Stephen Cluskey talks about advocacy work, including a project with wheelchair rugby players that drew major media attention and earned an Irish Film and Television Award nomination for highlighting accessibility challenges.
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I think advocacy has always been something that I've been interested in and passionate about, and I didn't really know where to start or what to do with it. It was about how do we get the message out on what we were doing. And I remember pitching an idea one day to my brother around rugby players. You know, I watched a lot of rugby, played rugby growing up, and you see these guys who are giants in society and they're probably the strongest physical beings you could see. And the idea of having them in a wheelchair and struggling, relating that to the challenges a normal person would face every day. So I pitched that to James about rugby players going in wheelchairs from Dublin to Limerick using public transport. And he told me it was a terrible idea. So that's basically why I pushed forward with it. And I reached out to a few companies to see if it was interesting. And one company came back and that was where that journey began. We were able to include some of the highest profile rugby players in Ireland who were passionate about advocacy and raising this issue in the public. Then we met with the national broadcasters here in Ireland. It got picked up by one of the main broadcasters. We were nominated for a NIFTA Award in Irish Film and Television Award with the documentary. So it wasn't disability focused. It wasn't the oh, poor me, oh, isn't this terrible type of thing. It was more just throw them in the wheelchairs and see what happens. And let's film the real genuine reactions with this. It's about showing the reality of the situation in everyday life. And I think that's what connected with people. When you do have that celebrity factor, it brings the masses to watch it. But there was a very genuine purpose and core message behind that, which we were able to get through SA.
