Reflections and lessons from Birdability Week 2021
Wow! What a blast. Birdability Week 2021 was even more exciting and empowering than our first Birdability Week last year… at least for me! (Hi! I’m Freya. I’m the staff person at Birdability.)
From amplifying the experiences of birders with access challenges, to helping more folks feel like part of the birding community; from sharing about the features of a truly accessible trail, to learning important lessons on respectful collaboration. We even continued to redefine birding! (If you missed any of the events, you can watch all the recordings via the Birdability Week 2021 webpage.)
By any measure, it was a successful event:
6 free, online events reached more than 17,000 people around the world, spreading the news about our work to share the joys of birding with people who have disabilities and other health concerns;
46 accessible bird outings were held during October across 22 US states and Canada to help celebrate Birdability Week;
46 (coincidence?!) new accessible birding locations were added to the Birdability Map;
We received more donations during that week than any other week of our existence as a nonprofit;
We created community, representation and amplified birders with access challenges, to help ensure that birding truly is for every body!
There were many highlights of our biggest event of the year. I learned, I reflected, and my brain expanded — so I wanted to take note of some of them in case they’re of value to you, too.
Often the onus to share your own accommodation needs in order to participate in an event (in-person or virtual) is put on someone with an access challenge. It’s so much more welcoming, and helps take off some of that weight of having to advocate for yourself, if event organizers can invite folks to share their accommodation requests ahead of time. (This also gives organizers a better chance at being able to meet these requests!) Although we had closed captions enabled for all our events, and American Sign Language interpreters at both panels, I was grateful to have this pointed out to me. During the Good IDEA for Birding panel, Kari Sasportas, who is autistic, requested that I call on her directly if she hadn’t answered a question, because sometimes she has difficulty knowing when it’s her turn to speak. Jerry Berrier (who is totally blind) mentioned that he wouldn’t be able to keep track of the chat box, and that he’d need any information presented visually to be verbalized or he’d miss it. This was wonderful! Now that I knew this, I could do my best to enable participation for these folks.
For the first time, in both these panels, I tried to set safety expectations of all participants by stating out loud that any racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist or anything else horrible would not be tolerated, and if someone did write something like that in the chat, after giving someone an opportunity to apologize or clarify their intent, I would remove them from the Zoom. I’m not naturally assertive, but for sure: the discomfort I might feel in saying (or even doing) this is much less than any harm that may have been caused to other audience members or panelists. I learned how valuable this was because multiple people thanked me privately for doing this. I mentioned to Emerson (who hosted the DIY Backyard Bird Feeders workshop) that I wasn’t planning on doing this before her event… but she assured me it was valuable and completely appropriate. Like sharing my pronouns when I introduce myself, or including a land acknowledgement, I’ve now learnt that stating this behavioral expectation upfront may or may not feel important to me, personally… but it may be really important to others in attendance. I plan on doing it for all virtual events going forward.
The unexpected highlight for me from Birdability Week was going on Instagram Live for the Birdability Big Sit. We were aiming to amplify birders with access challenges, and to fundraise for Birdability to help support the costs associated with Birdability Week (like honorariums for panelists and the cost of having ASL interpreters). What I wasn’t expecting was helping to create community among birders with access challenges, or how much fun it was just to go birding with folks who I know as Birdability Captains (our volunteers). The engagement we had with folks joining in our Instagram Lives, the questions and excitement in the chat, and having folks share what birds they were seeing or hearing where ever they were was amazing. So was the fact that a couple of our Birdability Captains who all live in New England, but who had never met in person before, have now been birding together because of the community that was created through this event. My cheeks were still sore from so much smiling four hours after we wrapped up, and receiving this Instagram message from one of the birders who watched and participated all morning was incredible:
Seriously thank you! As my mobility has declined over the years, watching wildlife and birds in my backyard has become a real source of joy. At the moment my own home is not fully wheelchair accessible nor is my car. The last few months have been especially challenging for me with illness, loss of my pet, and injury. I dream all the time of someone sitting on my patio and just watching the birds with me. Thanks to you, today that happened! #HappyTears
Empowering exploration and adventure
During the Empowering Exploration panel, we delved into what “exploring” and “adventures” mean to some folks with disabilities and other health concerns. A few really powerful thoughts were dropped by panelists, including:
"I think it slows you down if you worry too much about everything." — Topher Downham, who uses a manual wheelchair after a spinal cord injury.
"Exploring is something that happens in your head. It's not something that happens outside of you." — Michael Hurben, who has retinitis pigmentosa (which causes low vision).
"There are so many less rules outside. Go for it! Everything is exciting." — Emerson Milam, who has ADHD and chronic Lyme disease.
"Curiosity is a really important part of being an explorer." —Virginia Rose, who is the founder of Birdability and uses a manual wheelchair after a spinal cord injury.
"You know you've done a really good job exploring when you change your mind about something." — Michael Hurben, who has also written for the Birdability Blog (you can read about birding with retinitis pigmentosa here).
Welcoming and inclusive birders
During the A Good IDEA for Birding panel, I got to chat with some of my heroes about what being welcoming and inclusive means for BIPOC, LGBTQIA+ and disabled birders, and those who share intersecting identities. We could have talked for another hour and a half (easily!) and we didn’t cover everything I hoped to… which just goes to show how much work there is to do for us would-be allies. Some of the key messages I heard:
Being welcoming and inclusive is easier when you remove the ‘rank’ and assumptions from some folks’ approaches to birding.
“We take pride in our no judgement, fun, casual vibe to birding.” — Dexter Patterson, co-founder of the BIPOC Birding Club of Wisconsin.
“I don’t really focus on what I can’t do, or what abilities I don’t have. I focus on the ones that I do. I probably get a lot more out of birding than most sighted people think I do. So I promote a situation where I’m not judged, because you can’t really put yourself in my shoes and feel what I feel.” — Jerry Berrier, who is totally blind.
Regarding online birding groups: “It's not a competition folks! It's like, literally, it's just birds, you know! I think some people in those groups just get a little ridiculous where they think they're competing with this person and that person, and I'm not even thinking about you! !'m trying to get my lifer! So you can just mind your business. I mean, if you don't got nothing nice to say don't say nothing at all.” — Dexter Patterson, co-founder of the BIPOC Birding Club of Wisconsin.
It can be too much labor to try and change a system that wasn’t built with you in mind… but you can build your own system that does create what you need.
“You can’t always change the mainstream birding community and so we created our own system. We start with the premise that we know how to create safe space, but we also need the mainstream birding community to do better, and we will support people to do that.” — Monica Bryand, founder of the Urban Bird Collective.
“Part of creating a Queer space is having Queer people in leadership positions. It’s one thing to say ‘We are welcoming to all,’ and ‘This is a safe space,’ but it’s another thing to do the work to create that.” — Elise Greenberg, founder of Philly Queer Birders.
Redefining ‘birding’ to be more broad and inclusive helps everybody.
“The common thread is that birding is for everyone. The common thread is that we’re all human beings. The common thread is that birds are amazing. That’s what brings us together.”
“All birders are ornithologists, but not all ornithologists are birders. Just seeing birds and observing birds and appreciating birds is studying birds.” — Letícia Soares.
“We try to make spaces for birders who never even really thought they could be birders.” — Meghadeepa Maity, organizer for the Anti-racist Collective of Avid Birders.
“The common thread is that birding is for everyone. The common thread is that we’re all human beings. The common thread is that birds are amazing. That’s what brings us together, but the experiences will be different. And I think that the more we’re allowing ourselves to see that and to process those things, and making an effort to understand those differences for people, it’s only better for the community. ” — Dexter Patterson, co-founder of the BIPOC Birding Club of Wisconsin.
Be open-minded about how someone, or a group of people, want to engage with birds.
“I’ve really learned things from people who don’t bird the way I do, and that has helped me enjoy birding on days when certain things might not be accessible to me.” — Meghadeepa Maity, organizer for the Anti-racist Collective of Avid Birders.
“What I’ve learned is that even though I’m a Black birder from Philadelphia, I don’t know what the experience is for Black people in other places. So as a new person in this space, ‘What are the ways that you already enjoy birds?’ And one thing that I’ve heard a lot is that, ‘We love our birds! We love our wildlife! But we’re not considered to be doing it in what is named the ‘traditional’ way.’ And the fact that we even call it ‘traditional’ can be in many ways problematic. But people love their birds, even if they’ve never touched binoculars before. So being very strategic and intentional about how we can make the resources that have been accumulated in this space be available to people in ways that they want to engage with them. ” — Corina Newsome.
“I think just approaching people with a level of understanding that — unless we’re talking about it openly — we don’t know what other people are going through. And so I think it’s really important to approach people with an open mind and not make assumptions.” — Kari Sasportas.
“Realities are different in different places, and problems are different in different places. So learning the local needs of the communities that you would like to work with, and you'd like to serve — and I’m specifically using this word serve because you're serving these communities and serving their needs — so you need to listen and really learn the issues.” — Letícia Soares.
Make sure you’re working through an intersectional lens.
“I think intersectionality is acknowledging the multiple ways that white supremacy affects all of us in different ways. For some of us, those ways just cross and life gets harder and harder because of that. I think we should all be committed to deconstructing those values and putting different ones in place.” — Letícia Soares.
Trust people to be the experts on what they need.
“If we want to bring more people in, and bring people to these spaces, we have to do it our way. And our way is to hold that space for the targeted community — so BIPOC and LGBT folks. One of the things we do is try to say to white folks, ‘Give us the space. We need this to come out. And there will be other times when you all are welcome, but sometimes we just need our own space’.” — Monica Bryand, founder of the Urban Bird Collective.
“We don't have to disclose our disability. It's really up to us to explain it to you. If we just say ‘We are disabled,’ you don't need to ask. Let us disclose if we are comfortable.” — Letícia Soares.
And some quality general life advice: “It's crazy because fear keeps us from doing a lot of the things that we love, and a lot of the things that we care about.” — Dexter Patterson.
I also learned a lesson I wasn’t expecting. It can be scary to admit you don’t know something, or that you got something wrong — or that you might get something wrong — especially in a public setting. Would-be allies sometimes need safe spaces too when they’re doing their best to learn and amplify others. Constructive feedback to help you grow and improve — and acknowledgement when you do get it right — is so much productive than assuming the worst and only ever criticizing. I’m very grateful to the three BIPOC birders who taught me this before and after the Good IDEA panel; they provided me that safe space and encouraged me to keep going.
In all my preparation for Birdability Week, and for the Good IDEA panel, I missed two big things. During that panel, I paraphrased a famous quote without knowing who said it, and I referenced someone’s work… but in the chat, I shared other people’s explanations of it, and not the original source. I woke up the next morning realizing this. At the same time I realized, with some horror, that the two people who I had failed to reference as these sources were both Black women. As an occupational therapist with a strong respect for evidence and citing sources, I was pretty horrified that I’d missed both of these, especially as it may have been to do with some awful, racist internal bias that I hadn’t even realized. I am doing my best to continue to work on my anti-racism practice in my personal and professional life, and so in an effort to hold myself accountable for these errors I shared this on my Instagram account on Friday and would like to note two important things here:
It was Maya Angelou who said, “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
Kimberlé Crenshaw is the scholar who came up with the theory around intersectionality.
And my final lesson? Yes, it’s possible to plan these kinds of events by yourself. (I know, because I did this for Birdability Week 2020.) But it’s much less stressful, and much more fun, to have a team helping you (and a few months’ lead time). A huge thank you to the Birdability Captains who were part of the Birdability Week Planning Committee — coming up with creative ideas, keeping me on my toes, and being a wonderful group of thoughtful, engaged people. Thank you Emerson, Becca and Kari! We’re so grateful to National Audubon, too, who, again, collaborated with us so beautifully to help make Birdability Week 2021 such a great event. Big thanks to Tracy, Elizabeth, Casey, Alex, Bethany, Preeti, Liz, Nick, Loren, Chandler, Dan and everybody else who helped make this such a success. And thank you to you, too, for participating in Birdability Week! I hope you learnt something that you can amply to your birding (or to your every day life!).
Mark your calendars for 17-23 October 2022, folks! I can’t wait to learn more during Birdability Week 2022!
