A Disabled Mess
There is a court case going in London at the moment about discrimination on grounds of disability. It concerns Abercrombie and Fitch and a student who was employed by them to work as a sales and stockroom assistant. The had been born without her left forearm.
I’m not going to talk about the rights and wrongs of this case, as I have no legal training. Although, as my late wife was a barrister, I do have more than the average grasp of a barrack room lawyer.
I think that everybody takes much too much notice of disability.
I was brought up after the war and virtually every year in my schools had someone who had a withered arm or leg through polio. We didn’t bother and they usually got on with it. Perhaps the most famous polio victim was the great Indian bowler Chandrasekhar, who used to bowl with his damaged arm. No-one could tell how it would spin. There was also Murray Halberg, who won Olympic medals over 5,000 and 10,000 metres.
This was long before disabled sports and no-one bothered. But both were champions in their sports.
I also remember employing a guy with one leg. We were the first to give him an interview and he got the job as he was eminently suitable. But everybody else had turned him down at the application stage, as he was disabled. In my view and I suspect his, he wasn’t, as he probably did most things that we all do. He trained people all over the world for the company for a start.
The girl in the story may be disabled in the legal sense, but she is totally capable of performing the job for which she was hired and should not be hidden away in a back room. Compare this with a b ranch of one well-know chain store that I know, which employs someone with Down’s Syndrome on the till. That’s positive for everyone!
But perhaps for me the saddest thing in this tale is that it has come to court.
No-one will benefit!
Except of course lawyers.
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The Anonymous Widower 
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