'I wouldn't change anything about myself': Why the world needs to change, not people with disabilities

Watch You Can't Ask That on CBC Gem

Maria Bangash is 19. She loves K-pop, makeup, and combating ableism on social media. Also, she uses a wheelchair, and is one of the young people in Growing Up With a Disability, an episode from the new season of You Can't Ask That.

"I've always said I'm a person with a disability, not a disabled person," Maria says from her home in Markham, Ont. "And I don't think disability is a negative word, but I think our media has made it negative." 

As a person with a disability, too, I was excited to ask Maria about her experiences, her childhood, and her secret superpower.

Levelling the playing field

When I was a kid, I often felt excluded because of my disability — or rather, because of a lack of accessibility. My childhood was 30 years ago, though, and I asked Maria if she thinks things have improved for kids with disabilities. She says from a healthcare perspective, yes. 

But from a recreational perspective, we have a long way to go. Parks, sports and other activities are often inaccessible, and Maria points out wryly, "People with disabilities have hobbies and interests too, you know?"

People with disabilities have hobbies and interests too, you know?- Maria Bangash

"Kids with disabilities deserve to have fun. Kids with disabilities deserve to go on the same bus as all their friends at school. We need our educators, our schools to be more sensitive." 

My heart aches to know society is still so far behind, and I often think when it comes to some kids being excluded, both sides are missing out. Everyone benefits when everyone belongs.

A bird, a plane, a cut in line!

Having a disability can give you all kinds of superpowers — problem solving, observation, compassion — and not just a decent parking space. Maria says she delights when people offer to let her skip a line, or when security at a concert will take her to front row seats. 

"If there's something that your oppression can do to elevate you, I will use it," Maria says. "My whole life is so complex and complicated, and until you implement systems to level me out, I'm going to use that to my advantage." Maria says some people stare as she wheels past them to the front, but she doesn't care, and I think her superpower isn't just taking those opportunities, but not letting anyone take them from her. 

The question that always gets asked — and the turning point

"I wouldn't change anything about myself," Maria Bangash says in Growing Up with a Disability. But she adds, "If I could change things in society? Oh, 100 per cent!"

The question "What would you change, if you could?" is one all of us with a disability have been asked many times — sometimes with open curiosity, often with close-minded ignorance — and like Maria, I, too, wouldn't change anything about myself. But it took me well into my adult life to figure that out, and I'm struck that she's cracked the self-love code so soon.

"I woke up one morning and I was like, 'No, screw it, I'm done,'" she says about her turning point in self-acceptance during her first semester of college. "I can be pretty in my own way. Who says that sitting down can't make you pretty? Who says that being tall makes me pretty? Who told me that? Like, where am I getting this from?"

"I started doing things I like, that make me happy, that made me feel pretty," she continues. "I want to be happy. I want to live a fulfilling life."

These are basic desires, but for a person with a disability, it can be a radical declaration in the face of ableist media and a non-accessible world. 

The power of being seen

"Once I accepted myself, I saw my life change," Maria says. "I started posting on social media more, I started to gain a following." That following includes almost 10,000 people on TikTok, though when she first downloaded the app, she didn't start posting right away. 

"I saw some ableist content and I was like, not on my radar!" Maria says she was unafraid to get into arguments with creators and eventually took to posting her own stories to help make change. Social media can be a more level platform for people with disabilities, but the lack of representation in mainstream media, particularly of BIPOC with disability, has long made Maria want to speak up.

"I didn't see any people of colour like myself with disabilities on TV. I wanted to see a Muslim girl with a physical disability, chatting her story up on TV and taking the Canadian population by storm. I wanted to see what I could do to make a difference so that little young girls don't grow up thinking that they're less-than because of their physical disabilities."

Once you see Maria in You Can't Ask That, there will be no doubt in your mind she is destined to take us all by storm. The impact is twofold: for anyone with a disability, it's transformative to see ourselves represented. For non-disabled viewers, watching the show is a step toward better understanding.

"Listening to someone's story, their opportunities, what they have to say, their life experiences, I think it can humble somebody," says Maria. But also, viewers might just like her style, "whether it's because of my big mouth and my humour, whether it's because I like to wear makeup, or whatever it is. I hope that when they look at me and the other youth in the show that something about us speaks to them."

Making change

Representation matters. It impacts what each of us thinks is possible for ourselves and for others. I'm excited for Maria's generation and for the kids who will find her online and know that they, too, are more than their chair, or their crutches, or their feeding tube: they are bright, funny, beautiful, and they deserve to feel good in their skin.

"It humbles me so much that someone could take my lived experience and connect with me," says Maria of the kids who send her messages online. "And I'm just so content where I am right now. I wouldn't wish for anything else."