[trvlngwlbry]

I read GP's last paragraph as distinguishing between the use of "disabled people" vs. "people with disabilities," rather than between the use of "disabled" (or words with the same root) vs. other words.

My company did some work for an organization that supported people with disabilities in the workforce. The client stressed the importance of the distinction between using "people with disabilities" as opposed to "disabled people," with the former being much preferred because - due to its structure - it puts the focus (i.e. the first word) on "people" rather than "disabled/disability".

[DanBC]

...but it also says the disability lies with that person, and this is likely to be rejected by people who prefer the social model.

When people can't read a website it's tempting to tell them to ctrl + or install user CSS. But better is to just design the site in ways that don't exclude large numbers of the population, let alone people with visual impairment. It's not that person's eyesight that excludes them, it's the designer's poor choice of font size and colour that excludes them.

There are problems with this model, but it's still mostly useful.