by Oscar Pistorius is our modern day Bionic Man — but that doesn’t mean he any sort of mechanical advantage over average-bodied runners — even though the International Association of Athletics Federations originally banned him from competition for that very, mechanical, reason:
On Friday, an international court of appeals overturned the ban on Oscar competing with his carbon-fiber fake legs in the Olympics, setting right a horrible human wronging:
The watershed ruling made the runner, Oscar Pistorius,
the first amputee to successfully challenge the notion that his carbon-fiber prosthetics gave him an unfair advantage and assured his right to race against able-bodied athletes in the Olympics, should he qualify. Previously barred from competing in such races by track and field’s world governing body, Pistorius will continue to stoke the debate over the competitive issues created by evolving technology in sports.
I am always amazed how many average people are outraged when non-average people are provided “reasonable accommodation” under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1991.
When Marlee Matlin recently appeared on Dancing with the Stars there were some — including the judges — that felt she deserved no reasonable accommodation in the grading of her dancing because “she has to be treated just like everyone else” even though she is profoundly Deaf since birth and cannot hear music.
That sort of mindless cruelty against the disabled — all in the name of a misguided “universal fairness” and a sorry burping of “the spirit of competition” slogan — is disgusting and unnerving, and we all need to support the Oscars and the Marlees of the world who must not only fight against their own disability, but go to war every day against the misguided intentions of a condescending world unfairly set against them.
i don’t think i could ever run fast on those to compete. admiring him is right.
That’s a good attitude, arin. Putting yourself in his shoes — or legs — is a good way to imagine how hard it is to walk, let alone competitively run, on artificial limbs.
Are you kidding me???
He should have got a Gold just for his attitude!!!
Yes, Katha! Or at least a default, 10 second, head start! It’s incredible to think that a double amputee has an “advantage” by running on false legs. What a sad and awful notion!