Comments on: Disabled, abused and neglected

By: Hanora Brennan

Hanora Brennan — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 21:36:50 +0000

It’s like people with mental disabilities in this country being afraid to admit to it because of the social stigma attached. The same applies to suicide statistics in this country; they have always been under reported because of the stigma attached to that and also because it would invalidate any insurance due to the victim. What a backward nation we still are. The cubs of the Celtic tiger must have been gobbled up by the parents!

By: Hanora Brennan

Hanora Brennan — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 21:28:29 +0000

The current Ombudsman, (Emily O’Reilly) in her journalistic days at the inception of the Redress Board referred to it as ‘A MASS GRAB BY THE LOWER ORDERS’! The mask slipped big time that day Emily – huh? Any wonder you don’t take my calls or answer letters asking for an apology for your vulgar crassness! Who needs this Ombudsman? What constructive legislation has she instituted for children? Zilch!

By: Paddy

Paddy — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 17:22:33 +0000

A very powerful response Ed and a very powerful on too. What is it about this nation of ours that in Ireland we continue to relegate people with disabilities to the bottom of the social pile. I know this due to my own almost life-long disability and from being cast to the very margins of society to be pitied, patronised and prayed for. That’s no good to me. I don’t want any of it.

By: Paddy

Paddy — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 17:09:41 +0000

How true Frank, how true and how terrible. Being disabled is according to the Catholic Church a “punishment for sins committed in a previous life”. MMMMMMM I wish I could remember what awful sins I’d committed.

By: FXR

FXR — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 13:42:57 +0000

The idea that people with disabilities should be hidden away is based on Catholic Church preaching. It’s based on their obsession with sex as being evil going all he way back to Augustine of Hippo. I still remember as a child visiting my grandmothers where Aunt Molly was kept in a darkened backroom because she was in a wheelchair.

When you remove anyone from the community the community is incomplete and poorer for it.

By: Ed Burke

Ed Burke — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 06:06:09 +0000

Oh, yes, Paddy, I realize the great difficulty in “persuading the government” (and, I would add, its armies of “contractors”) that people with disabilities should live with their families or in local communities. However, I think it is essential that we do not essentially support their self-interested reasons for locking people up. We here are FAR from a model situation, but we have gone from about 250,000 in State institutions 35 years ago to about 35,000 now (population base 300+million). We now have over 10 States that have NO institutions at all (so the old, “Well, some people NEED institutions because they are too disabled…” argument is long gone). Important here is also the fact that our Supreme Court has ruled that the institutionalization of people with disabilities can constitute discrimination under civil rights law.
So, even if we begin to create “zones” where kids can grow up in families and adults can live locally, we demonstrate that there is a much saner and better way to do things. And, it almost always costs less (although I understand that money is no object when the goal is to segregate people with disabilities). Just some thoughts…

By: Paddy

Paddy — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 23:01:53 +0000

You’re right Bernadette, this is an issue close to my heart. All of us who work in the field of abuse of children in institutions must now focus on those vulnerable people who don’t have a voice such as we have.

By: Paddy

Paddy — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:48:20 +0000

While I agree with you Frank, there is the other point that needs to be made and that is that people with disabilities are treated like they were stupid. Also the vested interests do not want to shift the emphasis of disability from the medical model to a social model. The latter would ensure the integration of people with disabilities into ‘mainstream society’. As Ed Burke said, posting on this website, there is no good reason for keeping people in institutional care. It seems to me, the vested interests take priority over those people who have disabilities. Paddy.

By: Paddy

Paddy — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:41:40 +0000

I absolutely agree with you Ed. There isn’t any even half good reason for keeping people with disabilities in institutions. The difficulty arises when one tries to persuade government of that fact. It’s so often forgotten that ‘disability’ has become an industry employing hundreds of thousands of people around the world. These people have a very obvious interest in maintaining the status quo and protecting their jobs. Paddy

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 18:45:33 +0000

“Wherever vulnerable people are detained, an imbalance of power exists between those detained and those holding the keys”

Never a truer sentence spoken. We need a properly funded Ombudsman to restore balance.