As if..?

Sue Vincent's Daily Echo

Sculpture by Rob Mulholland

“You should write about it,” said my son. “It would make a good subject for a blog post.” He was right, but it wouldn’t make for a  comfortable one. We had been discussing the assumptions people make based upon appearances. It is not an uncommon topic when my son faces the world from the level of a wheelchair. The variation in the way he is spoken to by strangers is wide, ranging from those who just speak to the human being, to those who feel they have to treat a 32 year old man as a backward child.

We all experience this instant assessment every day, both as its focus and as the assessor. Most of us give little thought to such casual interactions, from either perspective. It is just the way we are built and probably stems from a very early mechanism for survival. For…

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