In the last week, I’ve seen a noticeable shift in conversations around accessibility and neuroinclusion at events. More organisers, suppliers and industry voices are buzzing in, asking questions, sharing experiences, debating “what’s reasonable,” and exploring what inclusion should look like in practice.
Awareness is rising, and that’s a really good thing. But as these discussions unfold, something else becomes very clear: We’re still talking about inclusion at the surface level, not the impact level.
Many of the questions being asked still sound like this:
- “Isn’t this going a bit too far?”
- “How many people really need this?”
- “Do we really have to provide everything?”
- “What if the cost is too high for only a few people?”
These aren’t bad questions, they’re just incomplete. They tell us that as an industry, we’re still viewing accessibility and neuroinclusion as nice-to-haves, “add-ons”, or elements to be weighed against ticket sales, schedules and logistics, not as core components of safety, dignity and equitable access.
The missing piece: depth over decoration
Much of the current conversation still focuses on checklists, good intentions, general principles and vague “be more inclusive” statements.
Those aren’t wrong, they’re just not enough because real inclusion isn’t created through a generic checklist or a well-worded policy, it’s created through design, planning, safeguarding, and an honest understanding of what accessibility actually looks like in the real world.
Over the last four years delivering supervised sensory and quiet rooms across conferences, exhibitions and festivals, we’ve seen the reality of what happens when someone reaches their limit at an event.
When a person hits overwhelm, shutdown, panic, dissociation or a trauma response, they are, for that moment, temporarily vulnerable, and how we prepare for that vulnerability determines whether the experience becomes; safe or unsafe, supportive or potentially harmful.
That’s why supervision matters, that’s why safeguarding matters, and that’s why quiet rooms cannot be superficially treated as “just a room”.
The problem with ‘how many people will use it?’ thinking
Another pattern that appears in these conversations is the question: “Is it reasonable if only a handful of people benefit?”
It’s an understandable perspective, but a deeply flawed one. If the number of people helped was the primary measure of whether something was “reasonable”, most accessibility provision would never happen. Imagine saying “Only one person needs a wheelchair ramp, so do we need one?” or “Only two people need BSL interpretation, so is that too much?”. The law doesn’t see it that way, ethics don’t see it that way, and duty of care certainly doesn’t see it that way.
Reasonable adjustments are not judged by popularity contests, they are judged by effectiveness, risk, safety, organisational resource, proportional cost and the potential harm of not acting. Spreading the cost across an event often makes adjustments negligible per person, but the impact for the individual who needs them can be life-changing.
Intentions vs Impact
Many organisers truly want to be more inclusive, but intentions don’t protect people, impact does. A quiet room with pillows, plants and a nice sign is a lovely intention, but without trained supervision, it can become misused, unsafe, inaccessible or triggering for the very people it was meant to support
Good intentions need to be paired with safeguarding knowledge, operational clarity, and true lived experience understanding of neurodivergent overload and realistic risk planning. That’s where the depth comes in and that’s where the work becomes meaningful.
We need to move past decoration and start designing
The real opportunity for the events industry is not to debate whether inclusion has “gone too far”, but to decide whether we’re willing to go deeper.
Accessibility is not a finishing touch, it’s a foundation. Neuroinclusion isn’t about creating special features, it’s about removing barriers so people don’t need to mask or hide. And quiet rooms aren’t about offering tranquillity, they’re about preventing distress.
Before we ask “are we doing too much?”, we should be asking “are we doing enough to make sure nobody is left unsupported when their nervous system shuts down?”
Where we go next
Over the coming weeks, EventWell will be sharing:
- insights from organisers who are trying to get this right
- stories from attendees about what support really looks like
- the gaps between intention and impact
- and simple, practical steps that genuinely improve neuroinclusion across events of all sizes
The conversation is changing, and that’s a really good thing, but if we want to build events where everyone feels safe, supported and able to participate, we need to go deeper than checklists, deeper than opinions, and far deeper than “is this too much?”.
Real inclusion requires more than awareness, it requires depth, design and responsibility, and the event industry is ready for that shift.
Helen Moon is the neurodivergent powerhouse behind EventWell, the award-winning not-for-profit championing neuroinclusion and mental wellbeing in the events industry. With nearly 30 years’ experience across hotels, venues, suppliers, and freelance operations, Helen knows events inside out.
Late diagnosed with AuDHD and Dyslexia, she founded EventWell in 2017 to make wellbeing and inclusion the norm, not the nice-to-have. Qualified in stress management, psychology, neurodiversity and safeguarding, she blends lived experience with professional clout to drive meaningful change.
Helen is a respected voice in event accessibility; an advocate, educator, and disruptor on a mission to rewire the way the industry thinks about inclusion.
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