I’ve had it up to here with those rascals!
Well I agree it can be difficult to tell upon looking who needs an ECV and who is just using one because they are too lazy to walk through Hersey Park - and I have no problem with people who need them using them to increase the quality of their life - we all know that there are some people who have extended the level of couch potato-ness to riding an ECV rather than walking because they can and are too lazy to walk. These people we can heap deserved scorn on.
Do you really think those self-righteous, judgmental stares are easier to bear when you know you need the device and know that it doesn’t look like you do? Let alone the open hostility and rudeness some engage in after deciding that you don’t really need the device? Reading a thread like this just brings a voice to all those stares and makes them worse to bear.
I can’t believe people are getting so huffy about the OP! I read it and couldn’t imagine anyone taking offense. I guess it’s true, you’re gonna offend somebody by saying anything, even that the sky is blue. :rolleyes:
Mockingbird, Chill. For cryin’ out loud, Scylla said that he was specifically referring to those who obviously didn’t need the damn scooter, as he said about the woman who climbed all those stairs once she hopped off of hers. Get a grip and direct your venom towards someone actually deserving of it and for chrissakes, quit looking for shit to get offended at.
I think everyone can agree that there are some people out there who abuse these things. The OP was directed at them. Not you. Unless you’re abusing them. Sometimes I wonder about some of the posters on this board. I mean, if you get offended so damn easily at every little thing, chances are, you’re pretty damn insecure about the way you live your own life.
Yes, people rent those scooter-thingies who don’t need them. I worked at Six Flags as a teenager, and it wasn’t unsual to find youngins riding around in those things in big packs, like they were trying to look like motocycle thugs or something.
That said, I’m sure people like that make up a noticeable but small portion of the scooter-riding population. There’s already a stigma associated with handicapped people. Why would an able-bodied person subject themselves to that just so they don’t have to flex their legs?
I’m not “looking for shit to get offended at.”
Scylla has a history of taking offense when the commoners try and talk to him and looking at others and becoming angry because he jumps to conclusions about what their capacity is and what they deserve.
So… you and Cheesesteak can go fuck yourselves.
Scylla has been an attention seeking jerk since he came on here, and little has changed since his first entitlement laden SUV rant.
“Sounds like someone has a case of the Mondays.”
Yes you are.
I didn’t know the Segway was being marketed to the handicapped. Or are you just saying that no one who’s not handicapped should be caught dead with one?
Because I think they look kinda fun…
I wish I thought you were all kidding me - there is a problem with able-bodied people using motorized scooters when they don’t need them in the US?!? What is the matter with people? Other than extreme laziness and a total sense of entitlement, of course. Creator save us from actually ever getting any exercise of any kind.
Well, here in the state of Mississippi, where the prevalence of obesity is ASTOUNDING, I feel no pain for a fatass in a scooter. Seriously. Okay, you weigh 400 pounds, you have a bad back/knees from the weight so you get a handicap sticker and scooter.
I think these fatasses could seriously stand a little sweating. And don’t give me this crap about it being genetic. Some people are more disposed to become obese than others, but I believe that it is possible to not be obese. Overweight is different, but I believe obesity is solvable. Look I can guarantee if someone with Obesity genes were raised in Okinawa, then they wouldn’t be fat if they grew up there. The problem is that Americans simply have a shitty food culture. There are much more fat people here than anywhere else. We weren’t so fat that long ago. I think you’ll find that obesity has been growing since the beginning of the century.
No attempt to hijack, but I have no patience for fatties. It is our culture folks.
Anyone know a European that moved to America and got fatter? I certainly know many. What about Americans that moved to Europe and got skinny? I also know a few too.
Look, I have sympathy for anyone in a scooter to some degree. Even the fatties. I mean they are to some degree a victim of a society that doesn’t condone fatness and doesn’t encourage healthiness.
Ever look at cooking show nowadays? They really cook some unhealthy shit!
Well, I feel bad for those fatties here. But it is under their control. And if they weren’t so fat, then they wouldn’t need a damn wheelchair.
Well, off to wal-mart! Wonder how many fatties I’ll see? I’ll report back
In Australia they have chaufeur driven ‘curtesy cars’ in some shopping centres and amusement parks, so you eliminate the problems of poor or dangerous driving and abuse by the able bodied.
I think that the proliferation of the marketing of them has been a cunning plan by the companies that make them, due to the rapidly ageing populations in developed nations - they are now heavily marketed here, along with incontinence knickers, sit in showers and chairs that push you up when you want to get up. God help our health if the able bodied start to use all of these things - on the other hand, buy shares in the companies that make them, cause we’re getting older and older.
Is it just me, or is the irony of this statement too impressive for words?
Well, it’s clear that futureman will provide a useful and insightful commentary about weight and weight loss issues to the SDMB.
Welcome futureman.
:rolleyes:
The thing that pisses me off is my own hypocricy. I feel uncomfortable using such devices in public because I’m sure people are staring at me, judging me, because I’m fat and, at first glance, you can’t see the muscular dystrophy that has caused the sedentary lifestyle that has led to the obesity.
As a result, I find myself giving judgmental looks to people I see using mobility devices and/or handicapped placards who look ablebodied, because they’re making it harder for us who need them to use them without being judged. I forget about, “Judge not lest you be judged.” It becomes a vicious circle of hypocricy, like a snake swallowing it’s own tail.
I hope he’ll forgive me if I’m wrong, but I think Mockingbird’s point is that Scylla again seems to be using his superhuman power of knowing without a doubt who is, and who is not, disabled. Perhaps the woman climbing the steps at such a jaunty pace only has motility problems at distance. I don’t know, I agree that it’s a problem for the physically disabled should aids such as this be abused, but whether the aids are being abused or not is seldom clear just from a quick look at the user. You see someone overweight riding an electric scooter: do you assume that they are a. using it because they are lazy, and that’s how they became overweight in the first place, or b. that their physical disability, and resulting lack of mobility/endurance, may have caused the weight gain in the first place? The charitable would assume the later and the judgemental the first, no?
Ha, okay I’m sorry about the tone of this post. But we’re in the pit, right? If this were in GD, then I would have obviously reasoned it out better and been more kind, because its expected. I always figured that the Pit was a place to vent irrational rantings without any type of discussion.
Look, that’s how I feel when I see a fat guy in a scooter. But if I reason it out, I give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Part of being human is learning to overcome those base feelings, but sometimes you have to let them out. But anyway, most of the posts in the pit seem to be lacking in insigntful commentary. Now that I read most of the posts I realize that is what people have done with this OP. But why is it in the Pit? I thought people post things in the pit because they expect it to get dirty. No?
Look, I think Scylla has often been an asshole about determining who deserves and doesn’t deserve a handicapped placard or what have you.
This is not one of those times. He made it quite clear in the OP that he knows some people may have non obvious reasons for having these carts. He apologizes IN ADVANCE about this.
I’m no Scylla defender, normally, but in this case, Mockingbird, you should take the stick out of your ass.
Yes, he apologizes. Yes, he uses the qualifer ‘seeming’ in an effort not to offend, I find it admirable. However, I quite understand how remarks such as this:
would get the back up of anyone likely to be considered ‘seemingly able-bodied’ by the general public (and, most likely, the OP) when perhaps they are not. I don’t condemn Scylla for his suspicions, but I certainly understand Mockingbird’s ire, and hope that if he does indeed have a stick up his ass, that’s he’s enjoying the experience immensely.
Mockingbird:
What can I do to mend fences with you?