I’m not sure if this is a Great Debate, but I do want the opinions of people who post here, so I’m going to put it here and if the mods want to move it, fine.
I was just read the riot act at by some woman I don’t know, who informed me that I discriminate against the disabled. Here’s the situation:
I have an apartment in my basement that I rent to offset part of my mortgage. I’m in the process of getting a new tenant. This woman (whom I will call Lana because that was her name) called to arrange a showing. I meet her at the apartment and she has a young man in tow who is very quiet but acting a little “off,” for lack of a better word. He’s sort of rocking, and plucking at his clothes, and gazing at the ceiling. Nothing threatening, just not all “there,” if you know what I mean. So we go through the apartment, and then the woman advises me that she is actually trying to rent it for her son (the odd young man). He has schizophrenia and is on full disability, including Section Eight (Federal housing subsidies).
I told Lana I was not comfortable renting the apartment to her son. She said that they were having a very difficult time finding him housing (which I can understand) because no one wants to rent to a person who is mentally ill. Lana became very insistent that I rent it to him, and I became more and more adamant that I would not, and the end result was the accusation (at loud volume) that I discriminate against the disabled.
So now I’m conflicted. On the one hand, I fully appreciate that this young man is trying to be independent and is entitled to respect and (hopefully) a hand from the community, including reasonable housing. I absolutely believe in attempting to help people who are trying to overcome difficulties and I do not (Lana’s accusations notwithstanding) think all mentally ill people are dangerous or “second-class citizens.”
But, as a single woman living alone, I just am not comfortable having a schizophrenic man living in my basement. Lana says his illness is mostly “memory problems,” but the fact is that he is so disabled by his illness that he cannot hold a job. Lana says he is on medication, but the fact is that I am not comfortable being the one who finds out what he’s like off medication, should he decide to stop taking it (as I understand sometimes – rarely, but sometimes – happens).
So, TM, please tell me what you think, both of my problem or, if you like, about society’s general responsibility to its disabled citizens. I guess I’m talking moral as opposed to legal, since (a) I don’t think it would illegal to refuse to rent the apartment to anyone, no matter their level of ability, who made me feel unsafe; and (b) I do have legitimate other reasons for not renting it to him, namely concerns about his ability to make the rent, considering he does not hold a job and the Federal subsidy is only a partial one. But having Lana scream at me that I’m an discriminating bigot has unsettled me. I mean, I can’t argue with “discriminating,” since, justified or not, I obviously did, but I’m really upset by “bigot.” What think you?
) grows in part from the fact that there are not adequate structures in place to help people like this. Why? For a very simple reason–the schizophrenic do not have the political clout to make the government do things. The money that Lana gives to the government (and Jodi, for that matter) goes into the pockets of the dairy farmers and the tobacco growers and the NEA and AFDC, but, more to the point, it goes into the pockets of those in the bureacracies whose jobs it is to hand it out.