Just Evolve

On 21 March 2026, the Italian National Coordination of Down Syndrome Associations launched the new global campaign “Just Evolve”

This year, the focus is on language, and in particular on the use of certain expressions which, even today, reinforce stereotypes and prejudices against people with disabilities.

«We are aware that in 90% of cases when people people use these words, it is not to offend directly the people with disabilities.

But their use contributes to creating a cultural context that associates disability with incapacity, failure and marginalisation. The words we choose shape reality – both that of others and our own perception of it – and can either include or exclude, and clarify or confuse.

We want to ask every person who still today uses these harmful expressions to stop. Not because “one can no longer say anything”.

But because they belong to the past.

Martina Fuga, Chair of CoorDown

The problem lies in the #ableist ideology that language perpetuates and reproduces: in everyday life, in the media, in institutions.

When disability is used as an insult, as a metaphor to degrade, as a narrative device to make people laugh, people are reduced to symbols and emotional shortcuts.

And this has real-world consequences: it reinforces stereotypes, legitimises discrimination, and makes full participation in social life more difficult, if not impossible.

From the press release issued by CoorDown, regarding the Just Evolve campaign.