Don't use "differently abled" in college: IHE article

[financeguy]

-Do I think allowing service animals (as opposed to therapy animals) is "nonsense." (A seeing eye dog, for example.)

No, I do not believe this is nonsense at all. I am not, however, in holding this view expressing the same sentiment that many hold when they say this or something similar, which may render some of the further answers to come irrelevant. When most people say something "ought to be" a certain way, that there's "a need for x" or any other mild approval of a concept, they really mean they want government force to compel their preference from others. I simply mean what I have literally said, but in no way do any of my statements imply that I want affirmative government violence to back my preference, only the opposite.

How do I arrive at my opinions and why would I want to use my opinion to cast doubt on the legitimacy of something that is a genuine need?

Like most, I arrive at conclusions in many ways including personal experience and observing like situations. Underpinning this decision making process is the absence of sufficient belief in mental health professions to simply defer to their judgement. Widespread abuse of a particular issue is certainly going to raise a flag that a similar instance may also be abusive.

Do I care if it "goes the other way" from an overreach allowing some abusive cases to restrictions such that some legitimate cases are not rendered assistance?

Again, I have to clarify what this question usually means. You probably are only euphemistically asking if I personally "care" if these things happen. Sure, I don't personally like seeing people struggle to receive legitimate assistance. The question you're implying is "don't you want a thug with a gun to enforce that preference" and the answer is no. I do not want a government mandate telling Joe Real Estate owner to let someone's dog on site.

Do I personally accommodate wishes I don't agree with or stonewall/ignore these requests?

If I accept a contract, I do what is agreed upon consistent with the policies of that institution up until the completion of a semester. If there is something I find disagreeable for whatever reason, I do not accept a subsequent appointment. This has happened two times on issues unrelated to disability accommodations. I'm not emotionally invested enough in a particular appointment to try to change this or anything else.

Outside the academic context, there is a bit of more nuanced response. I do not, for example, have any investment properties. This and other restrictions on my ability to make my own decisions are one of the many reasons. I have also considered a brick & mortar storefront for a business in the past before deciding to operate virtually, only occasionally getting a day office when needed in one of the executive suite locations. I likewise will use an external service rather than hire someone directly for anything I need in business. So the answer isn't that I "disobey" the rules as much as I refrain from behavior that is subjected to rules I do not wish to abide by, outsourcing that hassle to someone else.

What happened to the serial complainer?

The recent one ended up successfully completing my class the second time enrolled with neither of us mentioning the friction the previous time. The only reason he was not more of a hassle isn't because of any requirement I had, but that in making his complaints he infrequently if ever follows through on the procedural requirement of the disability office to submit the appropriate requests for accommodation or later complaint. It really doesn't matter either way with this guy since no matter what his reason, the traits that his ailment contain (going awol for several weeks, not paying attention, refusing to be punctual or on topic) are going to prevent him from entering, let alone succeeding in the field I teach in.

[smallcleanrat]

You probably are only euphemistically asking if I personally "care" if these things happen. Sure, I don't personally like seeing people struggle to receive legitimate assistance. The question you're implying is "don't you want a thug with a gun to enforce that preference" and the answer is no.

Umm...what?!?

[polly_mer]

You probably are only euphemistically asking if I personally "care" if these things happen. Sure, I don't personally like seeing people struggle to receive legitimate assistance. The question you're implying is "don't you want a thug with a gun to enforce that preference" and the answer is no.

Umm...what?!?

There's no magic wand so that polite people don't have to admit that they mean force others to conform.  However, there are indeed many people who want their preferences to be enforced by law.  Enforced by law at its heart means increasing consequences until people comply.  When fines and social pressure don't work, the next steps are implied force (having the lawyers write strongly worded letters) or actual force (send in the police to arrest those who do not comply).

Nice middle-class people seldom want to believe that the force of law is ultimately the violence of having the police come stop you from disobeying.  Nice middle-class people really want to believe that merely stating the rules in a good clear voice will be enough to make everyone comply.  Nice middle-class people usually live in a bubble where at most the lawyers are sufficient to solve most problems, but even then, the lawyers seem very serious and are to be avoided.

Nice middle-class people are often surprised when the riots start because obeying the rules is only a great option when rules are a minor inconvenience instead of a threat to one's life.

[writingprof]

Nice middle-class people are often surprised when the riots start because obeying the rules is only a great option when rules are a minor inconvenience instead of a threat to one's life.

Green New Deal proponents, take note.

[marshwiggle]

There's no magic wand so that polite people don't have to admit that they mean force others to conform.  However, there are indeed many people who want their preferences to be enforced by law.  Enforced by law at its heart means increasing consequences until people comply.  When fines and social pressure don't work, the next steps are implied force (having the lawyers write strongly worded letters) or actual force (send in the police to arrest those who do not comply).

Nice middle-class people seldom want to believe that the force of law is ultimately the violence of having the police come stop you from disobeying.  Nice middle-class people really want to believe that merely stating the rules in a good clear voice will be enough to make everyone comply.  Nice middle-class people usually live in a bubble where at most the lawyers are sufficient to solve most problems, but even then, the lawyers seem very serious and are to be avoided.

Nice middle-class people are often surprised when the riots start because obeying the rules is only a great option when rules are a minor inconvenience instead of a threat to one's life.

For Americans, if you look at the debates over Bill C-16 in Canada, the real concern is that failure to use a person's preferred pronouns could result in being fired, fined, or potentially jailed for not paying a fine. (The people taking soemone to jail are likely to be carrying guns.)

[smallcleanrat]

You probably are only euphemistically asking if I personally "care" if these things happen. Sure, I don't personally like seeing people struggle to receive legitimate assistance. The question you're implying is "don't you want a thug with a gun to enforce that preference" and the answer is no.

Umm...what?!?

There's no magic wand so that polite people don't have to admit that they mean force others to conform.  However, there are indeed many people who want their preferences to be enforced by law.  Enforced by law at its heart means increasing consequences until people comply.  When fines and social pressure don't work, the next steps are implied force (having the lawyers write strongly worded letters) or actual force (send in the police to arrest those who do not comply).

Nice middle-class people seldom want to believe that the force of law is ultimately the violence of having the police come stop you from disobeying.  Nice middle-class people really want to believe that merely stating the rules in a good clear voice will be enough to make everyone comply.  Nice middle-class people usually live in a bubble where at most the lawyers are sufficient to solve most problems, but even then, the lawyers seem very serious and are to be avoided.

Nice middle-class people are often surprised when the riots start because obeying the rules is only a great option when rules are a minor inconvenience instead of a threat to one's life.

Huh?

You're asserting that if I think there is valid reason to support certain aspects of the ADA or similar means I want to see it escalate to enforcement at gun point? Seriously...what? I don't want that. I'm sorry if I in any way implied that.

On this thread, people have objected to overreach, but no one here has suggested doing away with disability rights laws altogether (unless I missed another, unspoken implied meaning); does that mean everyone here is guilty of wanting "thugs with guns" to force compliance? I'm honestly baffled by this.

I didn't even assert anything about the way things 'should' be outside of saying there should be a way to stop scammers and that a professor shouldn't get to unilaterally decide on whether or not to comply with approved accommodations.

My "do you care" question was asking "do you think this is a problem?" As in, is this something worth considering along with the issue of how other people are negatively affected by accommodations being too easily approved or too broadly applied. The discussion here was on where to draw the line and find some balance. At least I thought it was.

Is anyone with an opinion on how things should be in favor of enforcement through violence? If you don't think strangers should berate parents if their kid is crying in the grocery store, does this mean you want forced compliance? That you must want the person dragged away in handcuffs if social pressure doesn't affect their behavior? What about the stranger? Does their attempt to tell that parent how they should handle their kid necessarily mean they want police with guns involved if the parent tells them to mind their own business?

If the things I said implied I want forced compliance by any means necessary then I'm sorry. I don't want that. I didn't think I was saying that. If I implied these things I guess it was out of ignorance and lack of self-awareness, not an actual desire for what you are telling me my posts implied. How could I have said things in a way that expresses an opinion on the issue without implying endorsement of violence?

[Parasaurolophus]

You definitely didn't say that, or anything which entails it.

In the minuscule number of cases where accommodations might conflict, your accessibility office will figure it out. And honestly, how many of you have ever even encountered such a conflict? The overwhelming bulk of accommodations, in my experience, are for students needing extra time or with a hearing impairment.

[financeguy]

I'm sorry if you don't "like" the literal interpretation of a statement but yes, a desire for a law (of any kind) IS the desire for someone (with a gun) to come and use the threat of state violence to enforce it. That's what a law is. Otherwise it's a recommendation. This is why when someone says something they think sounds benign such as "Yes, I do think you should have a state issued license to cut hair." I point out, "So you want someone to come with a gun to cage someone if they are cutting hair without a license?" You can attempt to pretend that those statements are not synonymous by pointing out intermediate steps that would occur but the heart of the issue is that you would by necessity wish that those who want to give a crew cut without paying the shakedown fee are met with armed individuals. Making the literal case simply shows how absurd the situation is. It's for the same reason that if we're going to have executions I want them public. No ability to hide behind masks or euphemisms to pretend we're not doing it. If you think an executioner needs to be anonymous you need to ask how much you actually support the act. The hair example (or ADA) example is just a less extreme version of that.

[marshwiggle]

You definitely didn't say that, or anything which entails it.

In the minuscule number of cases where accommodations might conflict, your accessibility office will figure it out. And honestly, how many of you have ever even encountered such a conflict?

That's not something you want to carry very far. I've never seen someone beat their spouse; I've never seen a sexual assault, but that doesn't mean they don't happen, or that the law should just kind of be allowed to "figure it out" if it ever hapens.

[smallcleanrat]

I didn't say anything about liking an implication so I don't know why that's in quotes. I said I didn't see that the implication was there. Was the "liking" also implied?

This is honestly an idea I wasn't aware of; I had never heard before that support of any law means support for enforcement with absolutely no limit on severity. I said I was sorry and I never meant that. Now I'm just trying to understand.

When you mention execution, are you including that as an implication in supporting a law? Because if not, what takes the implication all the way through threats at gunpoint but not further to execution? If someone supports a particular speed limit in residential areas, they are fooling themselves if they think it doesn't mean that they would want speeding drivers executed?

If laws were passed banning the use of phony certificates to get pets on planes, would you object for these reasons? Do you want this to stop solely based on suggestion? Or would you support enforcement of this law up to and including execution?

[smallcleanrat]

You definitely didn't say that, or anything which entails it.

In the minuscule number of cases where accommodations might conflict, your accessibility office will figure it out. And honestly, how many of you have ever even encountered such a conflict?

That's not something you want to carry very far. I've never seen someone beat their spouse; I've never seen a sexual assault, but that doesn't mean they don't happen, or that the law should just kind of be allowed to "figure it out" if it ever hapens.

Ok, prefacing this by saying I'm just trying to understand this better. No other hidden motivation that I'm aware of.

Is the problem you are talking about here

1) people primarily using their personal experiences when forming opinions on how big a problem something is can get it really wrong
Or
2) That the potential for conflicting interests needs to be worked out before putting rules in place, regardless of whether these conflicts would be common or rare

Or something else?

[marshwiggle]

You definitely didn't say that, or anything which entails it.

In the minuscule number of cases where accommodations might conflict, your accessibility office will figure it out. And honestly, how many of you have ever even encountered such a conflict?

That's not something you want to carry very far. I've never seen someone beat their spouse; I've never seen a sexual assault, but that doesn't mean they don't happen, or that the law should just kind of be allowed to "figure it out" if it ever hapens.

Ok, prefacing this by saying I'm just trying to understand this better. No other hidden motivation that I'm aware of.

Is the problem you are talking about here

1) people primarily using their personal experiences when forming opinions on how big a problem something is can get it really wrong
Or
2) That the potential for conflicting interests needs to be worked out before putting rules in place, regardless of whether these conflicts would be common or rare

Or something else?

This is it. It relates to what I said earlier; if accomodations are going to be required, so there are legal rules that need to be obeyed, then the rules need to cover cases of conflict. The alternative is to not have legal enforcement of rules. In that case, instead of rules you have guidelines, and so discretion in dealing with conflicts is allowed by virtue of the guidelines not being binding.

(For a related example, if a boss wants to micromanage an employee, then the boss is responsible for anything that goes wrong, as long as the employee follows instructions. If the employer doesn't want to be responsible for everything, then s/he needs to allow the employee some independence.)

[smallcleanrat]

You definitely didn't say that, or anything which entails it.

In the minuscule number of cases where accommodations might conflict, your accessibility office will figure it out. And honestly, how many of you have ever even encountered such a conflict?

That's not something you want to carry very far. I've never seen someone beat their spouse; I've never seen a sexual assault, but that doesn't mean they don't happen, or that the law should just kind of be allowed to "figure it out" if it ever hapens.

Ok, prefacing this by saying I'm just trying to understand this better. No other hidden motivation that I'm aware of.

Is the problem you are talking about here

1) people primarily using their personal experiences when forming opinions on how big a problem something is can get it really wrong
Or
2) That the potential for conflicting interests needs to be worked out before putting rules in place, regardless of whether these conflicts would be common or rare

Or something else?

This is it. It relates to what I said earlier; if accomodations are going to be required, so there are legal rules that need to be obeyed, then the rules need to cover cases of conflict. The alternative is to not have legal enforcement of rules. In that case, instead of rules you have guidelines, and so discretion in dealing with conflicts is allowed by virtue of the guidelines not being binding.

(For a related example, if a boss wants to micromanage an employee, then the boss is responsible for anything that goes wrong, as long as the employee follows instructions. If the employer doesn't want to be responsible for everything, then s/he needs to allow the employee some independence.)

Ok, I think I follow except for why in your earlier post you said "The problem with sweeping accomodations for rare conditions is that they can conflict." Why did you include the word "rare"? Does that make a difference?

And would including conditions like saying the law applies UNLESS there is an unresolvable conflict (or something similar) go any way towards this? I guess then you need clear criteria for what makes a conflict unresolvable... But if you could do this, at least some people would be covered by the law instead of none?

Can a rule contain guidelines within it? Similar to how you can give an employee discretion to use their own judgment when making work decisions, wouldn't they still have to work within certain guidelines? With consequences for going outside of those guidelines?

...

I looked up a few articles regarding the "violence is implied in law" idea. I may be misunderstanding, but it seems not everyone who argues for this is using the same definition as to what constitutes violence. I still don't understand why a law necessarily implies willingness to enforce right up to carting people off to prison and executing them.

Why is it all or nothing, with no possibility for capping enforcement at lesser levels?

Why can't there be a system like, Break Law #3 --> mild-level enforcement, continue breaking law --> mild-to-moderate level enforcement (but this is as far as enforcement can go for this particular law, on the grounds that anything more severe would be disproportionate to whatever harm is caused by the offense). This might mean some people continuing reoffending with lower levels of enforcement being used repeatedly, but never escalating with the understanding that higher levels of enforcement would be necessary for higher levels of compliance, but the higher levels of compliance are not worth the consequences of the higher levels of enforcement. So less-than-complete compliance is considered better than none, but complete compliance is NOT considered better than less-than-complete compliance.

I'm not making an argument about should's or shouldn't's, so please don't read ulterior meanings into this. If I'm missing something you think is glaringly obvious, I honestly don't see it; I'm not hiding another meaning behind insinuation.

Never attribute to malice what is adequately explained by stupidity and all that...

I'm just wondering why this isn't possible, at least theoretically, even when accepting premises like "law implies enforcement" and "enforcement implies violence" where does the premise "violence always includes the potential to escalate to its most extreme forms" come from? This seems to require the additional premise "law implies TOTAL enforcement". And I don't see why this is necessarily true.

[dismalist]

The difficulty arises from a federal law mandating behavior without providing for payment!

Instead of taxing us to pay for special amenities of the disabled, the law forces those who are in more intense contact with the disabled to pay for the amenities, with money and with time.

I am certainly not against providing extra resources to the disabled, but we should all pay for that. The political system is fundamentally dishonest and cowardly here.

These things are so widespread that they even have a name: Unfunded mandates.

[polly_mer]

This is honestly an idea I wasn't aware of; I had never heard before that support of any law means support for enforcement with absolutely no limit on severity. I said I was sorry and I never meant that. Now I'm just trying to understand.

(for those who yell all the time about how much expertise I have in how many areas, I am giving personal observations by having been an adult for several decades.  I am not a lawyer nor do I have any formal training in these areas).


Many people don't really think through the implications of the distinctions between a guideline, an ordinance, and a law nor do they then think about what enforcement entails or should entail in a given society.

One way that the US limits how severe the consequences are for breaking a rule is assigning categories when the rule is established.  One common set of categories is civil penalties, misdemeanors, and felonies.  One can receive a ticket requesting money for, say, breaking a city ordinance related to parking.  Indeed, for many low-level violations, one can rack up many tickets and just refuse to pay with the primary penalty being more money in fines.  However, that's not much of a deterrent when the fines are so small that a logical response is to simply budget for the fines as an operating expense and then break the rule/pay the penalty.  It's also not much of a deterrent when one cannot pay the fines at all and the "punishment" is another letter with a list of the current total fines that will not be paid.

Misdemeanors are reserved for activities that should not be done like petty theft, driving on a suspended license, indecent exposure, and simple battery (this varies by jurisdiction) .  The penalties for misdemeanors is often jail time, non-voluntary community service, heftier fines/restitution, and probation.  Probation is more for deterrence and other penalties are punishment.

Felonies are activities that need to be stopped immediately and result in more severe penalties, up to death in some jurisdictions for some crimes.  One argument against police brutality is that very few crimes come with a penalty of death in the US and therefore someone who hasn't yet even been charged should not be getting any punishment that so exceeds the legal penalty for the crime.

* Ideally, the guideline/ordinance/law points would be set where most people can obey them and want the rules enforced at those levels.  However, that's not necessarily true in any given jurisdiction, especially for very diverse places or the hard cases where the mere existence of the rules has no resemblance to how seriously anyone takes those rules.

The interesting discussions are very much related to how strongly does society wish to deter/stop a given behavior.  China has made very different choices than the US for the same crimes.  Various jurisdictions in the US make somewhat different choices based on how local folks feel about deterrence in general versus strict punishment to at least stop that one individual from committing more public acts.  Even colleges and universities differ widely in what constitutes grounds for immediate expulsion with possibly criminal penalties for fraud versus some sort of restitution to the community for the first N documented offenses.

A complicating factor for not having One True Choice is humans vary greatly in their responses to deterrence and even punishment.  The same person may have different responses depending on how hard the rule is for that person to follow.  For example, a modest "Timmy, remember we stand quietly in line" may have Timmy in tears, while Margaret in the same kindergarten may not obey even when an adult is with her and physically restraining her.  People who can afford good lawyers may decide they'd rather pay the lawyers to look for loopholes and then bargain down fines rather than obey the rules that have no possible jail time.  I have known individuals who view jail as a way to get a warm bed and a few meals rather than some sort of punishment.  Even fines won't matter to those folks because ya can't get blood from a stone and jailed for not paying fines is again a win, not a punishment.

Failing to have a severe enough punishment to deter or at least prevent someone from ever doing it again through being locked up or executed is generally a break down in law and order.

Having hugely severe penalties for very minor violations also tends to backfire because if chewing gum in public is the same penalty as stealing $50k, then many people will logically conclude that they should get all they can while the getting is good and bank on not being caught because the gum chewing is so much easier to prosecute.

That's a lot of words to say:

* There are limits on severity of punishment through the US judicial system, but those limits often mean that undesirable behavior can just be rampant if enough people decide those limits are acceptably low or are so disconnected to reality that, like the rain, sometimes one gets caught and is temporarily inconvenienced.

* However, some people do want a magic wand to stop certain behavior and aren't too picky if the full force of law does mean jail for others to make the behavior stop.  That's seldom limited to just stopping murder, rape, and grand larceny.  For example, hate crimes are somehow worse than just things like assault, even when the physical effect is the same for the victim.

* Anything the government decides is worthwhile to enforce ultimately comes down to literal force.  That is the last resort if the goal is to stop someone from doing something again (much research indicates that deterrence doesn't work very well for the big crimes, regardless of the known punishment).  For example, criminal tax evasion is how they jailed Al Capone, not any of the violent crimes he probably committed, but somehow were hard to prove.  But that's a felony with substantial jail time and Capone was arrested by the police.