THEN: Wheelchair

NOW: Mobile Sitting Apparatus

ALL I SAYING IS THAT THERE IS NO DAMN REASON WHY A PERSON SHOULD BE SUING FOR SOME BS LIKE THAT!!!! IM NOT DISABLED BUT MORE THAN ONE PERSON HAS MADE ME FEEL LIKE @#$% IN THIS LIFETIME. EVERYONE WANTS TO SUE...

I hate disabled people. Their hummer-sized wheelchairs get in the way of everything.

let me totally clarify everything..the conductor asked if he needed help to get off..(looking at his motorize wheelchair!!!) we of course said yes, he asked when we were getting off we told him, he past us numerous times through out ride from 11pm to 12 mid...we got to great river station where he never came to assist us, i step outside after the doors have been open awhile to find the conductor standing on the platform 2 cars down..i motioned to him, he motioned back, he finally came over and asked if we needed assistance, we responded yes thats what we told him we we got in, he then left us without setting up the ramp, next we heard his lovely announcements on the trains p/a which triggers vulgar language to my son, the conductor then returned to get the ramp which was 6 inches from my son the entire time locked up,he claimed its company policy to tell why HIS customers are being delayed, we asked if he was there from the beginning there wouldn't be a delay...he had the nerve to say there was NO DELAY..duh this is the say guy who made the page, same guy who was hanging outside on the platform!!!!!!!!! for all by the way even with the ramp there is no delay on the train ever if they do there job correctly....just to set the record right..............oh yeah yes I am the father......thank you for the nice comments to those that wrote them..enjoy..life is way too short..

Is he going to sue Newsday for pointing out that he's a "wheelchair user" in the first words of their headline about his retarded lawsuit?

>>>The LIRR does; they announced yesterday that employees will no longer refer to the disability of a customer as the reason for a delay.

They'll do what they usually do and not say a thing.

www.forgotten-ny.com

"They'll do what they usually do and not say a thing."

Actually, I ride the LIRR a couple of days a week and have always found them to be pretty good about keeping passengers informed... not at all like on the subway.

For example, on the LIRR you're not "being held by the train's controller," you're "waiting for a westbound to cross in front of us." I've also heard "we've struck a metal object on the tracks, so the conductor is leaving the train to investigate," and unfortunately once "a pedestrian has been struck, the train will advance to platform after investigation."

Never heard anywhere near that kind of information on the subway.

Actually, people in wheelchairs comprise only a tiny fraction of people covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act, comprising less than 5% of that protected population. (Ask Gov Patterson.) Yet they seem to demand and get all the attention.

There is nothing wrong or embarrassing about being in a wheelchair. I care for a family member at home in a wheelchair. No big deal. We don't want special favors and we don't sue restaurants for not having handicap ramps and we don't sue someone for mentioning there is a wheelchair-bound person present.

This guy is not a guy in a wheelchair.

This guy is a greedy litigious jerk in a wheelchair!

I just got off the phone with the LIRR. They will know announce: "Spill in Aisle 3".

Ugh. Thank you AspieSociologist for the only enlightening comment.

There has to be a better way to hold people accountable for things than lawsuits for causing "serious psychological injuries and distress."

The LIRR has a point that they also have a responsibility to other customers to explain delays. So their solution now is a new policy that they won't reference a disability, so in this situation the announce that "a customer needs assistance."

So... "He just kept emphasizing 'wheelchair,' 'wheelchair,' 'wheelchair.' You could just imagine all those eyes staring at me."

If that first sentence was the problem, it's solved. No more "wheelchair." But if the problem was in the second sentence, now all those eyes will be looking around to see what kind of assistance was necessary and who needed it.

Maybe even more "eyes," in fact, because some who wouldn't have bothered to look to see someone in a wheelchair (the announcement completely answered their question "why are we delayed?") now will be curious to find out exactly what the whole story is.

This is one of the more outrageous lawsuits I've heard of in a long time. He's not to blame for needing a ramp to exit the train, but he deserves all the scorn and humiliation the public can muster for filing this ridiculous lawsuit.

Yeah, no need for the lawsuit but he has every right to shame that conductor and the L.I.R.R. publicly for his ordeal. I'm sure it was embarrassing and humiliating. Problem is, we all have moments like this and do we sue? No, we soldier on and look dead ahead. This guy should do likewise.

Let me get this straight: being in a wheelchair is not an embarassment but somebody pointing it out is?

More politically-correct inspired incoherency.

"Unless this guy considers being in a wheelchair as inherently embarassing"...

Maybe he does. You are assuming, through some ill-conceived reverse-PC kung fu, that disabled people are supposed to be proud and well-adjusted to their condition at all times. The fact is, if I couldn't walk and needed assistance to enter and exit almost every damn building and vehicle, I'd find it profoundly depressing, demeaning, and yes, embarrassing. And, if the people I needed to rely on, whose JOB it was to help me, were assholes about it, I'd be pissed.

The fact is, the conductor should have done his job right in the first place, and certainly should not have called undue attention to him. That's undebatable. And if the LIRR needs to get sued to realize that (maybe they did, maybe they didn't, really) it would reflect poorly on them.

Well said.

How was he discriminated against buy the LIRR?

The train stopped and they made the effort to help the guy get off. They made the announcement to let the remaining passengers know the reason for the delay.

I once heard an announcement my train was delayed because of a medical emergency. Now, if I were the one with the medical emergency - and, knowing it was me who they were referring to in the announcement - AND I was embarrassed by this - would I have a right to sue?

Would you like to be introduced to people as "Huffy6241, the wheelchair patient"? I am guessing not.

The point is: the fact that you are in the wheelchair is supposed to be completely ignored, so that you can be recognized as an equal. The fact that you need special assistance is also not supposed be mentioned. The services are expected to accommodate you without advertising that they are doing anything special, even if this may inconvenience the others. That's the law, and it makes total sense.

If the LIRR had a policy whereby when men, all men, got on or off the train, they first held the doors then repeatedly announced that the doors were being held because men were trying to get on or off the train, then of course that is discriminatory against men. This is not all that different.

If the trains were built to be accessible from the start, there would be no issue; the environment of the train in and of itself is discriminatory because it requires special attention for disabled people. Because of the way in which the ADA is written, this accomodation is 'reasonable'. In practice, though, the proper use of these ramps on LIRR or Metro North add no more than 30 seconds to a station stop, so it shouldn't have been cause for a delay to the train. The train conductor violated this 'reasonable' (yet ultimately still discriminatory) accomodation by drawing attention to the passenger (not patient, passenger!). This is what is called legally 'animus' or irrational unfair treatment on the basis of condition. He was first discriminated against by the failure of the LIRR to have fully accessible public transit despite the Rehab Act of 1975 and the ADA of 1990; he was secondly discriminated against by being treated with animus on the basis of being a wheelchair user.

And that is how he was discriminated against by the LIRR.

"he was secondly discriminated against by being treated with animus"

Except that while animus can be a motivation for discrimination, it is not legally recognized as discrimination in itself.

You can dislike, hate, or despise a person because of their disability, and that person has no legal recourse unless and until your animus moves you a discriminatory action. To base a suit on that would require a proof that the conductor's animus was the reason he didn't promptly deploy the ramp, or was the reason he made the particular announcement he made.

An accusation that the announcement was made out of animus would have a pretty easy defense, because making that announcement was the railroad's policy.