Like any other group of people, those of us with disabilities are perfectly capable of pulling stunts that are really stupid, even criminal. Take, for instance, the case of the British man with autism accused of hacking into American military networks back in 2001-2002. Gary McKinnon now faces extradition to the U.S. to stand trial. McKinnon’s family and several members of parliament contend that he is too vulnerable to be sent off to America and should instead be tried in the U.K.
As an example of society’s conflicting notions about disability and criminal justice. It’s not difficult to ascribe McKinnon’s actions to naive obsession. He claims that he was only looking for evidence of a U.F.O. coverup and had no malicious intent. But British authorities argue that his disability doesn’t exempt him from equal treatment under the extradition treaty with the U.S. I’m inclined to agree. The struggle for disability rights is the struggle for equality in both the eyes of the law and in the eyes of our fellow citizens. We do ourselves little good if, in one breath, we demand equal access to employment, education and the like but then point to our frailties and beg for pity when we don’t like the full implications of said equality.
I realize that McKinnon may not care one bit about promoting the integrity of the disability rights movement. I probably wouldn’t if I was in his situation. But when a person with a disability argues that he should receive special dispensation under the law solely because of his disability, that should be cause for alarm.
It’s our civil right to be arrested!
But you have to make a distinction between mental and physical disabilities. Being autistic is a lot different than having a neuromuscular disease.