At what point do you finally say: Sorry Kid, you can't play

fgfg wrote:

the inalienable Right to Life, Liberty and ridaculling the retarded.....or world class 152 800 guys.

No such thing as a world-class 1:52 800 guy.

What the F***, how the hell can't she just carry the air tank, its not like it is big or filled with lead. if the dog can easily carry it, she should be able to as well.

and then for her parents to sue. This is ridiculous. The case should get thrown out, the girl should get given a small back pack for the air tank, and the parents should get bitch slapped across the face for being so dumb.

you have got to be kidding me wrote:

You guys must be kidding me. You have a girl who wants to participate in the special olympics. She should be able to play regardless of her dog. Everyone on this message board is f***ed up as well, do you assholes really have nothing else better to do than to bash on a teenage girl whose dreams of playing have been smashed? Shame on everyone here and I would never want any of you around a person of special needs because of ignorant bullshit just like this.

I work with people with mental retardation. One of the difficult things about a newspaper article like this is that there is always information missing. Special Olympics is not going to comment on the specifics of the case because 1. there is a lawsuit in progress and 2. it would violate confidentiality and be unprofessional. Therefore we are only getting one side of the story. We have some discussion of what Special Olympics has or hasn't offered but it has been from the parents perspective only.

I really haven't seen anybody bash on the girl who wants to play. I have seen some bashing of the parents. We don't know what, if any, solutions Special Olympics can work out to allow the child to participate. We don't know any details about the dog (does it have any duties other than carrying the Oxygen?), the specifics of the girl's physical disabilities (which may or may not impair a backpack solution), we don't know what if any other kinds of participation she has been offered.

What the hell wrote:

What the F***, how the hell can't she just carry the air tank, its not like it is big or filled with lead. if the dog can easily carry it, she should be able to as well.

and then for her parents to sue. This is ridiculous. The case should get thrown out, the girl should get given a small back pack for the air tank, and the parents should get bitch slapped across the face for being so dumb.

Yeah, I'm with you. Surely if this girl wants to play so badly, it shouldn't be too hard to find someone willing to design and make a special back back for her for no cost.

Also, the mom needs to drop the case. She is making things worse for everyone including herself and her daughter.

What the hell wrote:

What the F***, how the hell can't she just carry the air tank, its not like it is big or filled with lead. if the dog can easily carry it, she should be able to as well.

and then for her parents to sue. This is ridiculous. The case should get thrown out, the girl should get given a small back pack for the air tank, and the parents should get bitch slapped across the face for being so dumb.

This is the best response so far. Instead of bringing suit against a school system and charitable organization that has given their child fitting care/education and happiness in the past they should use their efforts to find scientists and researchers to develop and small and comfortable tank she can wear to eliminate the danger of the dog on the court.

Unless Dad taught Air Bud to set picks for her.

If the medal in the softball throw meant that much to her then Mommy and Daddy should be finding other events she can compete in with the dog besides basketball. A few more medals in other events that are safe to do with a dog will make her forget about basketball in a heartbeat.

Not sure just having a backpack to carry the O2 tank is the answer. The article said she gets tired very easily, so maybe carrying the tank is not feasible. You also don't know what other kind of issues she has...freaks out when things touch her back, etc. Can't be too judgmental there. So, NO, just because the dog can carry it doesn't mean she can.

ronner wrote:

What the hell wrote:

What the F***, how the hell can't she just carry the air tank, its not like it is big or filled with lead. if the dog can easily carry it, she should be able to as well.

and then for her parents to sue. This is ridiculous. The case should get thrown out, the girl should get given a small back pack for the air tank, and the parents should get bitch slapped across the face for being so dumb.

Yeah, I'm with you. Surely if this girl wants to play so badly, it shouldn't be too hard to find someone willing to design and make a special back back for her for no cost.

Also, the mom needs to drop the case. She is making things worse for everyone including herself and her daughter.

Ummm, ever heard of Air Bud?

you have got to be kidding me wrote:

She should be able to play regardless of her dog.

You must be kidding me. Nobody said she shouldn't be able to compete in the Special Olympics, just the event where the apparatus she needs endangers other participants.

In your rush to show righteous indignation, you missed the whole point of the OP's post, that at some point maybe parents need to decide that the world can't adjust to their kids every need, no matter what they are.

Are the parents going to sue and run to a newspaper every time someone says no to this kid?

Though in this case lawyers would love it. this set of parents sues to get the kid to play, then the other kids trip on the dog then sue the special olympics and the parents.

There's no rule that says dogs can't play basketball....

Here is a fine example of a parent and a lawyer.

Hot chocolate spill leads to lawsuit

Northlake woman sues McDonald's over daughter's burn

10:36 p.m. CDT, August 25, 2010

A Northlake woman sued McDonald's in Cook County Circuit Court on Wednesday alleging that her daughter was seriously burned in 2009 when a hot chocolate she ordered from the fast-food giant spilled and seriously burned her leg.

Vicki LaRocco bought the hot chocolate for her daughter on April 28, 2009, at a McDonald's drive-through window in Schiller Park, according to the lawsuit.

The lid of the cup was improperly secured, however, and the beverage spilled onto LaRocco's daughter, causing "severe pain and scarring," the suit states.

The suit further alleges that McDonald's should have known that the hot chocolate was too hot to drink.

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In 1994, a woman was awarded more than $2 million after suing McDonald's for burns she suffered when coffee she bought at a drive-through window spilled in her lap. That amount was later reduced by a judge.

LaRocco is asking for an unspecified amount of damages.

McDonald's spokeswoman Danya Proud declined to comment on the lawsuit Wednesday evening. "At this time, these are just allegations," Proud said.

— Cynthia Dizikes

ronner wrote:

Yeah, I'm with you. Surely if this girl wants to play so badly, it shouldn't be too hard to find someone willing to design and make a special back back for her for no cost.

Also, the mom needs to drop the case. She is making things worse for everyone including herself and her daughter.

Well, if people would actually read the article you'd realize that her mom did offer to have her carry a backpack, but that she was still denied. The article also said that she played basketball with her dog for six years at a different special ed program.

This wouldn't be such a big deal if the special olympics would have told her she couldn't do it in the first place, but according to the article she had already been practicing with the team when the decision was made. I don't know what developmental disabilities she has, but many kids with disabilities do very poorly with change, and they hold onto things for extremely long periods of time. I used to watch a girl with autism once a month and for several YEARS we played the exact same make believe game picking up the story line where we had left off the previous month.

I think the answer to this questions is... find a way for the girl to compete. There should be a way for her be included.

I can see that having her connected to a dog could be a safety issue for the other kids on a basketball court.

But I can't see why the backpack wouldn't be a workable compromise either for basketball or track.

This looks to me like a case where the grown-ups all need to act like grown-ups and make things work for the kid.