ableism

Noun

ableism (countable and uncountable, plural ableisms)

1. (uncountable) Discrimination or prejudice against individuals with physical, intellectual, psychiatric, or other disabilities.
   • [from late 20th c.]
   • Ableism is your ability to find reasons to push us aside to keeps us in cages, leave our struggles out of the history pages … pretend we never existed. Ableism is when you say I'm the only disabled friend you've ever had. Ableism is when you say that and still don't understand why we feel...2019, Michelle R. Nario-Redmond, Ableism: The Causes and Consequences of Disability Prejudice, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN

   Synonyms:

   able-bodyism, able-bodiedism, ablecentrism, disablism, handicapism

2. (countable) An instance of ableism.
   • Developing guidelines around which ableisms and favoritisms of abilities are ethical , e.g. which form and shape of competitiveness might be ethical and which might not, can be a useful tool for the governance of S&T.2010, Susan E. Cozzens, Jameson Wetmore, Nanotechnology and the Challenges of Equity, Equality and Development, page 101
   • And, as a media and communication PhD, I know this is because the English language itself is a media so biased, with ableisms so deeply built in, that roads (which seem to lead away from ableisms) in fact, lead directly back into them.2023, Dr. Bernadette "bird" Bowen, I have been the bad guy, page 242