It’s hard to believe that Elizabeth Barnes continues to position herself as a credible authority with respect to critical philosophical work on disability and even philosophy of disability more formulaically defined. But here we are. In a contribution to a series of summer guest posts at Daily Nous, that is, Barnes has done exactly that. This “personal reflection” at Daily Nous by Barnes–which is simultaneously self-important, disingenuous, and uninformed–provides the material for today’s quote-of-the-week post, though it’s only Thursday.

Why self-important? Because the very existence of the post is premised on the notion that Barnes is an authority with respect to disability and philosophical work on disability. Barnes evidently considers herself in this way, assuming that her alleged authoritative status with respect critical philosophical work on disability should render her professed respect for and friendship with Peter Singer highly controversial and should thus matter to the rest of us, should even trouble us to the point that we will seriously reconsider our own philosophical approaches and methods.

But why should I and other philosophers of disability care that Barnes likes Singer? I and dozens of other disabled philosophers produce work on disability that is much more sophisticated, critically and empirically informed, and innovative than the writing on disability that Barnes has done. Indeed, Barnes herself has repeatedly shown that the scope of her understanding of disability and ableism is limited and others (myself included) have repeatedly shown it to be such. Why should it be considered monumental to us or anyone else that Barnes likes Singer and respects him?

In Barnes’s attempt to dissuade anyone who might have noticed these refutations and criticisms of her claims about disability and revised their views about the importance of her work in the area, she has in the Daily Nous post reassured them that these objections are welcomed, a gift, and make her a better philosopher. This claim seems disingenuous however, insofar as the disabled philosopher issuing it repeatedly fails to acknowledge (in publications, in blog posts, and interviews) criticisms of her work and their authors unless the criticisms have been advanced by one her fan(boy)s. More importantly, why should I or anyone else care, in the first place, if/that Barnes has learned from her mistakes? Shouldn’t the salutation and credit for these alleged revisions go to the authors who compelled them rather than be credited to Barnes herself?

In the interview, Barnes articulates the latest evidence that she is uninformed about philosophy of disability and that her critical understanding of the epistemic and political phenomena that the apparatus of disability produces is astonishingly narrow, as well as demonstrates the extent to which she is uncircumspect about how her reputation as an authority with respect to critical philosophical work on disability is animated by prestige bias and her accomplishments in other areas of philosophy. Setting aside the ableist language that Barnes’s Daily Nous post incorporates, the uninformed nature of the post is perhaps best crystallized in this remark:

Sometimes I think—okay, I know—that people are reluctant to voice objections to things I’ve said, not because I’ve given a convincing argument, but because I’m a person with a disability making claims about disability, and it just feels uncomfortable to voice hard objections, especially in a public setting.

The apparent humility of this (contestable) sentence is especially remarkable insofar as the claim effectively obscures and hence invalidates the work of many other disabled philosophers of disability who have variously and astutely documented the epistemic oppression, gaslighting, structural gaslighting, verbal assaults and slurs, condescension, testimonial injustice, and other forms of humiliation and degradation that disabled people in general and disabled philosophers in particular encounter when they position themselves as knowers in academic institutions, exchanges, and publications; doctors’ offices and other medical encounters; professional settings; business dealings; families; friendships; and other everyday social situations. The literature in philosophy and theory of disability that documents these ableist forms of epistemic inequity and asymmetries is too vast to reference here in any specific detail. But readers and listeners of this post are encouraged to consult The Bloomsbury Guide to Philosophy of Disability in which they will find extensive writing in this regard.