In this episode of Queers & Co., I’m joined by Imogen Fox, a queer Disabled femme who serves up radical body politics, anti-diet talk and non-judgemental compassion.

We chat about Imogen’s first foray into disability rights activism as a teen, the trauma of eating rice cakes and cottage cheese and being indoctrinated into diet culture by those closest to us. We also talk about radical Disability politics, the co-opting and white-washing of movements and whether it’s really possible to use your privilege for good.

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Find out more about Gem Kennedy and Queers & Co.

Podcast Artwork by Gemma D’Souza

Resources

Follow Imogen on Instagram

Read Imogen’s self-proclaimed ‘dusty’ blog here

Watch You on Netflix here

Full Transcription

Gem: Hi Imogen.

Imogen: Hello my lovely! Yeah, I’m not too bad, thank you. I was just saying to you I’ve got a really bad tummy ache, so I’m like in a massive jumper with a big hot water bottle… and a kitten actually, just curled up on the sofa, nursing myself.

Gem: I’m sorry that you’re not well. But that sounds like a really lovely place to be in to recover.

Imogen: It’s not not wellness. The annoying bit about it is that it can be quite a regular occurrence. It’s just that my tummy is part of my impairment. So, things like this are kind of, sort of normal. And my go-to coping strategy is to—especially when it’s cold. Just to huddle up and nest myself a little bit…

Gem: Yeah, absolutely. Well, I think I came across your work maybe a couple of years ago. I’ve definitely been following you for quite a while…

Imogen: We’ve been in touch for a while.

Gem: Yeah! And we met at Body Kind last year.

Imogen: Yeah, yeah…

Gem: So, I’m really excited to get the chance to ask you all my questions. And I guess what I generally start off with when I’m chatting to people is just asking them to introduce how they identify, and I guess what different intersections play a role in them as a person.

Imogen: Yeah, okay. I would say I’m a queer disabled femme. I haven’t really kind of started using the term non-binary, but I don’t really identify as being part of a gender binary particularly. I still use the pronouns she/her although they’re not particularly comfortable. But then I don’t find they/them any more comfortable. So, I tend to use a mixture of both of those things.

I live in Bristol in the UK. And I have been a disability rights activist for most of my life actually. But I found an online community through Instagram a few years ago. So, I’ve just been writing and sharing stuff there for a while.

Gem: Yeah. And I’m really interested in how that came about. You talk about radical body politics which is really powerful and obviously has so many different sides to it. I know you say that you’re anti-diet as well. And sort of your relationship with the medical industry and all those kinds of different aspects… So, it will be amazing to start maybe at the beginning. You say you’ve been involved with disability rights activism for a really long time. How did that come about?

Imogen: Okay! Well, I went to into an integrated school. So, I went to school with other disabled children. And whilst my impairment hadn’t been diagnosed, I was already having symptoms. So, I had some learning support needs.

It was integrated to a point because we still had this designated building. Maybe now, it might be different. There might be accessible toilets in the toilets. But back then, we had to go back to the pavilion, it was called, in the middle of the school grounds. There was like bathtubs and physio rooms and there was like the little mini flat where you could learn cooking skills and that kind of stuff.

So, I was part of that little community. And so, I already had a reasonable experience of difference.

So, when I came out as queer, I was like, “This is an absolute nightmare! I couldn't be more different if I tried.” But back then, there was no Tinder or dating stuff. So, when I finally got the internet in my house—which I was nearly 17—I found a pen pal website where you could pen pal with people because that was a thing.  And I met this incredible woman who is still one of my absolute best friends today.  And she was a woman with an impairment. She’s 10 years older than me. And she was working for the Disability Rights Commission. They don’t even exist anymore, the DRC. And we just hit it off straightaway. There was never anything romantic. We were just really good friends. And we started spending loads of time together.

Well, she was part of the Direct Action Network. And so, when they were doing demonstrations, she’d just be like, “Right! We’re going!” So, I just started going to all these demonstrations. We did some in Birmingham over social care. We did some in Manchester. Actually, we did the Disability Rights Commission. But she did quit her job before we did that one. She didn’t just rock up and be like, “I’m not working today. I’m tying myself to my desk. Please still pay me.”

Yeah, we did loads of demos and stuff. But this was pre-18, so still quite kind of formative. I was forming all my political and identities. I was like, “This is what the social model of disability is.” And I was like, “Yes!” I was completely indoctrinated from the minute I heard it. I totally got it!

So, many of your listeners may well already be aware of what that means. But in society, we live in the medical model of disability which implies that our bodies are to blame for the situation that we find ourselves. However, the social model of disability flips that completely and says that society is to blame for the situations that we find ourselves in.

So, for example, the fact that we don’t have physical access to things isn’t our fault because we can’t physically access them. It’s society’s problem because they don’t make it accessible to us. And obviously, that stretches way beyond physical access, but also financial access or attitudinal access even, all the ways in which disabled people are marginalised by society. It is essentially society’s fault.

Gem: Yeah, and it’s just a completely different way of looking at things, isn’t it? I mean I’ve been lucky enough to work with one in particular disability rights activist who takes legal cases. And starting to work with her… it just shows my privilege. I didn’t realise that that is what people experienced. And yeah, it was really eye-opening.

Imogen: Yeah, I think when you live as a disabled person, you don’t realise either. I guess, in some ways, we’re so genuinely caught up in the belief that we’re to blame, that we just have a problem that is our fault—that we are too big and ask for too much and have too many needs. You don’t realise that you’re worthy of better than that.

And to be clear, I really lost my way in the middle. During my twenties, despite the fact that my impairment was probably—I was probably the most obviously physically impaired I’d ever been in my life, I started dieting. Funnily enough, that’s how I started my Instagram account. I was just doing little posts, but it very quickly turned into this is what I’ve eaten and all that kind of bullshit.

And I really didn’t realise until I clicked with anti-diet that the social model of disability stretches way, way, way beyond disabled people in the way that we might kind of assume disability to mean, that actually encompasses all queerness of bodies in general. It’s about a general societal attitude towards others that is the problem.

And when I finally realised that by thinning myself and dieting and restricting, I was actually suddenly part of the society that was so harmful. It all kind of clicked back into place. And it really reignited my politics. And that’s when my Instagram really took off, because I was angry again and mad about being sucked into something that I was so anti. But you don’t realise how desperate you feel to assimilate when you are already asking so much of the world around you.

So, I had 24-hour care needs. I had a host of medical things that needed doing absolutely every day. And I also wore a dress size 28. I was a full-time power chair user. And I guess a massive part of me just felt like if I can just look different, if I could just be more socially acceptable in my wheelchair with my 24-hour carer and everything else that comes with me, maybe that would make it more bearable? Maybe society would make more room for me? Maybe I could take a little bit more of what I need? And actually, in reality, that is so never the case. It’s never wh