--- at 3:49 PM 06/09/2002, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote --- >When I called about my employer's bike parking, the Zoning inspector >told me I was the only bicyclist to ever call about bike parking.
Just a data point, folks, from a parallel activist community. When I (or any of my disability rights comrades) complain to managers &c about a facility that's hostile to wheelchair users, 99% of the time we hear, "Well, you're the first wheelchair user to complain about it. Everybody else can handle it." Remember the irony factor: when the built environment excludes a group *by design*, then those who use the facility anyway are the pioneers, the adventurous, those who hack their way through the underbrush. Complaining about doing just that goes against the nature, The "nobody else" response has little to do with data, and everything to do with the responder's discomfort with the question. You are calling them on the hostile design of their facilities. They want to make the blame go somewhere else, and you are the handiest location. As Paul O'Leary so cogently identified, moving the conversation to the individual's emotional state is a rhetorical dodge. Stay calm. Stay with the law. Identify the violation & the citation. Express a desire to see conformity with the law so that you and all others similarly situated can access the services provided at the location. And keep on doing it. In Madison, disability rights activists have been pushing for 50 years. Thanks to the early activists, this town is accessible enough that there are *more* of us here to continue the push. I believe there's a parallel here, too: Madison *is* a bike-friendly town, and with your continued effort, it can become an even more bike-friendly town. -- Jesse the K -- Madison, WI USA -- mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] -[ Kindly forgive asynchrony; I read via digest ]- _______________________________________________ Bikies mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies
