MNHQ .. Can we talk about disability bashing?

[Brownsugarshortbread]

Over the years i have posted on and enjoyed MN.
Sadly there seems to be a growing culture of it being okay to have a go at disabilities, those who claim DLA and those who's children have 'invisable' disabilities such as ADHD and ADD.
The terms 'freak' and 'scrounger' have been batted around and comments from some posters IMO certainly boarder on harrassment and discrimination.

When certain posts or posters have been reported, some have been removed, yet a lot haven't.

And while I agree with free speech, these types of comment or reaction to these comments, are not an education for those bigoted posters. Nor do those whose lives are touched by disability wish to be used to educate those posters.

Disability Harassment

is unwanted behaviour based on disability,
impairment or additional need. Such behaviour may include comments that are patronising or objectionable to the recipient or which creates an intimidating, hostile or offensive environment for people with disabilities. Disability harassment includes inappropriate reference to disability, unwelcome discussion of the impact of disability, refusal to work with and exclusion of people with disabilities from social events or meetings.

South

but watch when the racist/homophobic/xenophobic threads get reminded fast that it is not acceptable and pulled yet disablity is ok .As apparentley we are just to sensive Pc people .

Mnhq Since you seem to struggle with undertanding just how offensive it is ,Would you like me to get my 8 yo dd to send you email explaining it in simple terms .Becuase she sure as hell understands that is is offensive and rude and not somethin g that should be used/said even in jest.

how about the 'do you have a poof?' thread? it's unlikely that the OP doesn't know how to spell pouffe, and i don't htink that she is sincerely interested in people's furniture arrangements. should that be zapped?

If it's designed to cause uproar and upset then yes.

Aitch - I think it really does depend on how the thread pans out. If the OP of the thread we're discussing had put 'Dp just called me a name for catching poorly' then most people would pass that thread by.

The very FACT that she used the wording she did in the title, screams of attention seeking to me. And in the worst way possible.

Aitch

she well might not know how to spell it.And am sorry that is completley differnt she is not calling any one person or comparing it to a person .

where the use of the word spastic I am sorry but 99% of people know that is offensive and it is being used as description of someones disablity

I don't think the poster who used spastic in the thread title needed to, they knew it was offensive, they had been offended, so there was no education, just someone using the word to get attention ,
perhaps I feel strongly as I have a child that gets called a spaz.
but that doesn't mean I am wrong

Agree with 2shoes. Dd gets called a spazz by disablist tossers.

So MNHQ should have told the OP that the word spastic is not acceptable on MN when used in that context (if at all?) and she/they should have removed the word or re-done the title.

I have said time and again, she knew what posting that would do and has achieved exactly the reaction she wanted.

oh yes, it was definite attention-seeking, no doubt about that.

re the poof thread, it is not innocent. not even slightly. and yet there are great posters on there ptsl about holes in poofs needing filled etc. or being an excellent place to keep rodents? would i zap it? in a heartbeat, and all those great posters would be up in arms about their right to have a joke about furniture. thankfully it's not for me to decide.

the only time spastic is acceptable is when you a re using it to describe a medical condtion

instead mn hq feel that it is ok, and if people like me are "upset" by the title we should hide it !!

i thought the term was cp nowadays?

it is CP but you can have spastic CP

Dd has spastic cp. Its a medical term

dd2 was original diagnosed with spastic quad cp, but the dx was changed to athetoid cp. (different types of cp, aitch p depends on whether your muscle tone is too tight, too loose or fluctuating between both ) so she is largely athetoid, but has some spasticity.

i think about 70% of cp dx are spastic cp - it is supposedly the most common. (or was - haven't checked the stats for a few years, and have seen lots of low tone dx recently)

trust dd to be different ant have athetoid cp

I've been on MN for years so know the score with it.. Happen to have a new name at the moment, not for this thread, but due to a bit of weirdiness going on else where. But I can happily say I cried tears over wanderingtrolley and her walking race thread! Amongst others and I suprised my spelling and typos haven't given me away tbh.

I started this thread because of quite a few threads, not just the telly addicts one or the 'spaz' one.
I didn't name the threads because i wanted to leave the discussion more open to the general issue, rather than consentrating on one or two threads alone.

what mine? or yours? lots of athetoid dx now - mainly birth injuries at term... largely physical disability with less instance of lds. someone was telling me how it seems cp dx has been changing last year... by two, dd2 was very low toned and still carting a spastic dx around with her. the paed told us she couldn't change it.

Dd has athetoid too but is too stiff for it to show. This will change when she has the baclofen pump.

dd has loads of extra movements but much beter now she is on meds to controll it.

but back to the thread, OP i think the spastic thread is a good example, as it proved that these threads don't educate

'The people who run MN have had their brains addled by years of reading the Guardian. hence they cannot see the clear parallels between racist abuse ( we have to get rid of that, Polly Toynbee wouldn't like it at all) and abuse of the disabled (hmmm, "edgy" comedians do that, maybe it's a bit cool and we should let it go).
Moral - avoid the soft left, unless you enjoy being nauseated by rank hypocrisy

Oioi SWC, some of us manage to be elfties and perfectly ralistic, thinking human beings my love! (now, those Telegraph readers.... )

It's not political (and Polly T is annoying) it's about humanity and decency

I want to be an elftie too. A socialist Galadriel would be v good.

Aitch - I've just read that 'poof' thread. It's a pure piss take and one that I don't find amusing, and actually, I'd quite like a gay poster to go one there and put them striaght (pardon the pun) on how to spell the bloody word!

Would I have sniggered a few years back before we had DS with SN? Would any of this bothered me then? Maybe.

Would I have used the same words that other kids did in the playground at school - 'Joey, spaz, mong' if I didn't have an uncle with Downs?

Most likely in all honesty when I was young and wanted to be in with the crowd......... Ignorance is bliss.

As long as it's not them that are in the firing line or being insulted then it's okay, right?

It's like once the ball is rolling, everyone wants to kick it.

The education bit- been giviung it a lot of thought

I've tried as much as anyone; heck I deserve a medal for it

It's a ridiculous policy becuase MN is a moving target: new posters every day, plus the same old idiots who don't care / do not have the capacity to care.

Now should MNHQ ish to pay me a wage I will glasy follow these threads around and educate away in my very best highly qualified manner. Howecer that will not happen so I shall not ut in what has been a day's work many times over that I could uae tothe benefoit of my family. Plus, although not tiny the 'active SN' group on here is not large enough that we will not end up repeating ourselves constantly.

In what world is it healthy to type the hardships faced by you or your children regularly onto a screen? In what way is it healthy to take the very real fear for their children's care and safety that many nof us have long term (ask most aprents their biggest fear and they will say 'when I am gone') and then ask the same people to delve long and hard into that vortex of worry, not just ask but lay it at their feet as a responsibility: it's our job to educate, right? or the kdis will lose out. Except the same group is one of the most vulnerable to PTSD, depression etc and really do not need that laid at their feet.

I have learned so much from MN: I credit it with making me realise I could study for my degree, helping me recognise the boy's needs and keeping me sane. I ahve had letter spublished supporting MN in teh press, especially during the whole Gine Ford saga so have given my bit back I hope- at least to the best of my ability. But the down side of feeling in the past that I have ahd a responsibility to fight for my boys on here, to educate, to read the continued bile from the bogots and respond, has been some really dark times and certainly tears in my lovely DH's arms about what society seems to think about me, the boys.

And I have fought the same battles for gay people, for racial minorities- and am proud to have done. Becuase it matters. but my kids are more vulnerable than those grous becuase they (certainly ds3, maybe ds4) do not have a voice. They cannot fight their own battles. If I fight though there's always some prat saying 'hey you just want the benefits' or 'lnot in my school' and walking away yelling vested interest: and until the people with loud voices, power and a delete key play their part that will happen. When rosa Parks made her stand she changed everything but only becuase the media and fellow humans gave her experience that voice and amde it heard.
Here, I feel I am shouting into the void.
nobody wants to hear that ds2 has a reading age 4 years above his actual, that ds1 is school council chair and vice captain of his house: they want to focus on some Sn bogeyman.

Well, hear me: SN isn;t the bogeyman. If there are mistaken dx's, they NT Paediatricians are the bogeymen 9really? show me the evidence pretty please). If people are falsely claiming SN benefits they are NT by definition or it wouldn;t be a false claim. If kids are causing trouble ins chools becuase they ahve Sn needs not met look to the (usually NT) councillors, panels, Government who have created (this Government and the last) a dearth of suitable eduational options and provisions.

They are the bogeymen. Not my lovely, warm hearted, valuable boys.

Hahathreadie- elftie is cool.

Elfties and bogeymen: what a fab world! Very Tom Holt. Take me there, please.