Disabled elite

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For me, at elite level it's someone disabled with a high media presence who's a 'go to' person for discussions about disability.

To me such a definition is a bit muddied. Simply having a lot of media presence doesn't necessarily make that person elite. In combination with disproportional amount of resources or intelligence along with that media presence.....well that's another story all together.

I think to be a genuine disabled elite someone needs to be elite in some way and gain media presence as a direct result rather than media presence being thrust upon them because of their popularity and/or disability and nothing else. The latter probably has little in the way of useful advice to give while the former has actually walked the walk and might have earned their media presence.

I think it's not so much the disabled elite themselves, but the way they're portrayed to sweep the realities of disability under the rug. They make "normal people" feel less concerned about the plight of the disabled.

Temple Grandin is an outlier. She makes it look as if this disability is really no big deal and that, given enough hard work, if she can do it, anyone can. Thus, it's not really a disability if the disabled person doesn't allow it to be.

And, of course, Grandin loves the limelight. Though there's a lot of positive and role model stuff, and destigmatization, she alone can't be the bellwether or even the mean for being on the spectrum.