From disTHIS.com
It's Only a Cripple!
By Kimberley Barreda
Feb 3, 2000, 08:05
Faggot, nigger, chink, cripple, jap, spic, greaser, beaner, wetback, retard.....
Sticks and stones... right?
WRONG.
Some words exist simply to identify a hatred.
Racism, homophobia, religious bigotry.....
Just say the words and you can play a little film in your mind that completely fills in the details, often with video-like reality courtesy of the 6 o'clock news.
Now enter the new kid on the block - physicalism - prejudice against the disabled. And boy did it come out fighting.
And along with it came the realization that we are an invisible, disposable community not entitled to the same protections under the law as others due to our disabilities.
On Thursday January 2, 2000, Jody Dunkel, a California State University at Monterrey Bay GRADUATE and Foundation temporary employee wrote the following note on a closed University bulletin board. His post has been left exactly as is - with all spelling and grammatical errors intact.
Thursday, January 6, 2000 3:44:25 PM
Message From: Jody Dunkel
Subject: I'll tell you what sucks!
To: Open Forum
Too much handicapped parking!!!
"Is it just me, or is there nothing more infuriating than seeing a packed store parking lot which is absolutely full, with the exception of five or six unused handicapped parking spaces right out in front of the store?!?
...and you gruble to yourself and end up parking a football field's length away from the entrance, and you vow to yourself that the next cripple in a wheelchair you see you're going to do something nasty and annoying to them.
Like stick pushpins in the tires of their wheel chair, or tie their shoelaces to their jerriatric walker, or plant car bombs in their automated scooter thingies, or maybe just drag them kicking -er sorry... limping and screaming out to the shitty parking space you had to park in and beat them with a bat!
If anybody wants to start up an anti-handicapped parking coalition let me know.
We can go out at night and with a militant attitude turn all the handicapped parking spaces into normal parking spaces and take part in other rebellious anti-whatever campaign rituals."
When confronted with the obvious hate mongering nature and overt call to action to commit violence against people with disabilities he responded with this rebuttal:
Dear friends and would be enemies,
My name is Jody. I'm 22 years old, living in California, and I work as a web designer at a CSU.
On January 6th of 2000, I wrote the following email to an online campus bulletin board called Open Forum.
It's a restricted forum which only campus students, faculty, and staff can access, and I've been known for the past 4 years to post intentionally radical material with a completely non-threatening humorous edge.
Go ahead and read what I wrote below, and judge for yourself the intentions of the author (me) at the time it was written.
[read above original post]
"I admit 100% to writing this, and am willing to take full responsibility for writing it. And now, if you're willing to listen, I will explain to you why I wrote this.
I realize the people who are the most upset by this are the disabled population because they feel threatened by what appears to be a hateful and threatening attitude.
First off, I would like to confirm that I have absolutely no hatred of anything or anybody, including the disabled.
Believe it or not, I am actually a very accepting, understanding, and probably the most tolerant and patient person anyone has ever met.
I would never ever think of carrying out any imagined act of violence for real.
Sure I'll think of violent acts, but in my mind it's a comical sort of violence much like one would see on Saturday Night Live... say for instance Jim Breuer doing his impression of Joe Pesci beating insubordinate guests with a bat, or George Carlin ranting about new ways to execute corporate lawyers.
Often times when people are frustrated with something, they vent their frustrations cracking jokes rather than really do anything about it.
I don't think this idea is an impossible concept to understand, and truly wish for the people who are calling what I wrote hate mail to reconsider their perceptions.
So here's the deal, when I wrote that email, I had a minor frustration with not being able to find a parking space in a crowded lot, yet I noticed there were handicapped spaces available.
Sure, my first reaction is annoyance, but it was an annoyance similar to when driving and someone cuts you off on the freeway by accident. You don't really harbor any true resentment of that person who cut you off, but still you're instinctively frustrated nonetheless.
So I'm then thinking to myself... "what are the reasons I can't park where I want to park, hmmmm... ::ding!:: it's them damn handicapped folk! Damn them! They're always causing trouble! Somebody should do something about this!!!"
(*please note that the last 4 exclamatory sentences are sarcasm.)
I'm not even sure how to explain to people who don't get it why sarcasm or exaggerative behavior are funny, but take my word for it that they are.
Again, please see past the superficial words, and try to see that insincerity does exist.
I'm obviously not a nationally reputable comedian or satirist, so nobody on a national level understands I was trying to be funny, but please trust me on this one that it was humor/sarcasm, nothing more.
Anyway, I don't really know what else to say at this point.
I've probably received more threatening and hostile email from the disabled community than I had ever imagined possible.
I don't blame the disabled community for being upset because the story they've heard from the news media probably went something like "University employee writes threatening hate mail targeting disabled students."
If they wanted to print a true story, their headlines should have read something like "Former university student now employee posts shock humor satire imitating foolish people who react maliciously to frustration." ...but that wouldn't sell any newspapers or television/radio advertising space would it?
Nice and well-intentioned people who make a mistake in judgement aren't nearly as interesting as evil no good bastards trampling the morale of the innocent.
I'm sorry to those who are hurt and reacted with a saddened yet capable of understanding and forgiving attitude.
The world needs more people like you, and you should be admired for your patience.
To those who have retaliated vindictively with
threatening emails or wishing to see something bad happen to me, you people are no better than the asshole you think I am.
Again, my apologies for hurting anyone or making anyone's life and peace of mind feel threatened.
Sincerely,
Jody Dunkel
Now, what I see here is not an apology at all, rather a long winded, self satisfied LECTURE justifying his post and taking the position that anyone who was rightly offended was wrong since he is, by his own words, and we of course should "trust him in this" - "a very accepting, understanding, and probably the most tolerant and patient person anyone has ever met"
His rebuttal assumes that the only ones upset are the disabled and it seems to be written directly to our community, hence his insulting tone and attitude.
There is nothing wrong with my perceptions and my disability does not make me stupid.
It must, however, make me an asshole because I do want something bad to happen to him.
At the very least, he should get a pink slip with his name on it. Or better yet, how about an arrest warrant with his name on it?
If he had said he wanted to "beat the next nigger he saw with a bat", or "blow up the next faggot with a bomb" he would be arrested for making death threats and inciting hatred.
But since its just cripples, that's ok?
He then goes on to blame the media for somehow making more of his words than he intended. HUH?
But he is correct in one sense. He IS a comedian of a sort. Not a good one.... certainly not a professional or even witty one... but laughable all the same.
And given this realization, we should enjoy the joke that this wonderful young man has written for us. We should be able to laugh about this. We should all be laughing from our handicapped parking spaces and sitting on our scooter thingies....we should be laughing at the real joke here - this pathetic person.
But while we enjoy the joke that is Jody Dunkel, we can't overlook the fact that the actions of this person have not had any consequences.
No one outside our community seems to care that he incites hatred and violence aganst those who can't defend themselves.
But I do. I care enough to share my feelings with anyone and everyone who will listen. Do you?
If so, here's a little something to make the sharing a little easier :)
Here's how you can reach Mister Dunkel, who works at CSUMB, whose online resume and contact information is available HERE and HERE (again, with all spelling and grammatical errors intact) and whose employer is reachable HERE...
You can also send an email to Peter Smith, Head of the University and ask him if the University condones hatred of minorities and if they do not, why are they protecting someone who advocates violence?
And you can phone Jody directly if you like - I'm sure he'd be more than happy to hear your happy wishes for him... (number removed for decency on our part).
So.... there you have it. Now, since Jody didn't leave an area for rebuttals, I've decided to re-write his letter for my own amusement which you can see in the Rants and Raves section.
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