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Anyone with a disability can draw disability. Duhhh..."""
Yes, after months and months of begging and re-applying and hoping! Then they do NOT get enough to live on.
"""Most people who have legitimate handicaps actually WANT to work, while lazy people make up excuses not to.
Maybe some people with handicaps want to work...so what?
That doesn't mean they all CAN!
And calling other handicapped people lazy is just disgusting and LAZY!!!!
....YOU are not in position to judge all handicapped people.
I ran in to Shop Rite (east coast grocery store) last week and the man bagging my groceries was...."----------" I'm not going to speculate on what his disability was. This store never has baggers, I didn't know to avoid the lines that did.
I spent $250 to get my eggs squashed, my (it was 2 days before my Easter) Peeps squashed FLAT, my chocolate Cadbury eggs squashed, my banannas squashed....come on. My raw chicken shoved in a bag with my ice cream....and when I got home I couldn't figure out what leaked out on what, so I had to toss 5lbs of chicken breast and a quart of Breyer's ice cream.
I'm glad he had a great day, but it didn't work for me.
What was I supposed to do? Should I have told him to be more careful? I kind of did and he kinda of spit off to the side (literally) ...and no one paid attention. Not the 21 year old cashier. I tried to take over and he didn't like it, so I took a step back...should I have stopped him? Called management on him? I didn't. Maybe I should have.
I didn't need to be forced in to this situation. This guy cost me a lot of money. I'm glad he felt good, and his proponents felt good for him (and I'm usually one of them) , but I was NOT happy.
His feeling good and getting out of wherever he lives cost me money I didn't want to donate right then and there.
Next time, I'll avoid the line with the "special bagger".
I'm sorry, I'm still pissed off.
I get the effort, I've seen it, I don't typically have an issue with it, it usually works...
I'm really sorry you had a bad experience that day. That said, that has nothing to do with being disabled. If someone is crappy at their job, they're crappy at their job. Some able-bodied people suck at doing their jobs. Some able-bodied people are great at doing their jobs. Some disabled people suck at doing their jobs. Some are great at doing their jobs. If that bagger were black, would you attribute their poor performance to their blackness? If they were gay, would you attribute it to their gayness and then avoid all gay employees? Do you realize how absurd it is to link one individual's poor performance to the entire disabled employed population? That's what discrimination is--when you take the action of one or a few people and attribute it to their entire demographic. There are plenty of disabled workers that do a good job that make that program a wonderful one, in spite of the few bad apples. Assess people as individuals, not as a group and try to give people a chance before you judge and condemn them so harshly. Maybe that guy did suck at his job, but that doesn't mean that every "special bagger" you come across will.
Well, when I was walking outside today to sign some papers... a guy was walking down the sidewalk and saw me and said "Give me some money so I can buy a hot dog".... I couldn't believe it, the guy looked like he was dressed to go to work and to go out and demand that I give him money so he can go eat a hot dog... I politely told him no...
That's strange, because on the flip side, sometimes people come up to me and give me money, just because I'm blind. I don't ask people for money and I don't want their money. I have my own job. For instance, I was just standing outside the metro waiting for a friend to come, and a guy comes up to me and gave me a dollar. I called out "no thanks" but he had already made his way down the escalator. Another time I was eating lunch and a guy came up to me, wrote "Merry Christmas" on my hand (when I was also deaf) and pressed $5 into my hand. He left right away and I had no way of knowing where he went.
Once I was on the metro with two friends, one in a wheelchair and one with no visible disability, except that we all appeared Deaf since we were chatting in sign language. Another "deaf" guy comes up to us and shows us a note begging for money for his schoolbooks. Anyone who is actually disabled knows that you can get your textbooks covered by vocational rehab. He also made some rudimentary signs, which led me to believe strongly that he was faking his deafness for money. I told him if he's disabled (I didn't want to assume), he's eligible for SSI, food stamps, section 8 housing, and can get his education covered by voc rehab. That's when he decided to get off that train car and hop onto another train car. I have no idea why he thought he could play the "pity me, I'm disabled" card with three people who are at a school that is entirely geared towards a community of deaf people, and especially with two of us who have other disabilities, but apparently he did.
I think most of the time "disabled" people that beg for money like that aren't really "disabled" but preying on the sensibilities of able-bodied people who don't know any better. My guess is that the image of the "poor disabled person" is actually propagated more by able-bodied people faking disabilities for money than actual disabled people. Most disabled people want to have independent and fulfilling lives, and either believe they can't or can't because of the people around them who constantly remind them what they can't do. In reality disabled people can do most jobs that able-bodied people can do. Sure, a blind person can't be a cab driver and a deaf person can't be a piano tuner and a cognitively disabled person might not become an astrophysicist, but there are literally thousands of jobs out there that all three of those people can do.
I have read and watched many heart warming stories about people, starting at a very young age, overcoming their handicaps because they believed anything is possible. I am curious about one thing: how are the people you know who are obtaining all these degrees paying for the higher education they receive?
Some of them are taking loans from the bank. My dad is paying for my education. Some of them get financial aid and work summers/campus jobs. I will admit openly that many students are using vocational rehab (because I assume that's what you're trying to get at) but their intention is to give back 100x more than they are taking right now. I do genuinely believe that right now disabled people do need that safety net (SSI, voc rehab, etc.) because we face so much discrimination in the workplace. At least these people are trying. They certainly beat deaf and other disabled people who watch TV for life while collecting their monthly SSI check.
Ideally, this is what I believe should happen. We should educate society as a whole about what disabled people can do so that we don't have to fall back on those handouts. For example, blind people have a 70% unemployment rate, not because we can't work, but because most sighted people won't hire us. And what do you think that 70% ends up doing? Yep, they do collect SSI--again, because people won't hire them due to their ignorance. I had to spend a year and a half proving to the people in my town that I could work before someone would finally hire me as a deaf blind person.
If we just educate companies and employers (who tend to be sighted, able-bodied people who know nothing about blindness or other disabilities) about the jobs that people blind people can do, and funnel all that SSI money into job training and paying for adaptive technology, then blind people can contribute to the economy instead of draining it!
The cost of training and accommodating blind people would be nowhere near as much as the cost of paying SSI for life. The same philosophy could be applied to people with all kinds of other disabilities. I do think SSI should be preserved for people who literally cannot make it through a workday, but it could be significantly decreased by employing disabled people, which is exactly what places like Walmart are doing.
Sometimes I feel like we can't win. First people complain about how disabled people collect SSI, and then they complain when disabled people get jobs. Wouldn't you rather disabled people be working and contributing to the economy than draining it by receiving government benefits?
I would happily participate in such programs. In fact, I'm part of an advisory team at my school right now, and we are planning on making a workshop for faculty at my school on how to work with students who have disabilities (not including deafness, since it's a deaf school and 95% of the population is deaf). I would love to be able to take that beyond my school walls and educate society as a whole, and apply it to employees with disabilities in the workplace.
Maybe some people with handicaps want to work...so what?
That doesn't mean they all CAN!
And calling other handicapped people lazy is just disgusting and LAZY!!!!
....YOU are not in position to judge all handicapped people.
Who the heck are you talking to, when you quote something I wrote, that has something else written in it?
I don't think people realize having cerebral palsy doesn't mean that you have below average intelligence.
I had a professor with CP,and she was intelligent.
In other words,normal,except she couldn't walk like we do. Her gait was slow.
Lol, a lot of people just look at a wheelchair and think "mentally challenged". My friends who are in wheelchairs get talked down to all the time for that exact reason.
Well, when I was walking outside today to sign some papers... a guy was walking down the sidewalk and saw me and said "Give me some money so I can buy a hot dog".... I couldn't believe it, the guy looked like he was dressed to go to work and to go out and demand that I give him money so he can go eat a hot dog... I politely told him no...
I hear ya pal... I was watching CNN and seeing all these wealthy Republicans centering their entire political agenda around the prospect of them and their wealthy friends paying lower tax rates than middle class workers! I couldn't believe it!
she did such a great job! She was a cashier, and was hard to make out what she was saying. She had a smile, worked so hard, and remembered me from two weeks prior. It literally brought a tear to my eye, that some one with such a disability would still go to work everyday, and be in good spirits. For all the phoniness, laziness, and excuse making in society today , this restored my faith in humanity for a day. Today was a good day!
Beats sitting at home. Funny, just this week I also went to target, and there was a guy with similar health/mental/neurological problem. He managed to get his job done without supervision and he seemed to have a good time doing it. He called me "gringo" in my face. LOL.
Last edited by Finn_Jarber; 04-17-2012 at 12:01 PM..
Lol, a lot of people just look at a wheelchair and think "mentally challenged". My friends who are in wheelchairs get talked down to all the time for that exact reason.
I'll probably err on the side of assuming capability and intelligence over being just another idiot talking down to someone or, yikes, pitying someone. I never assume someone can't understand or do something, I bet it drives perfectly intelligent folks that may have a visible physical or neurological disability absolutely batty when people continually do this.
Especially something like Cerebral Palsy or other conditions that manifest themselves as something that may be mistaken for a mental deficit. It takes just a little bit of empathy and patience to just treat everybody with a bit of respect and to be yourself with them. Just because a person may be in a wheelchair, have a cane or are somewhat difficult to talk with doesn't mean they can't be a great friend, lawyer or tour guide etc..., nor does it mean that if they are rude, mean or incompetent that you should react to them any differently that you would anyone else.
I'm not putting folks with disabilities on a pedestal, I'm just gonna be my friendly helpful self, I might offer to open the door for you or other help as I would anyone but I'm not gonna give you a medal because you made it to the bus or you are at your job just because you have a disability as well.
Challenges in life are what make us all the types of people that we become.
I'll probably err on the side of assuming capability and intelligence over being just another idiot talking down to someone or, yikes, pitying someone. I never assume someone can't understand or do something, I bet it drives perfectly intelligent folks that may have a visible physical or neurological disability absolutely batty when people continually do this.
Especially something like Cerebral Palsy or other conditions that manifest themselves as something that may be mistaken for a mental deficit. It takes just a little bit of empathy and patience to just treat everybody with a bit of respect and to be yourself with them. Just because a person may be in a wheelchair, have a cane or are somewhat difficult to talk with doesn't mean they can't be a great friend, lawyer or tour guide etc..., nor does it mean that if they are rude, mean or incompetent that you should react to them any differently that you would anyone else.
I'm not putting folks with disabilities on a pedestal, I'm just gonna be my friendly helpful self, I might offer to open the door for you or other help as I would anyone but I'm not gonna give you a medal because you made it to the bus or you are at your job just because you have a disability as well.
Challenges in life are what make us all the types of people that we become.
I can tell you straight up, it does. People talk to me like I'm a child all the time, and assume that I need to be supervised 24/7. A lot of my deaf friends who have "deaf voices" get it much worse because most people can't tell the difference between a deaf person's voice and someone who's developmentally delayed.
It seems like many people treat disabled folks with one of two extremes--either ignoring them or giving them too much attention, thinking we are leeches to society or a completely inspirational, that we're either stupid or super-gifted, etc. People tend to either be very rude or overly polite to me, to either talk down to me or put me on a pedestal. Either it's hard for me to get some help, or if I do get help, then it's hard to lose the help. My professors tend to either ignore my raised hand the whole semester or constantly single me out from the rest of the class. One extreme or the other.
You are exactly the kind of person I appreciate--someone who has a regular level of manners and treats me like a normal person, and someone who also expects the same level of manners from me and expects to be treated like a normal person--someone who knows how to offer help but not insist on it.
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