When you deny my ‘lived experience’, you deny my existence!

We, the undersigned, petition our flesh and bone (zombies excluded) oppressors to recognize the following,

Article 1. We are beings who refer to ourselves as ghosts. All other terms of reference such as ghouls (a misnomer ), spirits, phantoms, spectres, apparitions, wraiths, and especially the highly derogatory and offensive term ‘poltergeist’, must be expunged from public discourse, including educational discussion and materials. 

Article 2. Desecration of a graveyard is a hate crime.

Article 3. Exorcism is attempted genocide.

Article 4. Ghosts represented in film must be played by real ghosts. 

Article 5. Ghost sensitivity readers must approve all representations of ghosts in literature, journals, and articles.

Article 6. Halloween costumes, decor, and haunted house displays depicting ghosts are symbolic harms and must be prohibited.

Article 7. The words “boo!” and “wwhhooooo” are infantilizing, stereotypical linguistic harms and must be prohibited.

Article 8. “I don’t see you” and “I don’t believe in ghosts” are microaggressions which must be remedied by implicit bias training.

Article 9. We ghosts, for too long, have been invisible to our flesh and bone oppressors. When we are noticed, we are most often treated as pariahs. But we are beings of this world, children of the universe. We have a right to be here.

Article 10. We welcome allies. And we remind you of flesh and bone that, before long, you, too, will be among our number. The oppressor, without fail, becomes the oppressed.

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Categories: Guest Posts, Humour

Tags: activism, allies, diversity, EDI, equity, existence, ghosts, harm, implicit bias, inclusion, linguistic, lived experience, microaggressions, oppression, oppressors, paranormal, petition, prohibited, rights, sensitivity readers, speech, stereotype, symbolic