An interview with Stevie Hopkins from 3E Love

Stevie Hopkins is the founder/owner and Director of Awesome for 3E Love, which is an apparel company grounded in the values of disability empowerment and pride that he and his sister started in 2007. The 3E Love Wheelchair heart, the company’s now famous logo, is the international symbol of acceptance of people with disabilities as equals and of disabled people accepting their challenges and embracing them. The 3 E’s stand for Embrace, Educate and Empower.  3E Love has more than 40,000 customers in 40 countries around the world. You can find people across the world displaying the iconic wheelchair heart in anything from tattoos to bumper stickers to jewelry and everything in between. (Editor’s note: the story of the founding of 3e Love is well worth reading in its entirety. You can find it here- https://www.3elove.com/pages/what-is-3e-love)

 

 

What does it mean to have “Disability Pride?”

Having disability pride for me, boils down to being proud of myself and confident, while at the same time being fully aware and accepting of my disability – combining those two things can be very empowering. This idea is the basis of my company’s mission, which is to provide the tools for others to embrace diversity, educate society, and empower each other to love life.

 

How do you live out your disability pride? What does it look like in your everyday life?

I believe that once you get to that “point” of disability pride and full awareness, it’s important to put yourself out there into the world to maintain it. A lot of my pride and acceptance came from interactions and experiences, and I do begin to lose it when I shelter myself, hide out in my own bubble. It’s important to challenge your disability pride and your acceptance on a regular basis, and by challenging it you improve it and reinforce it with experience. Sometimes just being out in the world as a disabled person challenges your disability pride because of how hard it can be to obtain access to what you need and how people can sometimes react in rude ways. Yet, it is actually by pushing through these challenges that our pride can be reinforced.

 

What would you tell someone that is struggling with a new disability?

I always encourage people struggling with a new disability to keep talking about it, to open up to others, to be vulnerable to it and to share their feelings so that they can begin to understand their feelings. If they can’t understand them, then it’s hard to reach acceptance and adapt/evolve. In addition to that, I often encourage them to find new friends/acquaintances that are experiencing or have experienced similar challenges/feelings. A big turning point for me was meeting and making new friends with disabilities in college and bonding over our shared experiences, helping each other out. I give a lot of the same advice to parents and siblings of those with disabilities who ask for advice.

 

Whether you acquired your disability or you were born with your disability, pretend for a moment that you just received your medical “diagnosis” of your disability. What would be the first thing you do to adapt?

The sooner I take my own advice to keep talking about my feelings and find friends with disabilities, the better. If I bottle up my feelings and emotions and don’t share and talk about them, I’m screwed.

 

One piece of advice you wish you could give your younger, disabled self?

Try new things, put yourself out there, get involved in things you enjoy. And remember that when you are more alone than you’ve ever been, sadder than you ever thought you could be, you can still be filled with joy and hope for the future. 

 

Top 3 ways, in your own life, that you combat the message from society that “there’s something wrong with disabled people and we need to be fixed?”

This is a weird one for me because I don’t feel that society believes that on a mass level. I think people pity the disabled or underestimate them. But I don’t think the average member of society really believes that they can fix someone with a disability. I’ve honestly never understood that messaging. Maybe I’m taking it too literal, but the way that messaging is portrayed, it feels like it comes from a place of hatred. I believe that most people are good, albeit maybe ignorant.

 

As a leader in the disability community, what are the top 3 ways you combat this message as it is sent to others?

Just by doing what I do every day, owning my own business, going to concerts, being a role model for others, giving advice to young people with disabilities, contributing to the movement. I think I do my part to the best I can with the time I have. We can always do better, but I like to believe that I am prioritizing my role as a leader in the little things that I do day-to-day.

 

What do you think the disability movement can or should do to address depression and suicide in the disability community?

I am no expert in mental health and suicide prevention is way out of my expertise, but depression is something I know a thing or two about. It would be great if more of the movement was spent on helping, connecting, and supporting each other. Especially on the cross-disability spectrum. Many of the organizations and groups are disability-specific, but we can learn a lot from each other across the entire board.