Accessibility technology is the next big market, but teenage journalist (and power wheelchair user) Emily Flores is looking for tech giants to do better in 2022, and she's using her Cripple Media brand to make sure they listen.
Earlier this year, Microsoft announced(Opens in a new window) a “doubling down” on investment in technology for people with disabilities through multiple AI for Accessibility Grants(Opens in a new window). “If there is one thing we have learned from 25 years of work on accessibility at Microsoft, it’s this: People with disabilities represent one of the world’s largest untapped talent pools, but we all need to act with bolder ambition to empower disabled talent to achieve more,” the company said at the time.
One power wheelchair user who is doing just that is 19-year-old Emily Flores(Opens in a new window). Four years ago, frustrated with the lack of disabled teen representation online (and inspired by Tavi Gevinson’s millennial brand ROOKIE), Flores founded Cripple Media(Opens in a new window), the first Gen Z digital platform for, and created by, teens with disabilities.
Now a second-year journalism student at The University of Texas at Austin, and a researcher at the Center for Media Engagement, focusing on computational propaganda, cybersecurity and digital politics, Flores tells us how Cripple Media is changing the tech/media landscape—and why she’s totally up to report back from Beijing at the 2022 Paralympics.
First, we had to ask about the bold choice of company name. “Right,” laughs Flores. “I admit that part of the reason I called it Cripple is due to its shock value for non-disabled people when they first hear it. But, in all seriousness, it’s called that mainly because of its historical value(Opens in a new window) and meaning to our community—a way of reclaiming our power and ensuring our visibility.”
Like many young people online, it was only through digital communities that Flores could forge connections with like-minded (and similar-bodied) people. By age 14, she was already freelancing as a reporter, focusing on disability, yet it was the first time she came into contact with other disabled teens, found a community, and got a crash course in the disability rights movement. Until that point, like many of her peers, she’d relied on adult caregivers who essentially removed her autonomy and treated her as a lesser, dependent being.
“Until this time, I’d never had a friend—or even talked to someone—that had a disability like me, let alone connected with older disabled adults,” Flores says. “So when I started to report and make connections in the online disability community, I found a new identity. And, importantly, could channel the anger I’d felt at the way disabled people were treated. I knew there needed to be a bigger platform, with many voices to represent us, so I started Cripple as a platform where young disabled people can speak about these issues at a mainstream level.”
POV: you’re looking for disability representation in an abled world 👀 ib: @zarooza 💞 ##disability(Opens in a new window) ##representation(Opens in a new window)
Throughout its upbeat, instructive, and inclusive articles—check out “Ready to Rage – Disabled People Don’t Owe You Strength(Opens in a new window)“—Cripple Media is heavily influenced by the emerging social model(Opens in a new window) of disability. This argues that society itself needs to shape up; widen its concept of what a “normal body” looks like, and become more inclusive for those who are living with disabilities—swiftly replacing the 1950s-era “medical model,” which dismissed disabled people as having a “problem” that medicine could “manage” or “fix.” The former, obviously, is way more palatable to today’s teens looking for a cool identity and decent support.
“The moment I read more about the social model, my world changed,” says Flores. “Everything made sense for the first time. The truth is that systematically, and deliberately in places, society and institutions are not built for bodies like mine. And the pressure should not lie on people like us, but rather the institutions that deny bodies like mine an existence.”
Right now, Cripple is in the middle of transitioning from a zine-like blog (complete with cut-out collage effects and a floating hearts cursor tracker) to a grown-up media company, which will advocate for disabled teens, call brands to account, send a shout-out to tech giants that get it right, while also providing an outlet to train, mentor, and distribute multi-media content from disabled teen creatives.
Its current nascent (boot-strapped) business model is in sourcing support for content production through select sponsorship. But Flores also sees a future in providing fee-based consultancy services to organizations that want to improve their standing in the disability community. For example, in getting Cripple Media to give them the stamp of approval on accommodation for conferences (i.e. ramps, accessible bathrooms, modified hotel rooms, automatic closed captioning, ASL interpreters, and so on).
There’s also a growing band of influencers with disabilities creating branded content, like actor Lolo Spencer(Opens in a new window) (from Sundance 2019 smash Give Me Liberty(Opens in a new window)) and model/spokesperson Bri Scalesse(Opens in a new window), a Cripple Media contributor herself.
The emergence of open-source software, managed services, and modular development meant ramping up wasn’t hard for the team. After all, Flores and her generation have been customizing Tumblr and the like since middle school.
“Our online platform is completely managed and was created through WordPress,” says Flores. “When I was in middle school I spent a lot of time on Tumblr, the blogging site. Since Tumblr allowed for HTML editing and customization of your site, this allowed me to become pretty comfortable with the basics of web design and editing.
“When Cripple first started out, I took to WordPress because I knew it allowed for the customization and control I wanted, and from there I was able to choose and modify a theme for our website,” she adds. “Flash forward to May 2021 when we completely redesigned our website, we now had the honor to work with an amazing art and web designer, Jennifer Heale(Opens in a new window), who completely redid our website and expanded the site’s look and functionality.”
On the horizon—apart from midterms—Flores is looking to score a press pass for the Beijing 2022 Paralympics(Opens in a new window), arguing that it’s essential for representation (and to avoid harmful stereotyping) to have journalists like herself in the media stands.
“Covering the Paralympics is a huge event for the disability community, and so creating and reporting the news on the topic is as essential as any breaking news story,” says Flores. “It’s also crucial for disabled journalists to be the one telling those stories of the disabled athletes, as far too commonly non-disabled reporters frame the athlete’s story in an inspiring stereotypical trope. What’s needed in the next season is for more disabled journalists to take control of those narratives.”
Obviously, as a journalist, and media owner, Flores covers a wider brief beyond disability issues. She’s got her eye on CNN, MSNBC, and foreign bureaus to employ reporters, photojournalists, coders, and more who represent the breadth of talent in the disabled community.
“Cripple Media is pushing for the inclusion of disabled reporters in those newsrooms as well by amplifying young journalists’ voices today, and through offering training in media upskilling. Because not only does increased diversity in newsrooms encourage for the better telling of diversity stories (ex: disability stories), but also disabled journalists should also be supported and expected to tell any story that is outside of our community as well.”
While pushing for inclusion in mainstream media, what does Flores think about Silicon Valley’s take on accessibility and adaptive tech? The site has given kudos(Opens in a new window) to Microsoft for its Xbox controller release, but other companies have yet to catch up.
“The adaptive tech market is essential to the disability community,” says Flores. “Accessibility in everyday tech products such as video gaming equipment was essentially nonexistent, until the first adaptive gaming kit was released by Microsoft exclusively for Xbox.
Microsoft “also released a line of add-ons that is integral for many of us aside from the adaptive controller. Some of these included leg and wheelchair mounts, larger joysticks, foot pedals and controllers, grasp switches, and more,” she says. “However, two years later since the release, Microsoft still remains the only tech giant to tap into this market. We’re looking to the others to do better in 2022 and beyond.”
If you’ve got a concept for low-cost assistive technology, the next deadline for Microsoft AI for Accessibility Grants is Dec. 17, 2021(Opens in a new window).
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S. C. Stuart is an award-winning digital strategist and technology commentator for ELLE China, Esquire Latino, Singularity Hub, and PCMag, covering: artificial intelligence; augmented, virtual, and mixed reality; DARPA; NASA; US Army Cyber Command; sci-fi in Hollywood (including interviews with Spike Jonze and Ridley Scott); and robotics (real-life encounters with over 27 robots and counting).
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