When Disability is Misdiagnosed as Bad Behavior

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From Pacific Standard: People with hidden or invisible disabilities are often subjected to violence and verbal abuse, as well as denied accommodations and asked to prove they are disabled.

“Ableist discrimination and bigotry materialize in countless ways, but talk to anyone whose disability isn’t immediately obvious and this kind of story pops up again and again. Encounters turn bad because a random individual—sometimes in a position of official authority, other times just a meddling onlooker—decides someone is getting away with something. They cry ‘fraud.’ They demand proof. They seek to restore order. Such incidents often result in humiliation or forced disclosure. Worse, as in Minnesota, they can spark violence and trauma.”

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1 COMMENT

  1. When Bad Behavior Is Misdiagnosed Disability. There are, you know, welfare cheats. There are people finding clever ways of defrauding the government. There is also this blurred line between “disability” and “ability”. Is monkey aping another monkey, or is monkey actually “sick”? Get a lot of monkeys aping other monkeys, and what have you got? Oh, yes. Of course. A service industry.