Disability in the media – James Alexander Lyon
Disability in the Media – With the heighten awareness of disability through the Paralympics this year, I want to know why retailers and the media aren’t sitting up and taking notice and using more of them in their campaigns and programming.
Around 10 per cent of the world’s population, or 650 million people, live with a disability. They are the world’s largest minority. This figure is increasing through population growth, medical advances and the ageing process.
In the United Kingdom, 75% of the companies of the FTSE 100 Index on the London Stock Exchange do not meet basic levels of web accessibility, thus missing out on more than $147 million in revenue…and that’s only on the web. Can you imagine how much money that is in day-today life, because shops, restaurants, and other public places aren’t accessible?
When the websites and shops are accessible to people with disabilities they still do not feel totally included because they never see disability in their advertisement only when it’s to shock people or it’s for charity’s or government campaigns.
There are some amazing, talented and very pretty models in the UK like Shannon Murray who did a campaign for Debenhams, Sophie Morgan recently featured in the Stella McCartney London 2012 campaign and Kelly Knox winner of Britain’s Missing Top Model but for some reasons after one or two campaigns the British fashion world stopped using them.
I love the fact that some brands have used disabled models in the past and that it’s a good beginning, but we need to see it on a more regular basis!
You can see some of my images of disabled models HERE. If you are a disabled model and would like to be photographed I’d love to hear from you as I want to address the lack of Disability in the Media