In a conversation with Barsha Nandy, for RimJhim held on Oct 28th,2021, a film festival curated by Pickle Jar, Nidhi Goyal shared her personal journey of accepting her diagnosis, facing ableism, and learning to face it with humour. She grew up with her family’s humorous outlook on life and learnt to react to difficulties with humour. Nidhi realized that comedy was also a way to build awareness around disability. This cemented her decision to be a comedian. She spoke about how during a particular show, the audience didn’t see her as a comic but pitied her instead.
The conversation shifted to assistive devices. “The white cane or other such devices often announce our disability to the world, which often leads to us internalizing ableism.” She also spoke about how technology has helped her stay connected to the world. However, social norms do also affect our use of technology. “How many disabled people are actually visible on social media?”
Upon being asked about the #metoo movement, which was also majorly an online movement, she replied by asking if the movement had space for women with disabilities?
“Invisibility continues throughout our life, and it is seen in the #metoo movement as well.”
Our tweet thread to this discussion is here.