You may be surprised to hear this from a progressive, but I am
getting a bit tired of what I interpret as excessive accommodation (or
less flattering... tyranny of the minority). The Constitution protects
life, liberty, and the PURSUIT of happiness - not an actual guarantee of
happiness (especially when that may result in less liberty for others).
Life is hard much of the time for most of us (even "normal" folks); why
does society have to address your specific issue at what could be great
cost/unfairness to others, some of whom may be even needier by
reasonable measures? Part of that stems from the greater diversity and
funding for interest groups of course. But maybe part of it is also a
bit of egocentrism: my problems are more important than yours. Often
"fights for justice/rights/equality" have degenerated into fights for
disproportional, preferential treatment (pro-Israel lobby, breast cancer
funding, etc.). People rarely take the time to consider that the extra
stuff they get may result in involuntary sacrifices from others.
Obviously those with special needs deserve some assistance,
compassion, and reasonable laws to govern their treatment. But do we
give equivalent concern for other types of needs, such as language
barriers, poverty, climate-geography, family situation, non-mainstream
religions, or general inability to thrive in this market economy? Many
of those factors are also out of the individual's control and often no
fault of their own.
First of all, if we run the #s and accessibility/sensitivity
measures don't cost the nation that much, then it's a moot point. But
there are a gazillion types of disabilities, and some are of course
easier to accommodate for than others (and do employers and orgs have to
plan for all of them?). I couldn't find summarized figures, but as a
case example take
North Adams, MA
with a pop. of 14K. The DOJ is forcing them to pay $1M over 3-5 years
for ADA compliance. I am not sure if this is representative of the
overall US or not, but that is $71/resident. Disabled people are about
13% of the nation (43M ppl), but of course not all of them will need
every type of ADA modification. To put it in perspective, a single
person with a $50K income contributed $73 towards science/tech research
in their
federal tax return.
So North Adams was spending as much on ADA compliance (that may nor may
not help anyone) as they were on research (that ironically could
reduce/mitigate disabilities). So we're robbing from the future to pay
for quasi-arbitrary mandates. I am sure some of those upgrades were
serious and needed, but I'm also pretty sure some weren't.
With all our crumbling schools, bridges, power grids, etc., we have
to prioritize our spending by cost/benefit. Maybe that is cold, and of
course we don't want to leave critically needy people hanging, but
ultimately if we spend $ smarter, America will be better off. I wonder
if people even collect data regarding how many Braille signs are
actually used by the blind, how many CC-hearing impaired tools are actually used by the deaf, what % of workers are self-identified as
disabled, or how many ADA accessible bathrooms/parking stalls/etc. are
"surplus". There's no point imposing all these costs on businesses and
other orgs if they're not even helping the handicapped much.
The various versions of ADA were meant to be civil rights
legislation preventing discrimination against the handicapped, which is
probably good. But according to wiki sources below, the Act is so vague
and inconsistent (like most legislation) that it may actually make it
harder for the handicapped to get some jobs, and opened the door to an
avalanche of litigation. Of course the disabilities with the best
advocacy assets got more favorable attention/provisions (how does one
rank disabilities anyway?).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_with_Disabilities_Act_of_1990
People
should have equal rights and "relatively" equal access to public
services and life activities. But that doesn't mean we can all enjoy
them equally. People have "disadvantages", whether mental, physical,
emotional, economic, or otherwise that may significantly reduce their
access to privileged or even basic stuff. We can't remedy 100% of those
cases, and it would probably be highly corrupt and oppressive if we
tried. Sometime it's morally right and maybe socially justified to try,
but we need to give it a lot more thought before imposing sweeping
mandates on a community, or the entire nation.
Some of these comments apply to identity issues too. I'm
sorry, but society does not have to bend over backwards just so you can
"be who you are". ALL of us put on masks every day and have to conform
to some other persona just to be part of society. We don't have
unlimited, absolute freedom and liberty. Reasonable accommodations are
fine, but that is of course subjective and I am not sure if legislators
or even judges are the best people to make the call. I wonder how much
of it is real personal strife and how much is just vanity or an
attention grab. I really doubt most
elementary kids
can be certain of their gender identity; they've barely spent any time
at all as that gender. I know it is a real issue for some, but I can
envision a lot of misunderstanding and problems associated with this
type of law. Surely it is wrong for kids to be discriminated against
based on what gender they want to associate with and what society
expects them to have. But the law can't prevent every wrong from
occurring, and this could cause disturbance and tension for many other
students and their families. Maybe the best solution is to build a solo
unisex bathroom in each school? But that isn't much different than
enforcing ADA building rules I guess.
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