FIVE REASONS THE MENTALLY DISABLED DON’T DESERVE TO LIVE

The title says it all, so let’s not waste any time with clogged openings.

Here, for your consideration, are

FIVE REASONS THE MENTALLY DISABLED
DON’T DESERVE TO LIVE:

1. Mentally disabled people don’t deserve to live because they are a costly burden to society and represent a hiccup in others’ lives.
2. Mentally disabled people don’t deserve to live because, on top of sometimes being unable to care for themselves, they often lack the social skills to maintain any sort of normal relationship with friends, family, or (heaven forbid) loved ones.
3. Mentally disabled people don’t deserve to live because it takes too much for a normal-minded person to cope with stress of dealing with them on their otherwise normal day-by-day routine.
4. Mentally disabled people don’t deserve to live because society is a well-oiled machine that relies on fully-functioning cogs to keep the pieces moving each and every day.
5. Mentally disabled people don’t deserve to live because they are different

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Now, because it’s only fair to leave this post so dreadfully short and, for many readers, open to argument, allow me to delve a little further with

FIVE REASONS THE MENTALLY CAPABLE
DON’T DESERVE TO LIVE:

(Perhaps you didn’t see this coming, but that doesn’t make it any less in need of saying:)

1. Mentally capable people don’t deserve to live because they have the benefit of living a peaceful, manageable, and predictable and, as a result, can represent more to a society that they instead choose to complain about.
2. Mentally capable people don’t deserve to live because, though they have no excuses for it, they often lie, cheat, steal, and hurt their friends, family, or (heaven forbid) loved ones.
3. Mentally capable people don’t deserve to live because, though they have no reason to justify it, they choose to remain ignorant of the needs of others so that they can ease a small iota of potential stress and, instead, complain about something else in their normal day-by-day routine.
4. Mentally capable people don’t deserve to live because even the well-oiled machine that is society eventually breaks down and collapse, and it takes those who aren’t just cogs in doomed machines to think up newer, better societies so that the system can continue.
5. Mentally capable people don’t deserve to live because they, whether or not they choose to admit, are also different.

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Right about now I imagine there’s a swell of tension and anger and probably even a fair number of violent responses welling up within many of you. Suffice to say that a few have probably even stopped reading before this point to already begin constructing their responses. However, though a few passengers might have jumped the train early, the ride still continues, and the destination may not be what you’re expecting.

There’s a great deal of talk about what one deserves—adamant boasts that I/he/she/they do/do not DESERVE this-or-that—during the course of the day.

Let’s make something abundantly clear before we continue: this is a confusion; a total disregard of what it means to “deserve” something.

A person who trains hard and comes out victorious in that challenge deserves to be recognized for that achievement. A person who has committed a crime in total defiance of a clear and fair law deserves to see criminal charges. To deserve something implies a conscious action should be met with a fitting response.

Nobody—NOBODY!—deserves to live!

Living is a process by which an individual shapes their path and impacts the paths of others as they do; there is neither reward nor punishment in simply existing, regardless of the strengths or weaknesses they may have been born with.

Which brings me to the REAL point of this, and, with any luck, it may allow both the mentally disabled and the able-minded to have some fresh light shed on both themselves and their role in society:

And so, ladies and gentlemen still reading, I give you

FIVE REASONS THE MENTALLY DISABLED DESERVE RESPECT:

1. Mentally disabled people deserve respect because they’re forced to wake up each day with a metaphorical anchor that poses a far greater burden to their day than any they pose on another.
2. Mentally disabled people deserve respect because, despite often having a hard time understanding or expressing their feelings, they are capable of loving others in staggering ways.
3. Mentally disabled people deserve respect because, unlike those around them, there is no distancing themselves from the stress that burdens them on their otherwise normal day-by-day routine.
4. Mentally disabled people deserve respect because they fight a never-ending struggle each and every day to make their mark within the well-oiled machine of society.
5. Mentally disabled people deserve respect because we are all different in some way.

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And, because I’m all about being fair in both hate AND love, here’s

FIVE REASONS MENTALLY CAPABLE DESERVE RESPECT:

1. Mentally capable people deserve respect because their work does contribute to the treatments and care of those in need of assistance.
2. Mentally capable people deserve respect because, as more and more people are born/diagnosed with disabilities, there are more and more able-minded people who refuse to see them any different or love them any less.
3. Mentally capable people deserve respect because they take their private time and resources to help those in need.
4. Mentally capable people deserve respect because a machine is nothing and would serve no purpose without the working parts that keep it moving.
5. Mentally capable people deserve respect because (say it with me) we are all different in some way.

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Now, yes, it’s a given that there are those within BOTH ends of the spectrum that DON’T fall into the respect categories. There are those that lie to receive assistance or go to great lengths to deny it; those that choose hate over love; those that give up on others or themselves; and those that fight against being different.

And, arguably, THOSE are the people that don’t deserve to live…

But I think it’d piss them off all the more if we, the ones who worthy of respect, strove more to show them that, while we may not deserve anything, we’ve earned a great deal more than they ever will.

Isn’t that a gnarly notion?