Crip Camp Review

Happy Friday everyone! I was recently checking out Rotten Tomatoes’ list of 250 best movies on Netflix right now and was so thrilled to see that CripCamp was listed at #2.

If you haven’t heard of CripCamp it’s the first film, a documentary, released from the Michelle and Barack Obama’s Higher Ground production company. CripCamp focuses on a Camp Jened, a summer camp for disabled kids in the 1970’s that became an incubator for the Disability Rights movement leading to the passing of the ADA in 1990, as many of the Disability Rights leaders were these very kids from Camp Jened.

As the beginning of the film unfolded with footage from Camp Jened in the 1970’s I immediately thought back to last summer when I took Lamp to her first summer camp in Texas, a camp for kids with congenital limb differences. It is a unique experience to watch your disabled child walk into a room filled with other disabled children and know, KNOW, that this will be the first time she walks into a room full of children she doesn’t know and she won’t be stared at, won’t pointed at and won’t be whispered about. Unlike nearly every other situation in her life, she will blend in with the crowd. I watched as she rolled up to other kids and easy conversations started without double-takes or questioning each others’ bodies.

The beginning of CripCamp was a joyful peek into the past where these kids really could just be kids first and foremost. It’s funny, uncensured and a bit crazy like summer camp should be. (Also, it’s rated R, so not for little ones…although there is so much I want my children to see about this movie.) And then there are the conversations as these kids sit around the table discussing real issues–their rights. It was beautiful to see these kids from the past sit around and listen to each other, even when some of them had very delayed speech and were difficult to understand. Instinctively, they knew the importance and the necessity of waiting on bodies and minds that may not function at a typical pace, but that have important thoughts to communicate nevertheless.

The real value of this movie lies in the unfolding of the disability rights movement, something that we as Americans are completely uneducated about. Most of us can cite the Americans with Disabilities Act as the signature piece of legislation that brought disability rights to the forefront, but few of us–if any–can offhandedly name the leaders of this movement. Martin Luther King Jr, Rosa Parks, Gloria Steinham and even Harvey Milk roll off our tongues when speaking about leaders of other social right issues, but when it comes to these disability leaders, we don’t know our history.

In CripCamp we learn about Judy Heumann, Jim LeBrecht, and Denise and Neil Jacobson (a couple that met at Camp Jened) and more. The one disability civil rights name I was familiar with before this film was Ed Roberts. He was barely mentioned in this film, but that’s because most of his work started in the 60’s as a student in Berkeley. And when many of these kids eventually land as Berkeley–which is considered the birthplace of the disability civil rights movement–they are able to build upon the movement he already started. 

As I sat there and watched these brilliant leaders mobilize a movement with clarity, organization and conviction I was astonished and humbled. Because of them, my daughter–and millions of other children–have had access to education. Because of them we can stand firmly in our conviction that it is not only not OK to discriminate on the basis, it is against the law.

But also, I know I watch this film with new eyes that have spent years adjusting to seeing and understanding ableism, albeit from an able-bodied perspective. I see this film from inside a body that is protected in so many ways for the violation of rights these disabled warriors had to fight hard to receive, and now here I am an able-bodied mother of a child with a disability, coming in super late in the game and trying to do my little part to add to the tremendously difficult work they’ve already done. They had to drill through mountain sides, build bridges over cliffs and crush boulders into fine powder so we could have the relatively smooth road we have today. And then I come in with my pretty little pot of roadside flowers, dig a hole, plant it and people are like, “WOW! Way to go! You are so awesome.”

I’m not ashamed of my offerings, but I do want to put my efforts in context. There is a place for my easy little flower, because someone else created that space. And while I’m not ashamed of my offerings, I am rather ashamed that for a long time I didn’t stop to look around and wonder, “Who put that road here? Wow… where did that bridge come from?” And for a while I even thought, “Look at this road I discovered! Wait until everyone hears about this road!”

CripCamp will help you see where this road came from, who built it and just how hard it was to make. And like every other civil rights movement, the problem is not solved, and we still have a long way to go, but I hope that finally, finally, when it comes to disability rights the conversation has at least been started.

Have you had a chance to watch CripCamp yet? What were your thoughts? Anything in particular that surprised you? If you are disabled, what does this movie mean to you in particular? Any insights?