Just been told I bear the mark of Satan...

[davidgillon]

Someone wrote a really good piece for a Conservative Christian forum explaining why disabled people find the election result threatening and appealing for the readers to look at the situation from our viewpoint and with Christian understanding. The replies were appalling, some of the worst self-righteous disablism I've ever seen (one of the reasons I was really depressed early in the week). Several disability activitists, including me, replied to some of the worst of them. After several exchanges one of  them has just told me "The image of God that man was created in has been distorted by the evil one since the Fall and that is why people have disabilities. The gospel is explicit about that."

Headdesk.

Comments

[syntaxofthings]

what in the.

I am impressed you are trying to engage.

[davidgillon]

I figure that there's probably not much hope for the people who are being aggressive, but if I reply with the actual facts of what is being cut there may be many more people who read it but don't respond, and may actually think about the morality and the impact.

And to be honest they pushed me into angry replying and I've segued into obsessive replying, which isn't entirely good for me, but I may as well try and get some good out of it.

[hilarita]

Ah yes. Reminds me of someone in the Christian Union at college who told me that one of our friends had got appendicitis because 'it was the Devil in her'. Even though I was a practising Christian at the time, there was just no way I could engage with her about that. Because obviously God would heal your disability if only you had enough faith. Or your suffering is a perfect example of Christ's suffering, and you should bear it nobly. Or they should fuck off, and let us take some bloody painkillers, and not imply that it's noble that someone using crutches finds it difficult to negotiate steps.

*sound of heads meeting desks across the land*

[davidgillon]

It's actually not the most headdesk-worthy thing I've heard today, that honour goes to TEDx Sydney, of all people. That'll be a separate post.

[davidgillon]

I quoted the ACPO (Association of Chief Police Officers) guidance on hate incidents at him:

ACPO defines a hate incident as: 'any incident, which may or may not constitute a criminal offence, which is perceived by the victim or any other person, as being motivated by prejudice or hate.' (With a Hate Crime being where it is a criminal offence).

And got a fairly panicked reply back saying he was talking about Original Sin and we're all corrupt and 'I thought you were a Christian', by which I think he means if I'm a Christian I must think like him - that would be a no. So I told him I'm a Christian who finds the doctrine of Original Sin obscene, and that he's still saying I got an extra dose of Satan for being disabled. We'll see if he replies.

[kafj]

Aarrgh *headdesk* indeed.