Cripple-Women Groups
“Cripple-women: Let’s seize the day”1
The first ‘Krüppelfrauen-Gruppe’ (cripple-women group), as the members called themselves, was founded in 1981. Most of the women had previously been active in the women’s movement or the disability rights movement and now wanted to focus on the specific situation of disabled women.2
Like mixed-gender cripple groups, the women called themselves cripples to provocatively draw attention to the social exclusion of disabled people. The meetings of the cripple-women were open solely to disabled women. The activists showed solidarity with both the women’s movement and cripple groups or were active in both movements.3 However, they continually faced difficulties in the mixed women’s groups, where the problems faced by disabled women due to their disability receded into the background and were overlooked.4 In the (mixed-gender) cripple groups, on the other hand, there was too little reflection on gender relations.5
The cripple-women addressed their multiple discrimination as disabled and as women in the contexts of both the disabled movement and the women’s movement. Within the women’s movement, the disabled women had to continually work to ensure that their specific perspective was heard and they had to fight for barrier-free access to women’s spaces, such as during the Berlin Lesbian Week in 1987.6 The experience of not being heard within the women’s movement caused the cripple-women to question the feminist ‘we’. They demanded that precisely the differences between disabled and nondisabled women be dealt with for all women to be adequately represented. The conflict of the cripple-women within the women’s movement was part of the larger discussion on difference within feminist discourse that intensified in the 1980s through the founding of new feminist groups such as the ‘Shabbeskreis’, ‘ADEFRA’, and the ‘Krüppelrauen’.
Gender: Disabled, Distinguishing Feature: Woman
In the first half of the 1980s, a West German network of disabled women was founded. The women shared their experiences (of discrimination) and analyzed their specific oppression from that perspective. At their meeting, a proposal was made to write a book together that dealt explicitly with the situation of disabled women. The book, Geschlecht: behindert, besonderes Merkmal: Frau (Gender: Disabled, Distinguishing Feature: Woman), was published in 1985. It brought together personal experiences and theoretical reflections. The women wrote on several subjects: They analyzed how disabled girls were raised, taking gender-specific factors into consideration. They also investigated the consequences of beauty ideals and described their experiences in their daily working life and the discrimination they faced in the healthcare system—with respect to motherhood and abortion as well. The cripple-women broached subjects that had not been previously addressed publicly, such as forced sterilization and rape of disabled women and girls. The lawyer and law professor Theresia Degener drew attention to discrimination in German jurisprudence, which often questioned the credibility of disabled women and girls.7
The dilemma with self-determination
With respect to pregnancy, abortion, and § 218 (the German law restricting abortion), the cripple-women groups encountered implications of ableism, both in the legislation itself as well as in how feminists dealt with it. The embryopathic (i.e., fetal anomaly) indication in § 218 states that an abortion can be carried out with impunity if the embryo exhibits an ‘impairment’. The cripple-women interpreted this indication of § 218 as ableist. However, they also did not want to deny women the right to decide whether to continue a pregnancy:
“On the one hand we are fighting for women’s right to choose … and on the other hand we view the embryopathic indication as discriminatory against cripples. That might initially sound contradictory: Should a women’s right to choose end at the point when a disabled child can be expected?”8
As of 1983, the cripple groups increasingly addressed the history of eugenics in Germany, and in this context, they also challenged human genetic counseling and prenatal genetic diagnosis (PND).9 PND methods were successively refined in the 1970s and 1980s and promised to identify any abnormality or ‘damage’ to fetuses early in the pregnancy. The embryopathic indication in § 218 made it legal to have an abortion based on positive results from prenatal testing.
Research by the cripple groups, in particular that conducted by Nati Radtke and Udo Sierck, showed that human geneticists pursued eugenic objectives and usually recommended aborting ‘damaged’ fetuses.10 The cripple-women concluded from this that the decision by women to terminate a pregnancy based on PND could not be considered absolutely independent and made of free choice. In view of the ableist stance in society in general and of the human geneticists in particular, women could not ‘freely’ decide for or against the continuation of a pregnancy with a fetus that might have abnormalities. Consequently, the cripple-women demanded that § 218 be repealed and that human-genetic counseling centers be closed. They criticized the ‘freedom to choose’ paradigm of the women’s movement while at the same time attempting to develop a new feminist viewpoint incorporating disability politics.
The demand to close all human-genetic counseling centers and especially the questioning of the concept of free choice led to friction with parts of the women’s movement.11 However, it also led to new alliances among feminists. Two conferences were held, in 1985 and 1988, on the subject of ‘women against genetic and reproduction technology’, providing a forum for discussion among ecofeminists, natural scientists, lesbians, women’s health activists, and disabled women struggling to define a feminist stance on eugenics, human genetics, and the concept of free choice.12 Whereas only a fraction of the participants at the first conference supported the closing of the human genetics counseling centers, a position critical of eugenics prevailed at the second conference three years later. Swantje Köbsell, Anne Waldschmidt, and Degener introduced the positions of the cripple-women groups in the committees and plenary sessions.
New Structures and Networks
Disabled activists continued to expand their networks, make new contacts, and fight discrimination at all levels. The groups that had explicitly called themselves ‘Krüppel-Frauen-Gruppen’ disbanded in the late 1980s, as did the mixed-gender cripple groups. Some activists, however, continued to use the term ‘Krüppel-Frauen’. Many of the women are still active today and have invested considerable time and effort in antidiscrimination measures, theory development, and expanding their networks. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) was organized with significant participation by former cripple-activists, including Degener and Dinah Radtke. The Disability Studies in Germany working group was launched by Köbsell, Waldschmidt, Degener, and Gisela Hermes. Up to now, networks of disabled women have been set up in seven German federal states. Moreover, from 1995 into the 2000s, there was a cripple-lesbians network, and the ‘Weibernetz’, an association dedicated to political advocacy for disabled women/lesbians/girls, was founded in 1998 and is still active today.
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Footnotes
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1
Radtke, Nati: Krüppelfrauen: erobern wir uns den Tag, in: Krüppelzeitung, 1981, no. 3, 32–33. See also: Radtke, Nati: Krüppelfrauen, erobern wir uns den Tag, in: Sie nennen es Fürsorge. Behinderte zwischen Vernichtung und Widerstand, Berlin 1982, 165–70.
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2
While I use an asterisk to mark the diversity of identity positions (actors*, women*, etc.) as soon as I write about specific people, I write “women's movement” without an asterisk. The term “women's movement” is used as a source term; the asterisk here would not correspond to the designation of the movement by the actors at the time. I proceed in the same way with the 'Krüppelfrauengruppen' and all other source terms.
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3
The first cripple group was founded in Bremen in 1977. The activists published the Krüppelzeitung (Cripples Newspaper) starting in 1979. All issues of the newspapers can be viewed online in the archives of Germany’s disability rights movement: https://archiv-behindertenbewegung.org/zeitungen/krueppel-zeitung/.
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4
Strahl, Monika / Waldschmidt, Anne: ‘Na, das geht den Ausländerfrauen doch genauso!’ Zum Verhältnis von Krüppelfrauen und nichtbehinderten Frauen, in: Krüppelzeitung, 1982, no. 2, 10‒12.
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5
Degener, Theresia: Krüppelbewegung + Frauenbewegung – Jacke wie Hose?, in: Krüppelzeitung, 1981, no. 2, 14‒17.
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6
Raab, Heike: Und sie bewegen sich doch. Krüppellesben!, in:Dennert, Gabriele/Leidinger, Christiane/Rauchut, Franziska (Ed.): In Bewegung bleiben. 100 Jahre Politik, Kultur und Geschichte von Lesben, Berlin 2007, 182‒85.
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7
Ewinkel, Carola / Hermes, Gisela et al. (Eds.): Geschlecht: behindert, besonderes Merkmal: Frau. Ein Buch von behinderten Frauen, München 1985, 89.
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8
Ibid.
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9
Sierck, Udo / Radtke, Nati: Die WohlTÄTER-Mafia: vom Erbgesundheitsgericht zur humangenetischen Beratung, Hamburg 1984.
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10
[1] Ibid., 28.
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11
Christoph, Franz et al.: Krüppelschläge. Wie weit reicht das Selbstbestimmungsrecht der Frau?, in: Konkret, 1989, no. 4, 41–48.
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12
DIE GRÜNEN im Bundestag AK Frauenpolitik/Sozialwissenschaftliche Forschung und Praxis für Frauen e.V. (Ed.: Frauen gegen Gentechnik und Reproduktionstechnik, Köln 1986; Bradish, Paula / Feyerabend, Erika / Winkler, Ute (Eds.): Frauen gegen Gen- und Reproduktionstechnologien, München 1989.
