who is being unreasonable? disabled person 'over sensitive'

[amazeandastonish]

Person A has multiple disabilities and asks if everyone in a group can do something as a reasonable adjustment.
Person B refuses to do so. Person A asks again and explains why adjustment is needed. Person B tells person A they are 'woke', 'over sensitive' and that they (person B) will not be 'dictated to' by someone who doesn't even work here.
Person A complains to me (D&I advisor) and head of HR (my manager).
Neither me, nor manager were present.
Person A is an external disability awareness trainer and the group are a group of staff we had asked them to train on disabilitiy awareness as we had identified a need for it (as you can see!).
We struggled to get sign ups - expecting 30 but only 10 signed up. All other 9 people were positive about the session content.
Head of HR thinks Person A should 'let it go' because we are paying them, they are meant to be teaching us right from wrong, so should have expected that reaction and just dealt with it.
Head of HR thinks Person A was rude to 'single someone out' although neither of us were there to witness it (cause we had 'other things to do' - I did protest!)
I think we should action this but as you can see, my job isn't an easy one!

YABU - the trainer should have expected this / dealt with it themselves
YANBU - the trainer was right to complain and we should do something

Meant stroke 🫣

They said why.

They said they weren't interested because it's all woke nonsense. It's in the OP.

Person A may prefer to be described as an excellent piano player who also has an embarrassing amount of sheepskin slippers. Why do you insist one defining someone by their protected characteristics?

Have you done any D&I training recently?

And is it reasonable for me to say 'no' to the request for a physical description? Or if I was a Tesco employee, should I face disciplinary action for refusing such a request from a customer ?

Would you ask all the visually sighted people who could see that info to shut their eyes so as not to see your physical appearance?

If not - the question is why you'd want to keep it hidden from someone who couldn't see it without a description?

Obviously not all VI people want or would ask for this information.

Bit in the context of disability training it's designed to get people to consider why they'd want to or actively decide to hide information from a blind person readily available to a sighted one.

You can go on an assertiveness training course and even though the whole reason you’re there is to learn to be assertive it doesn’t mean you’re going to be capable of each step the second you’re told to just do it.

If people are genuinely uncomfortable with describing themselves that might be something the session could work on - how to come up with a useful spiel you can use in the future that you’re happy with and that will be useful to someone who is VI.

Regardless, if you discipline people who have voluntarily gone along to a training session for feeling too uncomfortable to participate in a part of it, you’re going to build resentment, not improve people’s capacity to be inclusive.

I'm not saying that A is a bad trainer - they're probably great. What I'm trying to say is that we have no idea what A is like, or B, or the other attendees, or even the guide dog! We're all making judgements based on assumptions and guesswork. OP is the one with the facts, or should be if she's actually investigated this properly which seems unlikely from what little she's written.
We can all make stories that fit the facts on the face of it but they could all be wrong.

Doesn't matter of the trainer was shot or what the dog was like.

The blind person asked someone to stop stroking their working guide dog.

They should have stopped.

They said they weren't interested because it's all woke nonsense. It's in the OP.

You are missing the point.

B allegedly said that to the trainer.

OP has only the trainer’s word for that. OP does not state whether the other employees backed up the trainers account. So far, it’s one person’s word you are relying on and you have no idea whether that person is reasonable or not.

I used to deal with complaints for a living, and a complaint is what this is.

At the moment, OP has a complaint from a single person, who gave their point of view.

As a minimum, I would expect her to get B’s point of view. She also has a number of witnesses to the events.

Just as an example, perhaps B felt picked on by A throughout. Perhaps B’s behaviour was a reaction. Perhaps A is lying about B’s behaviour.

On the face of it, B appears to have behaved very badly indeed, but as a minimum, she should be allowed to give her side before any decisions are made about the appropriate action to take. Having done that, you may reasonably conclude that B is every bit as bad as person A said, and act accordingly, but B should always be allowed to respond to accusations made against her.

As I understand it, a reasonable adjustment, is to enable a person to do a job. Could somebody please explain to how the refusal to supply a physical description of yourself to a blind colleague, prevents them doing their job ?

The problem with asking someone to describe themselves is not just the self esteem issues the individual may have, but in a woke workplace it could backfire on the person describing themself, and also it could pressure someone into having to express something that is a protected characteristic.

Eg. I'm a middle aged white women, whose overweight and has brown hair.

Why does anyone in the workplace need to know my age bracket? could announcing that I'm white, cause offence to someone else? I don't want to have to say outloud that I'm fat, and the brown hair bit is just glossing over the greys!!

And, how does any of this effect how I do my job or how the VI person does their's or at least it shouldn't.

I understand that it must be a strange and frustrating way to live if sightloss was later in life, but I'm not sure the trainer (person A) has really thought this through.

@EgonSpengler2020 pretty spectacular Joe Lycett moment there.

I think there are plenty of people who feel discriminated against because of the way they look who might want to keep that information away from others when they can. The fact that most people are able to judge you without your engagement doesn’t mean you wouldn’t reasonably want to avoid that when you have the opportunity.

I get the request not to disturb the guide dog, but I find the “describe yourself” to be a bit. - well - is it really necessary?

If I tell a VIP that I’m wearing a floral dress, I have brown hair and I’m 160 cm tall, how is that useful? Surely, it’s my voice and even more importantly, what I say, that is relevant here?

I’d be interested to know what blind or VI people really want to know.

Of course I wouldn't ask people to close their eyes so as not to see me because I have no right to demand such a thing of people. I might prefer that they don't see what I look like, but that's my problem, not theirs.

As for why I would want to keep my physical appearance from a blind person, its irrelevant whether I want to or not, that's not what they would be getting. What they are demanding is that I give them a VERBAL description of my appearance. A completely different thing.

I recently saw a severely visually impaired relative for the first time in a while. My DCs have grown and changed since we last met so I introduced that DC1 had the long brown hair and DC2 had the short black hair so she knew which child-sized blob was which. She knows who's older, but knowing that DC1 is taller isn't necessarily useful if the other isn't there to compare. DH and I are more obvious from our voices and consistent heights whereas the DCs are of similar pitch and accent.

Most VI people have some level of visual input of light/ colour. A small proportion have no visual input at all. A description may make it easier to match a name/ voice/ some degree of form. When meeting people in person, most people have the advantage of visual information to help join other information up and a VI person asking for a description helps fill that information gap. It's useful to know B is wearing a white shirt, C has a beard and D has a fringe. People may move around through the session and having some point of reference is useful.

If a participant has a social/ communication issue that makes it hinders participation in the training, that should be brought to the trainer's attention prior to the session. It is normal to interact and activities such as icebreakers might include talking about yourself.

Do not disturb a guide dog when its harness is on. Harness= work mode.

The combination of B continuing to stroke the guide dog after being told not to and their rude outburst is deeply unreasonable.

@Kendodd

Well yes

Because they need a verbal description because they're fucking blind

In my opinion your head of HR is being incredibly lazy by not investigating. I imagine they are relieved it was a training provider and not an employee who complained. What actual HR qualifications do they possess? Are they a member of CIPD and if so what level?

I'd rather not describe myself and don't feel that I should be forced to. If they can't see what I look like then they don't have to have that information. There are a few things about me out of the ordinary and I'd rather not call attention to that. I don't see why the VI person wanting that information should be more important than my feelings on this particular matter.

Your colleague shouldn't have pat the dog or been rude about it.

@NumberTheory

That's not a very good analogy and you know it - nothing like assertiveness training

It's like someone going on sexuality awareness training and refusing to disclose their sexuality when asked what their sexuality means to them - when it definitely matters in regards to the situation they're in

Or when I went through identity training as part of the adoption process, one of the exercises is in class to describe what your name means to you, if I had said 'I don't have to give my name out to all these people' that completely flies in the face of the training I'm there to receive - when in other situations it would be somewhat reasonable to refuse to share your name

Because you'd be there for inclusiveness training

If you're then told a way to be inclusive and understanding of a pretty common disability and refuse that's pretty grim

I've only read p1 but person B is a twat.

I think it’s a pretty perfect analogy. You’re at an assertiveness training course to learn how to be assertive and you engage as ,cut as you are able and receive support in what you have difficulty with. You go to a D&I course to learn how to be more inclusive and receive help with the things you have difficulty with. How are those morally different?

Not sure about your sexuality awareness course analogy (what is a sexuality awareness course?). Though any work situation which requires you divulge your sexuality is probably on shaky ground. And I think your identity training it would be more analogous to saying either “I don’t really know what my name means to me” or “My name means a lot and I find it too personal to talk about to strangers”. Which again, in a work situation, isn’t something to discipline some one for even if it does mean you can’t get out of the training what you were supposed to.

Distracting the guide dog is obviously not on.

However I would be mortified if I was asked to give an impromptu public description of my appearance. So I do understand where your colleague is coming from there.

If that is your situation obviously you are entitled to say so, because not being asked to describe yourself is a reasonable adjustment for you. But clearly that is not B's situation.

Person B is clearly an asshole and if working for me would be disciplined appropriately.

Why do the 'need' a verbal description, from me, of how I look?
And they have a right to this information, and for me to supply it, regardless of how I feel about it, just because sighted people have that information? I'm guessing because it would make the blind person feel more comfortable . What about my comfort? Why should I have to do something that would make me very uncomfortable? Why is my comfort less important?

And why is it a reasonable adjustment? How does refusing to make such an adjustment prevent the blind person from doing their job?