No Better (or Worse) Time To Be Disabled

By Tim Challies - Posted at Challies.com:

There is literally no worse place for a disabled child to be right now than inside his mother.

I acknowledge this is a bit of a weird question, but bear with me for just a minute: Has there ever been a better time to be disabled? I don’t mean to be smart, and I don’t mean to be cute. What I mean to say is that I am not aware of any society that has ever taken better care of its disabled members. And here I am thinking particularly of people with cognitive disabilities, though I’m sure we could extend the rule to every other form of disability. Historically, people with cognitive disabilities have been treated in the most inhumane ways possible. The bar has been set horrifically low.

However, at this point in time, here in the Western world, we place great value on those who are disabled. I have disabled people in my family, in my church, and in my neighborhood, and I am often amazed at the incredible programs that are available to them. We are only a generation or two removed from speaking of people with cognitive disabilities using pejorative terms like “village idiot.” It’s only in the past few years we’ve stopped using “retard” as an insult. In days past, with disabilities typically received little education, gained little training, and had few opportunities.

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