AIBU to be incredulous that this really does happen IRL?!

[ifyourehoppyandyouknowit]

Just saw a carpark skirmish between a car with a blue badge and a car with a baby, over the last parent and child space, at a big chain supermarket. All disabled bays were full, only one PAC space left, both car reach the space at the same time. Man in blue badge holding car waves blue badge from window, people with child in the car kick off and start shouting about how he should park in the disabled bays, saying that they don't care if they are all full that is a parent and child space. I just kind of stood there open mouthed. Plenty of space to park further back in the car park as it wasn't that full. Oh, and no one was going to dissolve because the carpark is under cover.

I'm just that this really actually happens in real life! I thought it was kind of a internet ranty thing and that no one would be dickheaded enough to actually challenge a blue badge holder's right to use a PAC space outside of the internet!

And now I feel like I should have said something, but the shouty parents didn't seem like they were the type to listen to anything except the sound of their own voices.

So am I BU and very naive?

All this just leaves me thinking how flipping lucky parents are these days - maternity leave, paternity leave, P & C spaces, nurseries for little 'uns, never mind epidurals, water births, birth plans and so on.

It's a whole different world to this old gimmer.

Actually, there were no disability blue badges either in those 'good' old days.

I have a disabled DH. Time and time again we go to the supermarket to find abled bodied people and sometimes parents with children parking in the disabled bays and he has to walk many extra yards, stopping a few times to get the blood circulation back in his legs.

So forgive me for feeling that P&C parkers and abled bodied who have all four functioning limbs and their health are just fecking selfish when they act like the people the OP posted about.

I think many people have an underlying, almost subconscious belief that people who call themselves disabled really just have a slightly bad back or something (unless they are in a wheelchair).

There is no understanding of what different disabilities really mean and what day to day living is really like for those people.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse, in this country.

The only time people are able to plead ignorance is when their mental faculties are impaired ,then the evidence has to be produced to court under the Mental Health Act that they are unfit to plead,

If we do not allow ignorance to be tolerated in a court of law, why do we tolerate it in everyday life.

if anyone wants to understand the issues it is terrible easy to experience the problems themselves,

I have no tolerance for people who choose to be ignorant because it serves their purpose. (No one can claim they are completely unaware of the existence disability)

I tend to use these as my marker, when dealing with others.

If you haven't volunteered to help out with one of your local groups on day trips by the time you are an adult then don't apply to me for a job.

Don't expect me to have the remotest interest in any of your suggestions towards design, if you haven't experienced for yourself what chair/stick life is like, you are not equipped or qualified to comment.

TABs indeed.

I've always been a fan of parking inspectors. I don't know why they get all the bad press they do- after all, they are the people who stand between the rest of us and numpties who park inconsiderately.

Hire more of them and give them the power to have cars towed. A fine doesn't clear the space for a disabled person, towing the offending car does.

A friend of mine was suffering badly after a back operation and parked one day in a P&C space because she found walking too far very painful. She was confronted by an indignant mum and explained it was because of a medical problem etc etc. The mum told her she should have parked in a disabled spot and not be 'taking up' a P&C space. It's that kind of ridiculous attitude that really convinces me these spaces should be either moved away from the door or just got rid of.