Here Today... Gone To Hell!

Ok, this has been on my mind today and i thought i would poll HTGTH to see if anyone else shares my feelings on a certain topic, or if i am in the minority on this.




At my graduation yesterday, a young lady with Cerebral Palsy received a diploma/degree...

as she was being helped across the stage everyone stood up and started clapping and cheering.........

I will be honest, I stayed in my seat and politely clapped just as I did for every other person receiving their diploma/degree


now, my way of thinking is, this girl has probably been treated different, stared at, dealt with all sorts of assholes treating her like she is helpless or less than healthy people etc.

so for me, she accomplished something which is great, but I thought in my way of thinking,she'd maybe appreciate for once, being treated like everybody else.

everyone singling her out and treating her "special" was a nice gesture i guess.. but what do u think?

am i totally off base with this?

I see this a lot, and I'm not trying to be tasteless or an asshole, but I agree with what you said.

A polite clap is good enough, like you did. Singling out someone like they did clapping and standing is wrong.

Did they accomplish something great? Yes.
Do they have a disability? Yes.
Do you think they want that to be the reason you are clapping and standing? No.
Did you, D, accomplish something great? Yes.

Good to see u share my thought process on this.

am very curious to see where other people come down on this.

For a class project last semester, we had to go to the mall and ride around in a wheelchair for an hour and let me tell u, it really changed my perspective on a lot of things. I just wanted to stand up at all the assholes staring and avoiding me and say, no no, i am not really handicapped. It honestly made me very uncomfortable how people treated me.

No you are not. She probably had mixed emotions about the response she received. It's nice to be applauded and not mocked, but she may have liked to be just normal. Since I don't know her personally, I can't say. Some people love to be the center of attention, others don't regardless of whether or not they have a disabilty. College graduation was one of the worst days of my life. I remember thinking, I'm not ready for the real world. :hihi:

I don't think people with disabilities want to be treated any differently (except in cases where they need help), but it's the 'normal' people around them that behave weirdly. Some are mean while others go out of their way to be nice to them and do them favours just to show that they don't have a problem with the person's disability. There are all kinds of people.

I'm with you on this one as well. Just like when you're joking with people, not to joke with disabled is often more disrespectful than giving them the "cotton treatment".  They want to be treated the same way as anyone. I've actually been thanked later on by disabled and their care takers for not keeping them out of my jokes, it makes them feel part of the group

they have a sense of humor as well and don't want to be singled out, you shouldn't take it too far though, just like you shouldn't take it too far with anybody else.

In this particular case, I'm sure you did the right thing, you were being genuine, that's all everybody wants. If you look at it from different perspectives, you can always start and look from your own, how would you have wanted it, if everybody was going apeshit and were being genuine at the same time, I'd probably think it was cool, but if everyone is going apeshit becaue they think it's the right thing to do, then i'd just want them to treat me like everybody else and i'm sure this young lady feels the same way

the exact same thing happened at my graduation too. He was in front of me when it was our turn to get our diploma and once he rolled up to get his diploma everyone gave a standing ovation and lasted for a full minuet or so. I was next so all i could do was smile. 

I get what you mean. A lot of the concern for how disabled people are treated etc. seem to come from us 'able-bodied' people, who don't want anyone to get offended. Now I don't have a disability and hopefully never do, but I'd probably want to be treated much like everyone else in most situations. Everyone cheering and clapping for her that day was nice, but I have to think that if stuff like that happened often, I'd probably get pretty tired of it.

missed this part before, I've done that in school as well! It was a cool experience and i got to ask hot moms to help me pick up groceries ;D some were toally ignorant though and wouldn't help me with extra high doorsteps

Yeah I understand your thinking on this D but that would be more appropate for normal life things.
You dont graguate collage every day and those times are for reconizing people like hers accomplishments.


If you did not clap I would have a problem :rant:


 :hihi: Just joking!!!




Joe