Remarkable World Commentary Episode #115: Ask Advocate Donna

🌐 Also available in: Français

In this practical episode of Remarkable World Commentary, Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA presents her October Ask Advocate Donna, opening with one of her favorite quotes, by an unknown author: speak in such a way that others love to listen to you, and listen in such a way that others love to speak to you. Her word game sets complacent against active, arguing that complacency leaves little room for advocacy while being active makes room for it, and then turns to in kind and unkind, wondering whether being cruel to be kind applies to the pair.

Donna then shares three listener stories, asking of each what advocacy is, who gets involved, why it is necessary, how and when. A mother, Emily, told a desk agent that her son Emil was vision impaired to get a discounted pass, and Emil’s friends spoke up; Donna calls this counter-advocacy and says using a disability to gain an advantage is not right. Rico was fined after his service dog left hair in an Uber; Donna says Uber must accept service dogs and should be called out, with Rico going from the company to a lawyer and social media. Finally, a medical assistant at a lab refused to help a vision-impaired patient undress and asked the patient’s friend to do it; Donna says that was very wrong and advises reporting it to the doctor and then the medical association.

TRANSCRIPT

Podcast Commentator: Greetings. Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, and MBA invites you to listen to her bi-weekly podcast, Remarkable World Commentary. Here, Donna shares some of her innermost thoughts, insights, perspectives, and more with her listeners. Donna focuses on topics that directly affect the future of kids, especially kids with disabilities. Donna is a blind advocate, author, sight loss coach, dinner mystery producer, writer, entrepreneur, law graduate, and podcast commentator. She has decades of lived experiences, knowledge, skills, and expertise in access technology and information. As someone who has been internationally recognized for her work and roles, she just wants to make things better than possible.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Hello there. I’m Donna J. Jodhan, your Ask An Advocate host. Second episode for the month of October. Thank you everyone for joining me today, and thank you for responding to my call for your thoughts, your words, your comments, your feedback. Okay? So continue writing to me at donnajodhan@gmail.com, okay? donnajodhan@gmail.com and keep on listening. You never know what you might come across in any of my podcasts and we go from there. All right, so let me start off today with one of my favorite quotes. And here goes: Speak in such a way that others love to listen to you, and listen in such a way that others love to speak to you. Unfortunately, this author is unknown. Now let’s go to my word game, one of my favorite segments of my podcast.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Okay? Many times advocates have to choose between being complacent or being active. I will tell you that being complacent in my books doesn’t happen very often. The minute that one is complacent, it means that they choose to ignore. They choose to not care. They choose simply to sit there and take it all in. Whereas on the flip side of the coin, you have active. So complacent versus active. Active is when you decide to do something about something. So complacent versus active. There are complacent advocates who really believe that being complacent is a way or a means of support. I don’t fully agree. If you’re complacent, I don’t think there’s much room for you to become involved in advocacy. Whereas if you become active, there is room for you. So let’s think about it, complacent versus active.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: All right. Here’s the other two terms I’d like you to think of for today. In kind or unkind. Do you do something to be kind? As they say, it’s in kind that you are performing some action or doing something. Or unkind means that, you know, it’s being viewed that you’re not being kind, you’re being unkind. I wonder if the thought of being cruel to be kind could be applied to these two terms. You’re being cruel to be kind when it is unkind. Is that so? What do you think? Or in kind is if you’re doing it because you honestly believe that it is a kind gesture. Send me your thoughts to donnajodhan@gmail.com. Now we’re going to move into the three stories of the month that our team has chosen for me to share with you, and here’s the first story.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: A parent says that her son, little Timmy, is vision impaired. Why is she saying this? Emily told the agents at the desk that her little boy, not Timmy, Emil, was vision impaired. Emily wrote this story and sent it to us, okay? And she did so because she wanted to get a special rate for her little boy, Emil.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Emil’s friends noticed what was going on. They noticed that Emily was telling the customer agent at the desk that little Emil was vision impaired. They took action. And this is a kind of a unique story in that Emil was not vision impaired, but the mother wanted to take advantage of something here by telling the customer agent that Emil was vision impaired. The friends knew differently, and the friends stepped up to the plate and said, “No, Emil is not vision impaired.” What would you have advised the customer agent to do? Would you, in this instance, to avoid any sort of argument or disturbance, simply gone along with Emily’s claim that little Emil was vision impaired and just simply issued a pass or a discounted pass to Emil? Or would you, like Emil’s friends, stepped up to the plate and said, “No, this is not right.”

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: You’re using what I call counter-advocacy here. You’re using a so-called disability to gain an advantage. Is this right? I don’t know what you think, but in my books, it is not right. It is not right to say something that is not true, and it is not right to use a disability to try and gain an advantage. What is your suggestion? What are your thoughts? Okay. So here is what I would like you to think about. Are you on the side of the friends, or are you on the side of Emily, or what would you advise the customer agent to do? Tough decision, eh? So what is advocacy all about? What is advocacy all about here? Advocacy, in my books, in this instance, is advocating for the right thing, the honorable thing. And who gets involved with advocacy in this instance?

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: It is the friends who gets involved in advocacy because little Emil may be too embarrassed to do something, but his friends can. Why is it necessary here? Because it’s a matter of stopping someone who has no conscience from trying to gain an advantage by saying that her son has a disability, and it is not so. How do you get involved in advocacy? You do so by exactly doing what the friends did. And when? When you see something that needs to be corrected. Let’s move on to the second story. All right.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Customer was penalized for having a service dog in an Uber cab. This is gaining a lot of attention, and Uber seems to not understand that the law or the regulations or the legislation says that they must accept service dogs. There is no other way, and this is a growing concern amongst our community here, for those with guide dogs.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Now, Rico had notified the Uber company that he had a service dog when he called them for a ride. Okay? At first, the driver said that the dog could go into the trunk. Okay? The driver said that the dog could sit with Rico in the backseat. Rico was then fined for his dog making a mess with its hairs or leaving its hairs on the seat or on the floor of the cab. What would be your advice to Rico? I know what mine would be. If I am very sure, and I think it is so, that legally Uber has to take a passenger with a service dog, then I would go much further. I will not take this because if this is what the law is, it is as it is, and Uber needs to be called out. There are too many people reporting on Facebook and even writing to me by telling me that this is the case.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: So let’s move on here. Okay? All right. What is advocacy all about? Advocacy here is when someone knows that the law says that the cab company must accept a passenger with a service dog. And the passenger has advised this, the Uber company. This is what advocacy is all about, fighting for your rights. Okay? Who gets involved in advocacy here? Well, it’s Rico to start with, and then Rico’s friends, and he does this through social media and by word of mouth. Why is it necessary? Because the Uber company is not adhering to what the law says. How do you get involved in advocacy? Rico starts the ball rolling. Rico goes to the Uber company to report what is going on. The Uber company does not do anything about it. Then Rico can go to or seek the services of a lawyer and post his experiences to social media.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: When do you get involved in advocacy? As I said above, when something is not right, when a company is not adhering to the law, and this appears to be the case here with Uber. Right. Let’s move on now to the next story. Okay?

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: You have someone who wrote to us saying that a medical assistant at a lab refused to help a patient with a vision impairment. In a lab, we had a medical assistant who refused to help a patient with a vision impairment.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: The assistant wanted the patient’s friend to help her get undressed. No, no, no. For me, it is a no, no, no. Okay? The friend told the assistant that it was their duty to help the patient. Okay? And the patient reiterated this. What’s wrong with this situation here? For the most part, we don’t get undressed in front of our friends, do we? Unless it’s our boyfriend or someone that we are intimate with. But normally, we do not get undressed in front of our friends, even our family. So for an assistant to say to the friend, “Help the patient,” is wrong. Very, very wrong. And what advice I would give to this person, and I did give it, is to go report this incident to the doctor themselves, not just to the person at the desk, but to the doctor themselves, and you start going higher.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Okay? What is advocacy? It’s advocating for something that must be offered by the medical assistant to the patient. It is a must. There’s no other way. Asking a friend or a family member to help the patient get undressed is totally inacceptable. This is what advocacy is all about, advocating for equal treatment or advocating for something to be carried out when the assistant knows or should know better. Okay? This is what advocacy is all about. And who gets involved? Well, it’s the patient first, then the friend, and then they build from there by going not just to the service desk or the administrative desk person, but going to the doctor themselves, and then you start going upwards from there. Hey, report it to the medical association. Report it to the person or the organization who is in charge of this lab. Okay? It doesn’t happen like that.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA: Why is advocacy necessary? It is necessary because this medical assistant crossed the line. And how do you get involved in advocacy? As I just stated above, patient, friend, go to the administrative desk of the office of the lab. Go to the doctor. Okay? And when do you get involved in advocacy? Again, as I said above, you get involved when you honestly believe that your privacy has been trampled upon or your rights have been trampled upon, and in this case, it is your privacy. Okay? So I am Donna J. Jodhan, thanking you for stopping by to listen to me today. Please keep on listening and sending your feedback to me at donnajodhan, D-O-N-N-A-J-O-D-H-A-N, @gmail.com. Thank you very much and see you next month.

Podcast Commentator: Donna wants to hear from you and invites you to write to her at donnajodhan@gmail.com. Until next time.

Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA
Global Leader In Disability Rights, Digital Accessibility, And Inclusive Policy Reform
Turning policy into progress for people with disabilities.