WE ROAR Magazine April 2024 - Magazine - Page 35
We have global advisors that have tonnes of
experience, and we have global advisors that are
14 years old with their own lived experience.
They're an expert on their lived experience. One
thing that we see is a lot of people are talking for
the disability community. There's a lot of
disability organisations. There are trillions of
dollars that are spent on our community, but we
still don't see change happening. The
unemployment rates are horrible, the identity
issues. We just don't see progress. I think what
we need to do is we need to convene so we all
can come together, share what each other's
doing, but also be seen
Because if we came together in force, like the
LGBTQIA+ did. They got actually marriage
equality in the United States and some other
countries because they came together. So one
thing I know for sure is that we must come
together.
Three key ones that stuck out for me were the
support for entrepreneurs, the shared economy,
and about empowering the community. I think for
us, where I saw a huge void, if you will, was in
that entrepreneurial/small business/creative
space. That’s where we saw really nobody doing
a lot of this work in the grassroots,
entrepreneurial-type space for our community.
And most backbones of economies are based
around entrepreneurs and small businesses. So I
love the fact that you specifically make it clear to
people that there is and there will be support for
entrepreneurs and that you’re creating that
shared economy.
We want to do funding. There's so much that we
want to do... but it really is about convening and
being discoverable. And we know that In the
United States, 65 % of entrepreneurs have
disabilities, are neurodiverse, ADHD or Dyslexic.
And that's not just in the US. We know that over
the age of 55, according to AARP in the US, 67%
of retired citizens, aged from 67, are disabled. So
as we age, more of us are moving into
[disability].
What was interesting in my life experience is,
sometimes you have no choice but to be brave.
You get thrust out there, right? I couldn't hide
that my daughter had Down Syndrome. I wanted
to at the beginning, but I couldn't because I didn't
want people to decide my daughter was broken
because she wasn't.
And if you come out and you're discriminated
against, I hope you're going to come and talk
about it on social media using hashtag
#WeAreBillionStrong, because the reality is we
really are very strong together.
There's a lot to do, but we have to convene first
and listen to each other and really champion the
changes that can take place, including working
with the AI for all, AI for good, making sure we're
not programming the unconscious biases into it.
Thanks so much for the great talk today. I’m
really looking forward to our work together
and all the great work you and Billion Strong
are and will do to change things for all of us.
(Get the full interview on our YouTube podcast.)
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