ABSTRACT

Oppression can be overt or subtle and, historically, the Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Association Labor Day Telethon contributed overtly to the oppression of people with disabilities through its reliance on charity and medical models of disability to solicit viewer donations. When long-time host and controversial figure, Jerry Lewis, parted ways with the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA), the organization rebranded the telethon to the MDA Show of Strength Telethon, a move that lasted from 2012 to 2014. These three years are the focus of this chapter, for they illustrated the organization's attempt to function away from Lewis's influence. As the analysis shows, those years provided a view of disability similar to years past but with some variation in the tactics used. Specifically, the chapter identifies and defines two discursive tactics—acceptable paternalism and heteronormative nostalgia—that operated euphemistically in the telethon by permitting MDA to shift discriminatory discourse onto naturalized hegemonic structures more difficult to criticize and more onerous to change. These subtle tactics allowed the MDA to protect its face and preemptively defend itself from future possible attacks of insensitivity, even if their phrasing, in actuality, reinforced the ideologies and power imbalances that produce the discomfort in the first place.