How dare they discriminate against Aspergers?

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i know of lots of people who abuse the system....

there's no newspaper article on them.

There are a lot of disabled campaigners against changes to benefits and cuts to services.
http://www.thebrokenofbritain.org/
http://www.dpac.uk.net/
http://www.facebook.com/blacktriangle11
http://www.carerwatch.com/

www.benefitsandwork.co.uk - this is the best site I have found for benefits claims advice. It costs money to join, but it helped me hugely with my DLA claim.

I was campaigning but it was affecting my mental health too much. I might go back to it at some point. My site is still there and gets a lot of hits still.
Twitter is the place to find activists, there are hundreds of individuals and groups on there.

I used to be so against people refusing to work full time when they are capable of it because I saw it as them abusing the system. I got a full time job and didn't get any money from them and I felt happy about it. I even had health insurance from them too but when I lost SSI, I lost my CareOregon and I didn't even have health insurance anymore either because I lost my full time job. I was like left out in the gutters and couldn't afford health insurance because it's so expensive. I then finally understood why people would not want to lose their benefits because if they worked full time and didn't get money from them for a while, they will lose it. Then what happens if they lose their job? They lose their health insurance and can lose their food stamps and are left out in the gutter and I am one of those people who struggle at getting a job and I realize lot of people are struggling these days to get a job but if places are hiring and refuse to hire me, it's not the economy then is it? Time to stop being in denial about my struggles and bullshitting myself about why I have such a hard time getting a job. So I can now understand why people would abuse the system because they need to to survive and they are afraid of the what ifs and ending up in a s**t hole. They won't be able to afford health care and pay their medical bills or even afford to eat every day or three times a day. I am sure there are people out there who think they should be in a s**t hole just like anyone else who isn't on disability. I wouldn't be surprised anyway because I have seen so many amazing opinions at Babycenter about how people should live their lives.

Until society stops discriminating people with disabilities, until health insurance is no longer expensive or until it's free like it is in Canada and Australia and the UK (But that is why their taxes are so high), there will be less abusers on the system.

But I think it's wrong to not work if you're on SSI when you are capable of working. Telling me you don't have to work is saying you choose not to work because you are on it. But even if they worked part time, they will still get it so my logic is probably flawed.

I do not get the welfare logic about people who want to be on it and not work. Welfare does not give you much money so I do not understand who would want to be on it and not work. I would hate to not have much money and how most of it would go to bills and I only have very little left of it. I would hate going paycheck to paycheck so why would I want to be on welfare and not work? I do not believe anyone would want to live with very little money left over so why would they want welfare when that can be avoided with working? If there are actually people that would rather live that way, wow. I am shocked because I do not understand it.

And SSI doesn't always spy on you. I found out they do not tap your phone lines and stuff to hear you have conversations with other people. I am sure they do not keep track of what you do online. But my ex told me they only check up on you if you have a psychical disability, if it's mental, they don't send anyone by. He didn't want to be on it for his back problems because he was afraid if they caught him lifting heavy things, they could charge him for fraud. I don't know if that was paranoia on his part or true. He just didn't want to be limited by SSI so he didn't want to be on it for that. But yet he was still trying to get on it so he can go to school. But I honestly thought he didn't need it because he had no issues with holding down a job and had no issues with getting one and despite his back problems, he didn't let it stop him from working. He dealt with the pain. But when he told me he wanted it so he can go back to school and I was like "Oh I see, okay."

Anecdotal. Second hand to the rest of us.

Where is it documented? How does it reflect the overall numbers? How pervasive is it really? Can you demonstrate this?

cyberdad had a couple examples that sounded fraudulent, but someone else suggested that people on benefits were fraudulent because they play video games and attend conventions. It's almost like someone brought up the idea earlier in the thread that disabled people visibly enjoying themselves are doubted and questioned as to whether they are really disabled, as if being on benefits means being required to live a Spartan life.

Whoever said that was such a jerk!!

I dont get why people are okay with the government stealing money from them but get so angry at people living off benefits ... they're just judgmental and angry.

I don't know about discrimination in getting benefits, but work place discrimination of aspies is all too common. Authorities and co-workers will take spectrum-related idiosyncrasies that don't even effect the job performance in any way, and really don't effect the job performance of other workers, and hold it against the person. A person can do their best to conform, but for some it can be near impossible, and even for the ones who are more successful, they can only fake it so long. In cases like that, I don't see how that's not discrimination. Even if you only disclosed that you have aspergers, and don't show the typical behavior, they can try to get rid of you because of the stigma, or they just assume you're a liability. Some fields are better fits than others, but lets face it...

well what I am referring to is several people I know in real life who are on welfare, not disability. I know people who have intentionally been fired so that they could go on welfare. And also people who sell their food stamps (which is now a credit card) for money to buy drugs, or simply drugs.

so this experience might be off topic =/

i do know two people who scammed the system that provides pay for those injured on the job, they were hurt off the job and said it was on the job. And got payed for many many months, one even got a large settlement because the damage was irreversible.

The problem with statistics on fraudulent claims is that they are undiscovered, the best scam is the one that goes unnoticed.

This has been my experience, I don’t have any experience with disability pay myself and don't know anyone on it currently.

I don't have any studies or statistics for you.

Though I am sure there are statistics for both sides.

I would agree there but I saw this:



So that tells me he isn't on disability for being an AB, he is on it for his impairments. I do not like to judge so I am not going to assume he is lazy or abusing the system. But if they left that out, I would have thought there has to be more to the story because you cannot get on it by being an AB.

Someone steps into the Social Security office to apply for SSI and the first question the lady asks is "Why are you applying?"

The man replies, "because I want to be a baby."

The lady asks, "Pardon?"

the man replies, "I am an adult baby so I am unable to work because the desire is so string it impairs me."


I doubt that would give him benefits.

I would have just wondered if the man has any disabilities because he can't possibly be on it because he is an AB. I think lot of people are so quick to judge. Just by what they do in their spare time does not mean they are abusing the system so maybe the man just happens to be an AB in his spare time. Just like people tend to spend time on the computer while living on disability because they are unable to work but people assume they are lazy and cheating the system. So I find it ironic an aspie would have the same assumption about an AB. I would view it as that be a message to all the adult babies out there that if they are on disability for any impairments they have, they better not live their life as an AB or people might think they are abusing the system. Just like when people are on welfare or on foodstamps or WIC or disability, they cannot have a nice car or any gaming systems or nice clothes and they must not accept them as gifts from anyone (being sarcastic here) because of the judgments people make, same as how people live their lives.

And reading other posts in this thread, the system is so screwed up that if you can do things like use a computer, they think you can get a job that requires that and verdandi pretty much explained why that isn't always possible for someone.

But after seeing his website he runs, it appears he sells things too on it so if he earns a living off it, then he probably doesn't need disability if he earns enough in his spare time. So maybe they do spy on people but someone could have just reported him to them because of their judgments or one of them happened to come across the site. So not really spying then.

Some people who were unable to hold down jobs have managed to run their own business or make a living at home somehow but that doesn't mean everyone can do it.

But I thought threatening to kill himself was pathetic and people don't get my sympathy when they threaten it.

Yeah, discrimination in getting benefits are there for certain.
I dare not mention being aspie in the job centre for fear of being kicked-off benefits again.

Also true in the workplace too - I've held-down jobs long-term which is a lot more than many can say, however being an aspie does mean that even if you keep most of the traits to yourself there are still aspects of how asperger's effects your communication and social skills that see you at a disadvantage and makes you an easy target for constructive dismissal or just outright being fired.

I think it's one of MANY examples of poor work ethic - I don't know about elsewhere but I think here in the UK it's especially bad, I'm not just talking about people themselves having poor work ethic and attitude to work, but employers too - there's no such thing as a job for life, no job security, no reward for loyalty, quality of work, performance, or skills...employees are disposable, and in that sort of culture it means those of us with disabilities or who are not 'normal' have even less worth in the jobs market.

Like what countries?

My suggestion is to come up with different words. To lie on legal documents is illegal. While I can think of different words, phrases and in general ways of saying one needs assistance when others believe they don't quality in context to this specific post I do not feel comfortable saying it. Simply because a conspiracy to commit fraud and or assisting what may be fraud in context to this reply is a grey area in my job as an advocate whom is to be funded by the government in the near term future.

My suggestion is if you need assistance speak to a Social Security Disability attorney and of whom typically do not charge a fee unless you win.

It is my personal opinion accommodating work settings and representation in public relations a certain way could decrease social service needs and improve outcomes for partial to full self-sufficiency. It is also my personal opinion government dollars can be used more effectively. Additionally my opinion is anyone that needs help should get it but at the same time there needs to be more innovation to free people from the barriers as a result of disability related limitations as well as what is constructed in the system when one qualifies for help so as to achieve becoming self-sufficient. I am currently working with my Congressman's office on federal changes to regulations with concern to HUD and self-employment for individuals deemed substantially disabled. .

Getting disability in the US is a game, you have to have the right attorney. Everyone gets denied, I went through five years of it, trying to hold down BS jobs, used up all my 401K, sold off the little bits of investments from when I managed to keep a real job for 5 years.
Eventually I was turned down, never got an attorney, idiot at the free mental health care place filled out some forms wrong, so....
I could have fought it, there are dozens upon dozens of people getting it where I used to live, that actually own businesses and hold down jobs.
I decided since my fate has always been NOT getting what others get, that I would go with that, and embrace the fact that I have far more abilities than disabilities and got back into school.
Currently alienating about half of the instructors and others I interact with, but hey, doing great otherwise.
And truth be told, people that play video games, or post on social networking sites CAN perform some jobs.

Sometimes this life is about not feeling sorry for oneself and doing all that one can, including (for me) being in so many stressful situations that I piss many people off, but it's not like I killed anybody
Oh, am currently going into massive debt for school. Oh well...........

The world is not a fair place, never was, never will be,

I never once was denied. The only thing that annoys me but I have also come to understand for some the reason why is people that max out the hours they can work without reducing their SSI or SSDI. My understanding from one individual is he cannot afford the $3,000 a month in medical expenses should he make anymore then be automatically responsible for all the expenses whereas previous he had the disability since birth and had no chance of being insured in adulthood.

The statement of feeling sorry for oneself can be if misdirected a form of discrimination and intolerance. For some they would like nothing more then to work like everyone else. I for one am working with my congressman's office because I do not like living in pallets of supplies and fragrances. So I would like my business to pay for a garage space where I also work as I depend on social services to transport and assist me.

I feel that in my good faith efforts to morally do all I can to work and when doing so helping others find work that goes far beyond reasonable expectations as I am highly motivated I should least have the right to proper living space when needing to work in the same environment as living whilst insured by means of my fathers taxes paid into the system since I was a child. I think of work 7 days a week and I play a video game once and a while. The law also says I have a human right not to work because I cannot but at the same time I have a human right to find and create within my means the accommodating settings for myself and others to in all possible ways achieve employability outside of the mainstream requirements that is comparative to the rights, potential and responsibilities of the mainstream public.

The grim reality is that in this country, there's still a fairly significant opposition to all forms of welfare, for anyone, regardless of circumstance. Some of it is the reasonable notion that the government is spending more money than it takes in and in difficult times, everyone has to cut back, though IMHO, the 900 billion dollar military budget should be first on the chopping block. Unfortunately, there's a great deal of sentiment that giving people money, even for such basic necessities as housing, food, shelter, health care, is unacceptable. Those who are chronically unemployed are "lazy" or "moochers". There are a lot of people that believe those on SSI, welfare, etc. are simply worthless bums. There is a school of thought that says people should have to fend for themselves. What is implied but never explicitly stated, (because it is horrifying to actually say out loud), is that those that fail to thrive in this system are worthless to society and society is better off without them. Remember the line from "A Christmas Carol" where Scrooge famously laments "Well if they'd rather die, they'd better do it, and decrease the surplus population". Scrooge, and the entire story really, was Dickens satire of the popular upper class doctrine of "social Darwinism" where society, like nature, is "survival of the fittest". Dickens correctly pointed out that applying these principles makes one into a most odious sort of person. My father is such a man, so I hear the rhetoric of social Darwinism everyday disguised by nice sounding phrases like "eliminating big government", "entitlement reform", and my personal favorite, "restoring personal responsibility".

I think it's sad that in a society where we have so much prosperity and excess, there is still widespread opposition to the notion that every human being deserves at least to have food, shelter, and basic health care. It is a symptom of an American culture that is increasingly driven by greed and materialism, and where the traditional religious values and institutions which once limited such forces are now being used to promote them.

Right. On. The. Nose. I often wonder about the basis of human society - in school I remember learning and debating about it. We left with the idea that "society" is basically people banding together for the purpose of mutually raising each other's living standards through collaboration. This of course implies taking care of the sick, disabled and elderly. I feel that much of the rhetoric in the USA actually antagonizes the very root of this conception. This push to "minimize government" and to "restore individual responsibility" is very strange to me - if we're going to have basically "the law of the jungle" then why bother to band together as a society at all?

I am most annoyed by the idea that one soemhow should be feeling as if they are a burden and that others treat others as a burden. There is very little observable human beauty in the idea of inclusion from politicians and mainstream awareness that denote a good feeling about the inclusion of the diversity (kind of like neurodiversity) but rather it seems more about bean counting self-sufficiency policies. I do not feel guilty I just have a exreme motivation for instance that never seems to go away. That is why in my campaigning for inclusion in media and radio I simulate past inclusion movements and the simplicity of the hope for inclusion.

Fuzzy philosophers are nice like the above but inclusion is also about quality of life to improve the well being of individuals that are sick and or disabled.