Why Intellectual Disability is Not Mere Difference

Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 19 (3):495-509 (2022)
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Abstract

A key question in disability studies, philosophy, and bioethics concerns the relationship between disability and well-being. The mere difference view, endorsed by Elizabeth Barnes, claims that physical and sensory disabilities by themselves do not make a person worse off overall—any negative impacts on welfare are due to social injustice. This article argues that Barnes’s Value Neutral Model does not extend to intellectual disability. Intellectual disability is (1) intrinsically bad—by itself it makes a person worse off, apart from a non-accommodating environment; (2) universally bad—it lowers quality of life for every intellectually disabled person; and (3) globally bad—it reduces a person’s overall well-being. While people with intellectual disabilities are functionally disadvantaged, this does not imply that they are morally inferior—lower quality of life does not mean lesser moral status. No clinical implications concerning disability-based selective abortion, denial of life-saving treatment, or rationing of scarce resources follow from the claim that intellectual disability is bad difference.

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Citations of this work

What Do ‘Humans’ Need? Sufficiency and Pluralism.Ben Davies - forthcoming - Ethics, Policy and Environment.
Despair of the Intellect, but Hope of the Heart?Michael A. Ashby - 2022 - Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 19 (3):353-356.

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References found in this work

Reasons and Persons.Derek Parfit - 1984 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.
Natural goodness.Philippa Foot - 2001 - New York: Oxford University Press.
The Minority Body: A Theory of Disability.Elizabeth Barnes - 2016 - Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.

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