Why "Disability" Gets It Wrong: The Case for Less Ability

Lucy stopped visiting her grandchildren in Portland. Not because she didn't want to see them. She wanted nothing more. But accepting the mobility scooter her daughter suggested meant accepting a label she'd spent her entire life avoiding. At 72, Lucy had become someone with a "disability."

 

Except she hadn't.

 

Lucy's knees hurt after walking more than two blocks. She got winded climbing stairs. She needed to sit down more often than she used to. These facts didn't make her disabled. They made her someone with less walking ability than she had at 45. The difference between those two framings changes everything.

The Problem Lives in the Language

"Disability" positions human capability as binary. You either have ability or you lack it. You're either able-bodied or disabled. This framing collapses the entire spectrum of human physical experience into two categories, neither of which reflects reality.

 

Consider three people. Mark tore his ACL playing basketball at 28 and needs crutches for six weeks. Janet has rheumatoid arthritis at 52 and experiences variable mobility depending on inflammation levels. Robert is 78 and manages his energy carefully to maintain independence. The medical establishment and mobility industry group all three under "disability." The label erases the profound differences in their experiences, needs, and identities.

Less ability describes what's actually happening. Mark temporarily has less walking ability. Janet has less hand dexterity during flare-ups and manages this reality with adaptive tools. Robert has less stamina than he did at 45 and makes strategic choices about energy expenditure. None of these descriptions position them as broken versions of an imagined normal body.

How We Got Here

The mobility industry built itself on medical models and insurance billing codes. Products got designed for "the disabled." Marketing emphasized loss, limitation, and medical necessity. Showrooms looked like hospital supply closets. The message was clear: mobility aids are for people who can no longer participate in normal life.

 

 

This approach served the industry's business model. Medical necessity justified insurance coverage. Emphasizing severity helped with reimbursement approvals. But it created a psychological barrier that keeps people like Lucy isolated in their homes, avoiding family gatherings, and declining travel opportunities that remain completely accessible to them.

 

Movinglife entered this market with different questions. What if we designed for people with less walking ability who still travel internationally? What if we assumed our customers go to concerts, visit museums, and meet friends for lunch? What if the goal was maintaining capability rather than accommodating loss?

The Resistance Has Real Consequences

Lucy's daughter watched her mother choose isolation over accepting "disability status." This pattern repeats in families across every demographic. Adult children see their parents decline social invitations, skip family weddings, and gradually narrow their worlds. Not because they lack the physical capability to participate with the right mobility support. Because accepting the support means accepting an identity they reject.

 

The language creates the barrier. Tell someone they need a "disability aid" and you're asking them to fundamentally reframe their self-concept. Tell someone a mobility scooter extends their walking ability and you're offering a tool that maintains their existing identity and lifestyle.

 

This distinction affects product adoption rates, but more critically, it affects quality of life. Every family gathering missed, every trip declined, every friendship that fades because meeting in person becomes too difficult represents real harm caused by terminology.

What Changes With Less Ability

Framing mobility support as tools for people with less walking ability shifts both product design and user experience. Suddenly airline travel matters because these customers still travel. Style becomes relevant because these customers care how they present themselves in public. Compact folding mechanisms matter because these customers navigate regular life, not just medical facilities.

 

Here is a perfect example. The ATTO folds in 10 seconds and fits in an overhead bin because Movinglife designs for travelers with less walking stamina, not for "disabled patients." The distinction drives every engineering decision. Weight matters for car trunk lifting. Appearance matters for restaurant dining. Speed matters for keeping pace with walking companions.

 

Less ability also acknowledges the spectrum nature of physical capability. An ATTO Sport owner might walk comfortably for a block but need support for a day at the botanical gardens. They have less ability than marathon runners and more ability than people with severe mobility limitations. Both statements are true. Neither makes them disabled.

The Broader Shift

This reframing extends beyond mobility aids. Vision corrects less visual acuity. Hearing aids support less auditory capacity. Reading glasses compensate for less close-up focus. Somehow we normalized optical and auditory support without the identity crisis that accompanies mobility aids. The difference lies entirely in terminology and cultural framing.

 

Needing glasses just to read does not make you blind. Needing a hearing aid to improve your hearing 10% does not make you deaf. Yet needing a mobility scooter to extend your walking range somehow makes you "disabled" in the eyes of society and often in your own perception. The inconsistency reveals how arbitrary these labels have become.

 

Every human body exists on a capability spectrum that shifts across a lifetime and varies by physical domain. Olympic swimmers might have less mathematical ability than accountants. Marathon runners might have less musical ability than concert pianists. Physical capability represents just one dimension of human variation, and walking ability represents just one dimension of physical capability.

 

Lucy eventually got her ATTO Sport. She visited Portland for Thanksgiving and folded the scooter into her daughter's trunk in 10 seconds. Her grandchildren barely noticed the device because Lucy spent the weekend fully present and participating in family activities. She didn't become disabled that day. She became someone with less walking ability who now had the tools to live exactly as she always had.

 

The mobility industry needs to catch up with this reality. People don't want disability aids. They want tools that extend capability, maintain independence, and support the lives they're already living. Less ability describes the actual human experience. Everything else is just inherited language that no longer serves anyone.

 

About Movinglife: We design ultra-compact folding mobility scooters for people who refuse to let less walking ability limit their lives. Every ATTO model reflects our belief that mobility support should enable travel, social connection, and active living.