2:37pm April 15, 2012

Walking to the car

after class, I saw a woman in one of those “Hover-Round” motorized wheelchairs.

She wasn’t old. She was maybe 30. Maybe. And it didn’t seem as though she had any sort of handicap(other than being mildly obese, but not to the point of it being crippling).
That being said,

She was “driving” this motorized wheelchair while texting on her phone on a curved path, not looking at where she was going or anything.

Am I wrong to post about this in the manner that I am?

Yes, actually, you are. Many disabilities aren’t immediately apparent when you look at someone. Especially if you don’t know what to look for.

It’s also wrong to be looking at disabled people with an eye to see whether we’re “getting away with something”. Especially if you don’t even know enough to know that many impairments that cause a person to need a powerchair aren’t visible unless you know exactly what to look for, and look at the person at exactly the right time. Many powerchair users can even walk short distances. (Every wheelchair user in my elderly/disabled housing unit who isn’t an amputee, can walk anywhere from a few steps to around a small house.)

The only part I can see it being okay to comment on is the texting – something nondisabled people become a hazard when they walk around doing, too. But as for the rest, when you act like you can even begin to judge whether another person is disabled or not, and especially when people look to disabled people as if we must be getting away something (therefore make sure we can’t wiggle our toes, because ~all chair users are paralyzed~, or something)… you’re making life harder for disabled people. You’re making it so any disabled person (especially an “invisibly” disabled person) who reads what you wrote could feel that much more uncomfortable going out the door, knowing that people will be judging them. A lot of disabled people actually become housebound, not because they can’t physically leave the house, but because all the “little” judgements people make of them add up until it becomes too much of an emotional effort to go out the door. So yeah, please don’t contribute to making people’s lives hell? It may seem little, but one little thing and another little thing and all the little things are suddenly weighing you down. You don’t really have to worry that we’re getting away with anything, because most of what we get from society is shit, not special treatment.

Notes: