Piss on Pity? A Qualified Defense of Pity and Compassion Towards Disabled People

Disability theorists and disability justice activists have long rejected pity as a response to disability, perceived as denigrating and as based in incorrect assumptions about disabled people. Even so, many people – even those who reject the idea that disability is inherently negative – have felt pity towards disabled individuals. In this article, we assess the moral permissibility and fittingness of pity as a response to disability. We start by presenting the argument according to which pity felt toward disabled people is both unfitting and morally impermissible, and consider whether compassion might be a more apt emotional response to disability. We then present alternative conceptions of pity and compassion informed by Buddhism and feminist care ethics. We conclude by arguing that pity can be fitting, but only when it responds to systemic disadvantages incurred by disabled people (and not when it responds to an alleged inherent badness of disability per se), and can be temporarily morally permissible, provided that it is soon replaced by a compassionate, sympathetic response that includes awareness of the pitfalls of implicit ableism and is imbued with a perception of our interconnectedness and vulnerability as human beings.