Some people don't get it

[Ignatius Reilly]

Re: Some people don't get it

I hate to admit this, but when I first saw the picture, I didn't really see the problem.

I saw the obvious - one kid was positioned on his own in his wheelchair and was leaning in to be as close as possible to the others. It seemed natural enough. The kid has a great expression on his face.

I didn't see any agenda or malice. I do see that the 2nd picture is better.

I wonder if the kid in the photo needs to be sheltered from seeing the original. Surely he knows he has limitations to his movement - and that those need not be huge limitations to his quality of life. Different, yes, but not worse or less worthy.

My point is this: It seems that the photographer and the school didn't see the problem either. At least not initially. So when I saw dmcdam's comment that he might react poorly if the same thing happened to his kid, my advice is to step back, take a breath or two, and try to see things from another viewpoint. The people involved in this didn't make the best choice, but I'm not sure they made a horrible mistake. The expression on his face isn't significantly different between the two - he may have felt every bit as included in both.

Raising a child with special needs must be a huge challenge, but one doesn't need to see any more problems than necessary. My only experience with anything similar is two different friends who have raised kids with Down's Syndrome. Both had tremendous challenges, and some very real successes too. I admire their strength.

[hackerhare]

Re: Some people don't get it

I hate to admit this, but when I first saw the picture, I didn't really see the problem.

I saw the obvious - one kid was positioned on his own in his wheelchair and was leaning in to be as close as possible to the others. It seemed natural enough. The kid has a great expression on his face.

I didn't see any agenda or malice. I do see that the 2nd picture is better.

I wonder if the kid in the photo needs to be sheltered from seeing the original. Surely he knows he has limitations to his movement - and that those need not be huge limitations to his quality of life. Different, yes, but not worse or less worthy.

My point is this: It seems that the photographer and the school didn't see the problem either. At least not initially. So when I saw dmcdam's comment that he might react poorly if the same thing happened to his kid, my advice is to step back, take a breath or two, and try to see things from another viewpoint. The people involved in this didn't make the best choice, but I'm not sure they made a horrible mistake. The expression on his face isn't significantly different between the two - he may have felt every bit as included in both.

Raising a child with special needs must be a huge challenge, but one doesn't need to see any more problems than necessary. My only experience with anything similar is two different friends who have raised kids with Down's Syndrome. Both had tremendous challenges, and some very real successes too. I admire their strength.

+1. Cannot say it any better.

[Chalk]

Re: Some people don't get it

Photographer's fault! The photographer could have seen this before the shot was taken.

Love the smile on that kid! Full of life!

[xrox]

Re: Some people don't get it

I hate to admit this, but when I first saw the picture, I didn't really see the problem.

I saw the obvious - one kid was positioned on his own in his wheelchair and was leaning in to be as close as possible to the others. It seemed natural enough. The kid has a great expression on his face.

I didn't see any agenda or malice. I do see that the 2nd picture is better.

I wonder if the kid in the photo needs to be sheltered from seeing the original. Surely he knows he has limitations to his movement - and that those need not be huge limitations to his quality of life. Different, yes, but not worse or less worthy.

My point is this: It seems that the photographer and the school didn't see the problem either. At least not initially. So when I saw dmcdam's comment that he might react poorly if the same thing happened to his kid, my advice is to step back, take a breath or two, and try to see things from another viewpoint. The people involved in this didn't make the best choice, but I'm not sure they made a horrible mistake. The expression on his face isn't significantly different between the two - he may have felt every bit as included in both.

Raising a child with special needs must be a huge challenge, but one doesn't need to see any more problems than necessary. My only experience with anything similar is two different friends who have raised kids with Down's Syndrome. Both had tremendous challenges, and some very real successes too. I admire their strength.

Of course there was no agenda or malice in this case. When there is I can only say people are pure evil. This case is more about discrimination, sensitivity, and respect.

Let's say the kid is not disabled. Is it ok to put him over there away from the group? Would the photographer have noticed that there might be a problem?

When I read your post it sounds like you are saying it is ok to treat him different because he is different? And since he is young enough not to feel ostracized then no harm done.

Honestly, you sound like the person that doesn't quite get it. At least in this case.

[dmcdam]

Re: Some people don't get it

I hate to admit this, but when I first saw the picture, I didn't really see the problem.

I saw the obvious - one kid was positioned on his own in his wheelchair and was leaning in to be as close as possible to the others. It seemed natural enough. The kid has a great expression on his face.

I didn't see any agenda or malice. I do see that the 2nd picture is better.

I wonder if the kid in the photo needs to be sheltered from seeing the original. Surely he knows he has limitations to his movement - and that those need not be huge limitations to his quality of life. Different, yes, but not worse or less worthy.

My point is this: It seems that the photographer and the school didn't see the problem either. At least not initially. So when I saw dmcdam's comment that he might react poorly if the same thing happened to his kid, my advice is to step back, take a breath or two, and try to see things from another viewpoint. The people involved in this didn't make the best choice, but I'm not sure they made a horrible mistake. The expression on his face isn't significantly different between the two - he may have felt every bit as included in both.

Raising a child with special needs must be a huge challenge, but one doesn't need to see any more problems than necessary. My only experience with anything similar is two different friends who have raised kids with Down's Syndrome. Both had tremendous challenges, and some very real successes too. I admire their strength.

I agree that it likely wasn't done with any malice but most certainly a lack of understanding. That a small accommodation from the norm won't be worked around to even give the appearance of being inclusive speaks volumes to me. The picture is almost an analogy - 'you don't really fit' and we won't go out of our way to change that. Everyone feels this way sometimes, but most of us don't have it so clearly immortalized in our yearbook. I also think the same message is being communicated to anyone who looks at the photo and that might be even a bigger problem.

I spoke to my wife about it and we thought it likely would make the parents feel a lot worse than the kid, but only because he may still be young enough that he doesn't feel all that different from other kids. Hopefully he still feels this way when he gets older.

[Benz]

Re: Some people don't get it

I agree with the thread title, but respectfully, I'm not sure exactly who it is that doesn't "get it".

While I sympathize with any family who has to face the additional challenges of raising a child with special needs, I feel that this story is somewhat one-sided. That is, the photographer and the school staff were portrayed in very unfavourable light by parents who perhaps over-played their hand.

Consider the following as a means to possibly add some context to the overall situation:

1) Did the photographer know that he was allowed to remove the child from his wheelchair? It's seems obvious now that he had that latitude, but if I were him, I would not even have made the suggestion.

2) If the second photo had been taken in the first place, would some people have then been equally offended that the school was trying to 'hide' or 'deny' the boys condition in order to create a more appealing photo?

3) If the boy had been injured or traumatized while out of his wheelchair to take this photo, who would be liable for that? Would those who now criticize the photographer and staff come to their defense because they were trying to 'do the right thing'?

4) Was this the only class being photographed that day? I recall that school photo day is a very busy time. Should the photographer and/or school staff be responsible to review the situations of every student in every class (and compose the photo accordingly) in order to avoid potentially upsetting someone? What if a parent objected to his/her child being photographed standing next to another child of a different religion? Should that the considered or accommodated?

5) School photos are nothing new. Is this the boy's first school photo? If not, where and how was he positioned in the others? Did his parents make any specific requests regarding their expectations, or did simply just wait to see if they would be offended by the results?

I regret that the parents were upset by this situation and felt it should be escalated to the media. I don't know whether the boy himself was upset, but I suspect that he dealt with it better than his parents did. My sympathies are with the photographer and school staff who apparently are being pilloried in the press for something they did which is not considered universally offensive. They acted in good faith and now are being criticized by people who were not there at the time. Just sayin'...

[Cdntac]

Re: Some people don't get it

Of course there was no agenda or malice in this case. When there is I can only say people are pure evil. This case is more about discrimination, sensitivity, and respect.

Let's say the kid is not disabled. Is it ok to put him over there away from the group? Would the photographer have noticed that there might be a problem?

When I read your post it sounds like you are saying it is ok to treat him different because he is different? And since he is young enough not to feel ostracized then no harm done.

Honestly, you sound like the person that doesn't quite get it. At least in this case.

I suspect the phtotgrapher's thought process was simply "NEXT!! Ok, he's in a wheelchair...can't have him sitting on the bench as that wouldn't be safe....let's see...we'll just place him safely here on the side and take the photo...."

There's no intended slight, no malice, no purposely trying to exclude or treat anyone differently.....just simply trying to get the best photo given the circumstances.

[dmcdam]

Re: Some people don't get it

I agree with the thread title, but respectfully, I'm not sure exactly who it is that doesn't "get it". - I meant the portrait company who responded that they saw nothing wrong with the photo...at least until they started getting heat over it.

While I sympathize with any family who has to face the additional challenges of raising a child with special needs, I feel that this story is somewhat one-sided. That is, the photographer and the school staff were portrayed in very unfavourable light by parents who perhaps over-played their hand.

Consider the following as a means to possibly add some context to the overall situation:

1) Did the photographer know that he was allowed to remove the child from his wheelchair? It's seems obvious now that he had that latitude, but if I were him, I would not even have made the suggestion. Maybe not but he could have at least tried to include the child and wheelchair in the photo. It appears there was no attempt at all to do this.

2) If the second photo had been taken in the first place, would some people have then been equally offended that the school was trying to 'hide' or 'deny' the boys condition in order to create a more appealing photo? SSome people would but they're not really important. It's about how the kid and the parents feel about it and they clearly said they had no problem with it.

3) If the boy had been injured or traumatized while out of his wheelchair to take this photo, who would be liable for that? Would those who now criticize the photographer and staff come to their defense because they were trying to 'do the right thing'? The child would have a personal support worker with him who would be properly trained to handle his needs safely.

4) Was this the only class being photographed that day? I recall that school photo day is a very busy time. Should the photographer and/or school staff be responsible to review the situations of every student in every class (and compose the photo accordingly) in order to avoid potentially upsetting someone? What if a parent objected to his/her child being photographed standing next to another child of a different religion? Should that the considered or accommodated? I'm really not sure it's the same thing at all but if you want to draw a parallel, it's more like making the kid in the turban stand 3 or 4 feet out of the picture and say it's because his head gets in the way.

5) School photos are nothing new. Is this the boy's first school photo? If not, where and how was he positioned in the others? Did his parents make any specific requests regarding their expectations, or did simply just wait to see if they would be offended by the results? Do they need to specifically request that he appear to be part of the class when the photo is taken? Last year he was only in Grade 1 so maybe he sat on the floor with his personal support worker?

I regret that the parents were upset by this situation and felt it should be escalated to the media. I don't know whether the boy himself was upset, but I suspect that he dealt with it better than his parents did. My sympathies are with the photographer and school staff who apparently are being pilloried in the press for something they did which is not considered universally offensive. They acted in good faith and now are being criticized by people who were not there at the time. Just sayin'...

It was escalated to the media when they company and school responded by saying there was nothing wrong with the picture and refuse to do anything to help fix the situation. Had they taken the time to accommodate the child properly from the outset, OR, been understanding and tried to fix the problem once identified by the parents, they probably wouldn't have been lambasted by the press.

[4wedges]

Re: Some people don't get it

I only saw one picture, and didn't like it. For obvious reasons. I'm just going to rantvabout 'discrimination' and 'inclusiveness' or any other popular buzzword. What it says to me is several people messed up. Without knowing any more im not going to say it was done with malice. We dont know what any of the adultsvwere thinking.
Any kid being made to sit or stand that far apart from his class, well that's wrong. The photographer and the teacher did not handle this well at all.
My initial reaction was why not have the class simply shift over so the lad would be close to them?

[Bellyhungry]

Re: Some people don't get it

Yes but what I meant was he personally was leaning to his right.

The kid leaning into the frame is the most heart-wrenching part I noticed in the pic and the article.

Having said that, what I have learned over the last few years is that kids are very resilient and tend to take whatever life throws at them in stride.

I don't have kids myself but I am close to my good friend's 2 kids. While they are lacking in life experience, their attitude and positive outlook towards life constantly serve as a reminder to me what is the more important thing in life.

The kid will be alright.

[Ignatius Reilly]

Re: Some people don't get it

Of course there was no agenda or malice in this case. When there is I can only say people are pure evil. This case is more about discrimination, sensitivity, and respect.

Let's say the kid is not disabled. Is it ok to put him over there away from the group? Would the photographer have noticed that there might be a problem?

When I read your post it sounds like you are saying it is ok to treat him different because he is different? And since he is young enough not to feel ostracized then no harm done.

Honestly, you sound like the person that doesn't quite get it. At least in this case.

The kid (Miles) arrived for the picture in a wheelchair. If he was not disabled, then the photographer would have made a conscious decision to segregate him, and that would have required some explanation. As it was, he made a conscious (or un?) decision to photograph him as he arrived, in his chair.

That may not have been the best choice, but I still don't see it as all that bad.

For more thoughts on the choices people make when faced with challenges to their mobility, I was reminded of the classic painting by Andrew Wyeth of "Christina's World". This was popular - iconic even - when I was at uni in the 70s. The pic is below, but there is a very interesting (at least to me) discussion about it here: http://davehingsburger.blogspot.ca/2...rld-wasnt.html

And with that, I'm out of this one. I respect dmcdam's stance and don't want to challenge it, so much as provide an alternative viewpoint that may be helpful.

[dekker]

Re: Some people don't get it

Ive taken the liberty to post the article and the photo since not everybody will click on the link.


from the article



When Anne Belanger received her son’s grade two class photo last month, she immediately stuffed the image back into its envelope in disgust.
In the photo, the students and teacher line up neatly in three rows. But one student is missing from the group.
There, in the far right edge, her son Miles Ambridge sits in his wheelchair, separated from the rest of his classmates by an empty space on a bench. Despite the obvious gap, the seven-year-old beams for the camera, craning as far to the side as his tiny body will allow to be closer to his friends.
While she can hardly stand to look at the photo, Belanger is overcome with anger and sadness when she does.
“Look at the angle that he was in,” said the New Westminster mom, her voice a whisper as she fought back tears. “He’s ostracized. He wants to be part of the gang so much.”
Miles has spinal muscular atrophy, a genetic disease that attacks nerve cells in the spinal cord, causing muscles throughout the body, especially in the arms and legs, to weaken. The disease does not affect cognitive abilities.
Miles was diagnosed at just 13 months, when doctors told his parents their boy would never walk.
Living in a wheelchair, Miles has already faced more challenges than any young child should have to deal with, said his father Don Ambridge. That’s why it was all the more frustrating to see Miles excluded from the group in what should have been a simple class photo, he said.
Ambridge, who was the first to see the photo, said the image made him feel humiliated for his son.
“For some reason it makes me feel even worse that he’s so happy in the picture,” he said. “I think it’s because he’s still innocent ... He’s still naive to how other people can treat him.”
Miles’ parents have decided to keep the photo from their son, who hasn’t seen the picture. Belanger said Miles is “profoundly aware that he’s different than his peers.” If he saw it, she thinks he would be deeply hurt.
But his parents still wanted to bring attention to the photo in a bid to shed light on discrimination, which they said is still a daily reality for people with disabilities.
Belanger posted the photo to the photography company’s Facebook page. Lifetouch Canada removed the photo with a message that it was taken down due to privacy laws, but that they had sent it to their head office.
Not satisfied with their response, Belanger posted the photo again with the other children’s faces blacked out. Meanwhile, Miles’ dad sent the photo back to his son’s school, Herbert Spencer Elementary, requesting it be thrown out. When school principal Tracy Fulton received the returned photo, she said she immediately contacted Lifetouch as well.
Still, Fulton said the company didn’t immediately see anything wrong with the photo. It took some coaxing until Lifetouch agreed the separation of Miles from his class was a mistake and offered to retake the photo, she said.
“You want to think that they just made a mistake and they weren’t willing to correct it,” said Fulton. “But in the meantime, the parents were really hurt by it.”
Miles’ mom said she blames both the photographer and the school for the gaffe. However, Fulton defended the school’s actions and said the photographer was solely to blame.
Fulton said none of the school staff had seen the photo before Miles’ father sent it back. At the photo shoot, she said his teacher, from her position, also couldn’t see the distinct gap between him and the rest of the class.
The photo was retaken earlier this week by another Lifetouch photographer. In the new photo, which his parents have not yet seen, Miles was taken out of his wheelchair and supported by a caregiver on a bench beside his classmates.
On Thursday, Lifetouch admitted their photographer made a mistake.
Dean Cochrane, manager for the Lifetouch office in Burnaby, said the company teaches its photographers to build the composition of photos differently when they work with people in wheelchairs.
“On this composition, it wasn’t done right,” he said. “This will be a learning experience for this photographer.”
Regardless, Belanger said the photo is discrimination and a reflection of a society that still attaches stigma to disability.
“Kids can be cruel but this comes from adults, which is even worse,” she said. “Adults should know better.”

Lifetouch is in the business of selling school photos, a very lucrative contract.
Miles is undoubtedly not their first effort in caturing a classroom photo that included a wheel-chair bound child. No doubt there will be some file searching going on.

[Cowboy]

Re: Some people don't get it

I agree with Ignatius, hackhare and Benz. THe term discrimination is ridiculously over-used, or rather, over-used with a negative connotation.

If the second picture makes the parents feel better...whoop dee do. If the child felt upset about the initial one (which I don't think he did), then I hope the second one makes him feel happier and more included.

I would almost go as far as equating this to "Tall kids get in the back row". Why does my kid have to stand in the back just because he's taller than everyone else? Because it's the easiet way to take a picture. Why is the child that uses a wheelchair off to the side, because it was the easiest way to take the picture, on picture day, which I'm sure we all remember was busy and always behind schedule.

With teacher's getting in trouble for /no longer allowed to restrain children when they are violent, or helping them get dressed if they need the help.... I wouldn't expect a teacher, or a photographer visiting the school, to even consider removing the child from his chair as an option unless instructed to do so by the parents.

[hackerhare]

Re: Some people don't get it

The most "correct" picture would have Miles in a wheelchair side by side with his classmates.

[Benz]

Re: Some people don't get it

1) Maybe not but he could have at least tried to include the child and wheelchair in the photo. It appears there was no attempt at all to do this.

No attempt at all? The first photo I saw had the wheelchair right next to the end of the front bench, apparently as close as possible. Are you and I referring to the same photo?

2) Some people would but they're not really important. It's about how the kid and the parents feel about it and they clearly said they had no problem with it.

Did the parents ever give specific instructions about how their son should be photographed? Further, did they ever provide clear permission for anyone to remove their son from his wheelchair in order to accommodate a particular photo? If not, then the parents simply expected the school and the photographer to know what 'they' (the parents) would find acceptable.

3)The child would have a personal support worker with him who would be properly trained to handle his needs safely.

Fine. Has anyone heard from this person regarding whether a request was made to move the boy from the wheelchair to the bench for the original photo?

4)I'm really not sure it's the same thing at all but if you want to draw a parallel, it's more like making the kid in the turban stand 3 or 4 feet out of the picture and say it's because his head gets in the way.

I see your point, but you cannot ignore the size of the wheelchair.

5)Do they need to specifically request that he appear to be part of the class when the photo is taken? Last year he was only in Grade 1 so maybe he sat on the floor with his personal support worker?

He was part of the original photo, just not close enough to suit the parents. For anyone to suggest that he was 'left out' would be somewhat misleading.
I would be interested to see his Grade 1 photo and to know whether his parents had any concerns with it, and if so, what did they do about it.


I appreciate your feedback and I respect that you have a special perspective on this situation. My point is simply that the offense in question here is entirely subjective and that there was neither malice nor negligence involved in taking the original photo.