Katie Reilly

Last year, an Instagram post promoting a queer burlesque pride celebration caught my attention for all the wrong reasons. It sounded like a really fun, empowering, body positive event. The post noted the event would create a safe, supportive space that welcomed a diverse community. But the event was being held in a basement down what the venue’s Yelp reviews website described as a steep set of stairs, and the building didn’t have an elevator.

Of course Andrea Gibson would leave us in the middle of Disability Pride Month. It feels like one final shout into the world: I was here. I was chronically ill. I mattered — and you do, too. The first time I heard Andrea Gibson’s work, my partner — at the time, someone I was just beginning to fall in love with, now my spouse — sent me a YouTube video while I was commuting to a soul-crushing job.

At least three of the people who died in the Los Angeles area fires last month were disabled individuals who physically could not escape without assistance. Their deaths were met with shockingly cruel comments online, blaming them for not leaving—even though they physically could not evacuate on their own. This is not an isolated incident. Disabled people are frequently left behind in disasters, their needs ignored by emergency systems that fail to account for the barriers they face.