today. Tell us a little bit about you and your experience with your disability and why you prefer to be called a little person.

听

Fats: So I was born with a condition called Achondroplasia. My parents, found out when my mother was six months pregnant that I would either have Down Syndrome or Dwarfism, and my mum said, I'm gonna accept my daughter for whatever disability she has, and I will forever appreciate her for that. And then I came out with Dwarfism. Growing up I was very confused because I was like, 鈥渨hy is everyone so tall? Like everyone's way taller than me!鈥� And I would have to go to the hospital a lot of the time for check ups because I'd have ear problems. I would have complications with my Dwarfism as well. A lot of people don't know that Dwarfism carries a lot of health complications. Um, and the fact that I think, I think for me, I like the word little person or the term little person because it makes me sound as human as everyone else. I think Dwarf is just too mythical for me.

I don't wanna, I don't wanna sound like a mythical creature, you know? I wanna sound like a person. I just happen to be little and that's all.

India: I like that. I can sort of understand that because obviously the name for the condition you had, I couldn't even remember.听

Fats: Achondroplasia.听

India: See that is a mouthful and the name for my condition is Symbrachydactyly and I feel like they give these huge names to something and I just call my hand, my baby hand. And then you refer to yourself as a little person and it's completely taking ownership of you and who you are. And that is what you prefer to call yourself. And I prefer to say baby hand.

I really like that. I can relate to that.

Kaite: Yeah. And these, like you say, these names are so complicated, so hard to say, so hard to spell and write that that's never gonna be the common term that everybody uses. So then I suppose what naturally happens is a more common term is born and people say Dwarfism, but then I suppose that's then become Dwarf. Which, like you say, just has these mythical connotations. Why is that? Is it cause of snow white?听

Fats: I guess obviously, in the olden days they saw little people as mythical creatures because they never used to see people like that around. Where it is very rare to have, um, Dwarfism, one in 30,000 births, to be honest with you.

So when they do see one, it's like, wow, these are like mythical people, so I guess writers included them in fairy tales and things like that. So I think that's why society has seen, um, little people as, as that, you know, type of thing. And it's annoying as well because it's like, ra, I didn't choose to have this connotation on my head or, or my, uh, disability that I didn't choose as well. So it's, it's annoying, but I'm, I'm writing my own, um, narrative on my disability and um, like you said, taking ownership.听

India:I love that. And I feel like what you touched on there about kind of it being pictured as this mythical, like mythical dwarf and snow white and the seven dwarfs. I feel like that kind of goes back to something really important, which is representation and how we are representing people with disabilities.Because I feel like anytime you see disabilities on TV and movies and stuff, it's mostly kind of in this kind of fantastical way, and it's like the villain, all these mythical creatures, and it's really dehumanising. It completely takes you away from the fact that you are a normal person and this is your normal life and this is just who you are.

Fats:I completely agree. I feel like representation in, uh, traditional forms of media, whether it's like TV shows, movies, the way they portray disabled people most of the time is like an evil character. And it's like, well, we're not all evil, you know,听 and, um, I feel like it can influence a lot of kids because they can later on be scared of people with disabilities.

India: Yeah, cuz it is usually children's movies and stuff and they're always kind of the evil characters or these scary characters. And I suppose we're adults. Like, I don't think it affects us that much. If we, oh, there's a villain on tv, then people are gonna think I'm the villain. We kind of don't think like that, but kids and stuff, they might. And it could almost distance kids who look different, who are different from their peers and then they end up growing up being a bit more isolated than everybody else. And I suppose that's just something that really doesn't help anybody.

Fats: Exactly. I think a lot of disabled people face a lot of isolation. I faced that in college a lot of the time because I felt like nobody wanted to talk to me. I guess it's, it's a thing where a lot of people don't understand it, there's not much awareness. They're just ignorant to it, I guess. That's what needs to change as well.听

Katie: I think people are scared of offending somebody and saying the wrong thing. So if somebody is very different to them in whatever way that may be, be it gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, If it's somebody with a disability, I think people are like, Oh, I don't really know what to say to that person because their, their life experience is so different to mine. And what if I say the wrong thing? But it's probably because, like what you're saying, India, we grow up not being taught that people are different. Like, we grow up sort of seeing these people on TV and stuff of being like, oh, they're other, you know? And that's, that's the wrong way to go about it.听

India: And that's why I love the whole social media thing and people starting to talk about it more on there. We've took over that now and there's lots more people on there that are talking about their individual life experiences. And for a lot of people, it's the first time that they've ever seen somebody with different types of disabilities. And actually heard firsthand experience of what it's like to be them.听

Kaite: Okay. Well, you've got three things that you would like to change about the world. If we were to scrub it all out and rebuild it again tomorrow, Fats, what's the first one?听

Fats: The first one is making every building or public space accessible for everyone, every type of disability, whether it's blind people, like, let's say there's like a disabled assistant that can help guide blind people or there's subtitles everywhere for deaf people. Just making it so accessible that anyone can walk into a building, you know. For wheelchair users having lifts everywhere, automatic doors, you know,, there's this thing called the purple pound, and I don't know the exact facts and figures, but I think the UK is missing out on like 2 billion or something from the disabled community because so many disabled people can't access these things because it's inaccessible. Like deaf people, they can't go to the cinema cus there's no subtitles. My visually impaired friend can't watch a lot of shows because they don't have audio description in them. My other wheelchair friend, there's so many clubs she can't go to because they don't have lifts. So if they simply made these buildings a bit more accessible, a lot of more people can attend. Cuz one in five people are disabled and a lot of them are just forgotten about.听

Kaite: It's in everyone's interest, you know? It's necessary for the disabled people. But like you say that, that's all about the money, isn't it?

India: Well the money's there just let us spend it.听

Katie: Exactly. Yeah, one of my friends who is a wheelchair user, the amount of stairs we've just carried her up in clubs, like in her wheelchair. And bless her, like that's, you know, she doesn't like that we have to do that, but she's like, no, no, it's fine. just carry me up. It's absolutely fine. But it鈥檚 not ideal to get a load of drunk people to carry somebody up the stairs either though. It's usually for karaoke, there's a karaoke bar where there's a lot of stairs, so you know, you gotta make that extra effort for karaoke.听 What's the second thing you'd like to change about the world Fats.

Fats: Including disability awareness in like PSHE classes in schools so that kids know that there's not just one type of human being. There's different types. So I think making society more aware and understanding and empathetic so they don't, like they're not surprised or bully the next person for having a disability.

India: See, I don't think I was ever taught in school anything to do with disability. Like I was taught about equality in my, what was called learning for life and work, but disability was left out. It was gender, race, it was everything else. And there was no disability mentioned. It was listed, but it wasn't ever discussed or taught or anything expanded on. So I love that point.听

Katie: Yeah, same here. I was never taught anything and actually I think I only started to learn about different disabilities. I've got a family member who's down syndrome, so I knew about that, but I didn't know about dwarfism, I didn't know about any other disabilities actually until I started working for the 大象传媒. And actually the 大象传媒 hires quite a lot of disabled people and I started to work with more people with disabilities and that was when I started to learn about it. But yeah, I don't think I was ever taught about it in primary school or secondary school. And that is crazy when you think about it.

India: That's something that should be addressed if anybody's listening to this that can address that, please.听

India: And you have a final thing that you would do to the world to change it big or small? What would you do for your last one?听

Fats: Giving equal opportunity to everyone in employment. A lot of disabled people are unemployed. I think it, obviously, it's the fact that a lot of buildings are inaccessible. And because a lot of disabled people don't have much confidence as well to address the situation that they're in. Because it's not easy to say, oh, I need help with X, Y, and Z.

And, I think if employers were more understanding and accommodating to disabled people within the workplace, it would make it easier for them to feel like, oh, okay, I can get so and so job, you know? I feel like it's just simple changes that need to happen and then yeah. Cus, it's not rocket science. I guess depending on what disability they have it depends on what job they can get.听 But I think if we made jobs more accessible as well in general, then it would be easier for disabled people to get jobs.听

India: I actually had, this is a really random, like just off point on what you just said there, but I had this business idea like a couple of years ago where, because obviously I have a disability, it popped into my head.I think it's in my notes and my phone from like 2017 that we could try this thing. It's like an app or something. I don't know. I haven't discussed the details with myself. But it's. an app or something that allows people who are quite hesitant to go and to try different jobs because of any restrictions that they might face or anything that might hinder them.

And they can try a shift where they're completely like with someone who's familiar with them or something and they can try to do everything that's in that job and see if they're capable of it. And then you can also show the employer and stuff, you know, I am capable of it and you can actually give a shift a go.

Katie: Like shadowing or work experience, I suppose.听 And then also you could maybe try out that job and you could say to the employer, I can do this, but we need this, this, this. And like, you know, you need to make a few amendments. And then this is a place that disabled people can work.听

India: Practical. Practical.听

Fats: Exactly.听

Katie: Of course, disabled people shouldn't be you know, at home, you know, just having to sort of stay in and, and not be a part of society. Fats, thank you so much for being on the podcast with us today.听

Fats: Thank you so much for having me guys. I feel like it's been a therapy session as well.