Discrimination against people with disabilities.

[tkulesa]

On another thread someone mentioned that nobody hear talks about discrimination against people with disabilities. I posted this. It was suggested that I start a new thread about this. So that's what I'm doing.

Why don't people know about the extent of discrimination against people with disabilities? And if they know, why don't they talk about it?

.............................

I think it rarely gets talked about because there are so few of us who can talk about it safely.

So many people with disabilities are dependent on social workers, agencies, charities, doctors and bureaucrats of all kinds that we quickly learn that having an opinion will be used against us.

I have had doctors become hostile because they asked a social or political question and I gave an opinion they didn't like. In two cases, they then stopped taking my medical issues seriously and suggested that it was all in my head.

Doctors who says "it's all in your head" should be taken out and shot.

Back in college there was the imfamous "Office of Services for the Handicapped." The people in that office treated students with disabilities like imbeciles. It was almost assumed that students with disabilities only graduate because of social promotion. And it was taken for granted that most of us would never have careers anyway so why get into a professional degree program? They took horrible liberties pushing people into certain programs (Social Word being the big one) as if we can't work in professional fields with everyone else.

I remember a friend of mind, Kevin, who had 2 undergraduate degrees being evaluated by a bureaucrat with an associates degree who told him that he was only qualified to work on an assembly line in a sheltered workshop for a fraction of the minimum wage. There was no effort to help him get any real career guidance or assistance. It was just assumed that he was useless and had to get used to it.

The worst thing that could happen to you was to be labeled a troublemaker. And this could be for something as simple as requesting a locker on campus because you can't easily carry books. (I kid you not.) Any request could become an issue just because you dared to ask for something. Then you were guaranteed to have a hell of a time getting any of the help that was supposed to be mandated. Everything became a fight.

So college is just another environment were people with disabilities learn that you have to agree with what the non-disabled bureaucrats say or else. Be docile and agreeable, or else.

People who don't have disabilities will never understand the level of dependence can can be forced down your throat, or the pressure that can be put on you to conform to every social worker and administrator's views of who you should be.

So is it any wonder that discrimination against people with disabilities doesn't get discussed?

[drdigi420]

1. one person with the disability of being stupid made it to POTUS

[tkulesa]

2. While I do agree with you,

That isn't the type of discussion I am hoping for on this thread. :)

[drdigi420]

5. twas just a joke

relax

[nofurylike]

4. and lo! one made it here! n/t

no, not stupid, but insensitive.

stupid is not a disability, clearly. look the administration! the ruling class!

just takes some powerful white-male affirmative action. plenty "Gentlemen's C's" as a great philosopher i know explained to me.

sorry. it is true what you said of *.


peace

*edited due to my knee-jerk hostility.

[drdigi420]

6. does lack of a sense of humor count?

cmon ppl, relax

its bad when i cant even make a joke at dubya's expense without ppl getting all upset

geez

[nofurylike]

3. ABSOLUTELY, tkulesa! well put!!

it is agony. it is torture and incessant emotional blackmail. it is criminal mental and economic cruelty.

i Know. i empathize. i get it. you are more right than any who isn't there can know.

hang in, keep on, and feel embraced.


peace!

[cosmicdot]

7. I brought my Senator up-to-speed a few years back

... now, imagine how long this has been in affect ... that people qualifying for Social Security Disability Income (under 65), don't qualify (emphasizing the nature of the need ... disability) for Medicare until after 24 months of being on SSDI ...

no health insurance ... no job ... no Medicare (and, we know it doesn't cover everything)

... if one is under 65 and disabled (on SSDI), it's hard for many to find supplemental and/or affordable Medigap insurance (insurance policies which help to meet the gap that Medicare misses, i.e, dental, prescriptions) ... it's a different situation for those over 65 (not that it's any easier) ...

Medicare for the disabled 24 months after being accepted into the Social Security system ... that just didn't make sense to me ... the very people who likely need it the most have to wait 2 years ... what genius thought that through and when did that happen?

this one was an eye-opener for me: the amount of SSDI benefits a disabled person qualifies for is subtracted from whatever Long Term Disability that person might receive through employment, a program many people buy into for extra security ... guess they won't the disabled to be running around with too much money ...


... and, then, being disabled, having to deal with 'the system' for the rest of your life ... which, for many, can be a process of discrimination in itself ... 'the system' demands that you pay into 'the system' in order to 'stay in the system' ... you pay the dues in the form of disability benefits maintenance ... and, I would think that someone, also, on company long term disability, face discriminatory process requirements ... what is corporate america's motto: "keep the disabled annually challenged"?


... or the system that terminates employees for "abandonment", when the employee is not better ... and, likely, without the means to litigate the matter ...

[nofurylike]

8. "keep the disabled annually challenged"? yes. exactly. n/t

[tkulesa]

9. My housemate was hurt on 911

She was one of the survivors, but she got seriously messed up. She has now joined our ranks with a depressingly large number of permanent medical problems.

We figured that because she was hurt at the WTC she wasn't going to be attacked and demonized the way so many of us have been. Wrong. Annually Challenged doesn't even begin to describe how workers comp is treating her.

The insurance company petitions to lower her (minimal) benefits every few months claiming that she has recovered and no longer qualifies. This is even though all of the doctors, including their own doctors, agree that she is 100% disabled and has medical issues that are still not properly diagnosed.

For God's sake, she is in the emergency room at least once per month. The last time because she is having muscle spasms in her heart and they don't know why.

They cancel her benefits because they haven't received a report from her doctors, when the request only just arrived a few days before.

They sent private investigators to follow her around. They sent teams of lawyers who know nothing about her to go in an argue that the doctors are all wrong and she is really a fraud and a faker. Because we all know that faking an injury through workers comp is worth so damned much money. :eyes:

They have spent far more money on PIs and attorneys to harrass her than they would ever pay in workers comp and medical payments.

We both agree that there must be automatic challenges mandated by bureaucratic policy that say to harrass people, challenge people and attack people regardless of how badly they are hurt. Every few months you come to the top of the list to be attacked again. Annually Challenged is a good way to describe it, but that's being nice about it.

[Muddleoftheroad]

10. Use the media

She should contact the media and tell her story. She should also contact her congressman. She is a living hero and deserves better treatment.

It's amazing how insurance companies run scared when reporters or congressional aides call.

[tkulesa]

12. We are talking about that

You would be surprised how indifferent the media is. But there are a bunch of us encouraging a letter writing campaign. We know a reporter for the local Staten Island paper who might be interested in her story.

But she's so shell-shocked from the constant attacks that she's heavily depressed. (very severe chronic depression, and being zonked out on pain killers doesn't help.) So she keeps putting it off. Sje also doesn't want us doing anything until she's ready.

She's worried that if she talks to people they won't listen and she will just get attacked from more sides. Or that she will find herself cut off from medical care because she offended someone powerful.

She knows several other Survivors who were not hurt as badly as she was, but they are all being ignored. The families of the people who did not survive, and especially the families of the firefighters are being treated very very well. But the survivors are being told, "get over it and get back to work."

All those millions of dollars in donations? She was turned away because the donations are for the families of those who died, not to help survivors.

We know there are some class action lawsuits getting put together. She wants to sign on to some of those but doesn't know who to contact or where. If any of you know anything about those class action lawsuits please pass me the information.

Thanks.

[nofurylike]

11. is true. more, continuously challenged, and slammed on top of that. n/t

[Interrobang]

13. Oh, boy, do *I* know what you're talking about...

I wish I didn't...

I have Cerebral Palsy. I'm a spastic quadriplegic, but I'm pretty able-bodied and I get around reasonably well. Not *only* do I walk, but I also work out, lift weights, dance, and horseback ride...on my terms, anyway.

Unfortunately, there are still a lot of things that I can't do. I have a fair number of physical "barriers to employment" -- when I'm out of work, I can't get a job waiting tables, for instance, because my balance isn't good enough, or I can't get a job checking groceries or doing retail sales, because I can't stand still for that long.

I was never pushed into any sort of "handicapped" vocational stuff, because I'm pretty good at "passing" (sad to say) and I've learned that the best strategy is basically "shut up and act able-bodied." My major problems with discrimination have been meeting people under the auspices of "disabled" whatever; or with employment.

Advocates: I really despise walking into some place full of (able-bodied) "disability advocates" or the like, and having people treat me as though I'm either five years old, or have the equivalent intellect, especially since some of the time, I can absolutely wipe up the floor with these people, intellectually speaking. (Not to brag, or anything, but I have an IQ somewhere around 165, two degrees, a fairly solid list of professional credentials, I speak three languages competently and three more a little bit, and I can do almost anydamnthing I put my mind to!) In fact, I'm so bitter about this attitude that it's one of the underlying reasons why I want to get a PhD -- so that when drips like this come up to me and say, "So, how are we today, Sara?" (NB: Using someone's first name without their permission in a formal setting in Canada is *really* impolite!) I can say, "Excuse me, that's *Doctor* ------ to you..." with the appropriate -1C look.

Employment: I'm also tired of people taking a (minor) disability as an automatic downcheck towards employment, but in a subtle sneaky way that one can't have them hauled up in front of the Human Rights Commission (or your local entity of similar description and lack of teeth here) for discriminatory hiring practices. I've had to endure questions in interviews like, "How's your energy level? How much can you get done in one day?" (Now you know why I put a lot of that energy into passing...) I've also had at least one potential employer watch how I walked out, and I didn't get that job, even though I passed the interview *and* the editing test with flying colours (I even found a typo in the test itself!).

Even the educational system here is rather discriminatory. If I'd wanted to, I could have gotten a full *grant* (not a loan, a grant) to get a whole undergraduate degree, but the catch was, I would have been prohibited to take more than 1/3 of a full courseload in a year. So if I'd wanted to milk the system and go to school for free, I could have done an entire Honours BA in 12 years... Sheesh. Wouldn't it be cheaper for the government for people like me just to give us a similar grant for *four* years of full-time study?!

Of course, none of this is even getting into what my fiance has been going through since he got hit over the head by a flying tv cameraman and has since been on Workers Comp and SSDI. Lawyers going after doctors, Medicare, Medicaid, oh my god, it's enough to make this OHIP-lovin' (and New York boy fiance-lovin') Canadian girl quiver with rage -- "Quit bickering over whose *responsibility* it is to *fill out the goddam paperwork* and just *treat the man,* already, stupid doctors!!"

[tkulesa]

14. I can't wait to hear that you got that PhD.

I would buy tickets to see you make them call you Doctor. :)

You are right about a small disability downgrading your employment. I work with a guy fresh out of college, ten years younger than me with very little industry experience. I recently found out that he makes a small amount more than I do. He has the same job that I do but handles different, usually less complicated projects.

I get excellent job evaluations, and our clients love me. So why am I earning slightly less than someone with 10 years less experience and significantly less industry skills and knowledge?

I think it is my cane and crutches.