[QUAD-L] speaking of fakes

[River Wolfe]

Hey everyone, I've been aware of the phenomenon of "wheelchair pretenders" for quite some time and haven't seen much discussion about it here on the quad list.  At times, I wonder if everyone here is for real, but have usually let it go.   What do others think and feel about these people who "need" to be in a  chair or pretend to be amputees.  This site http://www.transabled.org/mos/Frontpage/:states that it is a psychological need much like a person who is born female but their mind their emotions and everything else are programmed to be female - transgendered.  I definitely feel there are some folks that fit the transgendered category, you can't help but admit some boys were meant to be girls and vice versa.  BUT I definitelly don't believe some folks are born able-bodied and they are really supposed to be disabled, to me that's a "mental illness" that can be dealt with by lots of therapy.  In my opinion, these are people who are seeking attention and sympathy, and or they get some sort of sexual satisfaction from pretending to be disabled.  They make me wanna scream "go jump off a cliff or dive in the shallow end of a pool and stop pretending, see how you like it then"  I simply don't get it. There's even a story of a woman who wanted to have her legs amputated for the hell of it, just to live life as an amputee.  Hell, I say lets just send her to Iraq. Lets discuss this interesting topic. Peace, River