Our ambassadors

My name's Isabella Choate.

My pronouns are they/them

and I am a living experience advocate.

I'm also an ambassador for

International Day of People with Disability.

I used to be an elite athlete on the Australian team

for canoe slalom.

I was diagnosed with a chronic illness in year 11.

I ended up being bedbound for about eight months.

It was about six years of isolation

and really, really struggling

before I even considered the disabled community.

My big question is

'can you give me an example

of disabled rage and disabled joy?'

Oh, that's a good one. That's a good question.

Yeah.

People are surprised by the things that I'm joyous about.

Seeing other disabled people out and about,

going out to lunch with my friends

and we've dressed up all of our mobility aids

and we look fantastic.

If people are going to look at me,

give them something to look at.

(Ronan Soussa) Paralympics, wheelchair basketball, is like joy,

because it's not just about the disability,

it's what people can actually do.

(Maree Jenner) Joy for me was when I first connected

with the Short Statured People of Australia.

When we go out, it's pretty joyful.

Disabled rage is an experience that is unique

to people with disability.

It is a human right that people

with disability should be allowed in any space.

It's okay to be upset when you are discriminated against.

(Santiago Velasquez) My rage comes when somebody says,

"Trey can't come in."

I can be refused and you feel powerless.

But my joy is the opposite,

when people realise I'm just another person.

International Day of People with Disability

is a really great opportunity

for the Australian community to consider how we feel

that we are different and how we feel that we're the same.

Like many, many Australians, I didn't have anything to do

with disability, or so I thought.

Disability is a culture.

It's not a look, it's not just a definition.

It's not just a way to access different benefits.

There is a culture, there is a community, and it's beautiful,

and I'm proudly disabled.

I acquired my disability when I was 21.

I remember when I woke up from surgery,

everyone's attitudes around me,

the doctors’ and the nurses’, instantly changed.

I was just like constantly hearing people tell me

that they felt sad for me and sorry for me,

and I didn't really connect with that.

I'm James. I'm a model, a disability advocate

and Wiradjuri man.

And an ambassador for

International Day of People with Disability 2025.

Being an ambassador is really important to me

to challenge and keep rewriting the narrative

of what it's like to have a disability.

My big question is why do you think the media

avoids showing people with a disability

as sexual or desirable?

We're all humans, we all have desire,

and a part of desire is also to be sexual.

(Isabella Choate) There is an ongoing issue where the general public

seems to infantilise people with disability.

(Maree Jenner) It's the lack of representations.

People think we live life with a deficit,

where it's exactly the opposite.

(Ronan Soussa) I truly agree with you

because like you just think of yourself

as a regular person.

Going back into dating after acquiring a disability

was like a whole different experience.

And, in that, what I did find is a narrative there

that they're like going to be a helper or a caregiver.

I think having more people with disability in media

and in mainstream spaces is probably the most important.

And when I first started modelling,

actually it was my first runway,

and I remember a kid, I think he was about five or six,

and he was using a prosthetic,

and to be able to watch him and his reaction

when he saw me up on the screen,

he probably had never seen someone like him before.

My hopes for the future is just have people with disability

as characters or within media, just there as people,

just showing us living life as someone else would.

Yes, I'm blind, so what?

I love listening to music, cooking,

trying new, unusual things.

I flew a plane last weekend, like an actual real plane.

That's not a joke.

Hi, my name is Santiago.

Everything that I always wanted to do,

I have always given it a go.

And now I'm a blind electrical engineer

and I am an ambassador for

International Day of People with Disability 2025.

My big question is 'for somebody with your disability,

how has the technology revolution been, good or bad?'

I run a company called Hailo, and I started it

because I was frustrated by buses leaving me behind.

And if I fix that or if I fix the problem

of being dropped off at the incorrect stop, in a way

that benefits me but benefits everybody else,

we can improve public transport for everybody.

(Maree Jenner) For me personally, I think

Siri and Alexa is fantastic.

For light switches and things,

I can turn lights on with it.

(Olivia Sidhu) Technology is good

because it helps us to travel,

to use transport.

(Isabella Choate) The creative solutions that tech

or tech companies are coming up with, I think a lot

of them are coming from people with disability.

When the people who need it the most

are either developing it

or right there from the beginning,

technology is brilliant.

But it's when people

that are designing it have no lived experience,

getting to this mindset of technology is

going to fix my life,

that we get into trouble.

The more we can break down the perception that people

with disabilities need to be fixed,

the more we can move forward as a society.

Everybody has to play an equal part

for getting rid of this idea that we are a burden.

I'm not a second class citizen

and I'll be damned if somebody's going to tell me otherwise.

Yes, I'm blind, but some people are tall,

some people are short, some people are

different ethnicities.

We're just another mix

in this massive pot we call the world.