My family has a weekday night time tradition watching the Daly Show and the Colbere Report. Due to the State of the Union Adress it was not on when I went down stairs.
So I was dishearten when I saw the following clip .
I really hated the last part. It felt like I was being punched in the gut. You see I am 22 years old and live with a developmental disability. I have Cerebral Palsy.
No I do not have a intellectual disability that is the proper term now not the R word . Although if you met me you might think that I do because I have a speech impairment and drool at times. But it still hurts what Pete said. I do not respect him enough to use his last name.
In the spring of 2009 I had a school meeting at which time a job coach sat across the table from me and my mother and recommend that I work at Safeway, most likely working for pennies a hour, and live in a group home. He had said this despite the fact that I was in my second semester of Advanced Placement United States History, which I ended up passing the AP test with a three. I was a junior at the time, so when senior year rolled around I was scared of leaving high school. Can you blame me? I did not want to do it and I assumed that the job coach was right because he worked in the field and knew me. Senior year I had to work one of those jobs and I hated. I got a pay check but was unaware of the low wages. To this day I am scared of working a entry level job. Its not fair . I want to get off social security, you see that is where the money comes from but its hardly enough to live off of.
After high school, I decided to attend a community college and I excelled in those classes. I got good grades. I got so many that when I graduated I was able to graduate with honors. Thats right a person who was predicted to work for pennies a hour went on to graduate with honors. I am not worthless. I attend university where people did not respect me and am currently on a leave of absence to care of my health.
The world is not set up for people with disabilities. Colleges do not know how to included those with developmental disabilities and thanks to the loophole in the Fair Employment Act the jobs that societies expect us to do barely pay us anything. Disabled people have feelings and we want to be include in life. We can be tax payers, some people may need help paying taxes but they can still pay them. We do not need to be dependent on the government.
Oh and our founding fathers said this about people.
" We all hold these truths to be self eve dent that all men are created equal." Ring a bell. If not look in the Declaration of Independence and maybe then you will find a heart
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