A British councilman has apologized for saying “disabled children cost the council too much money and should be put down,” the BBC reported.
Collin Brewer, an independent member of Cornwall Council, said he was trying to “provoke a reaction” when he made the comments to a member of Disability Cornwall, an advocacy group for disabled people. The charity complained, and Brewer was ordered to make a formal apology.
“I am writing to offer my wholehearted apology for the offence these remarks have clearly caused,” he wrote in a letter, according to the BBC. “While I meant no offence by my remarks to you I can see, in retrospect, that they were ill-judged and insensitive and should not have been made at all.”
Roughly 6 percent of children in the U.K. have some form of disability, according to the UK Office for Disability Issues.
Brewer said he was “hot under the collar” when he made the comment after a morning meeting about budget and job cuts.
Make no mistake: this ordered apology is an apology for having said aloud what it is that many on the left believe and have always believed, from Margaret Sanger to the Nazis to progressive eugenicists to, now, people like Paul Krugman, who thoughtfully rub their learned, award-winning chins and speak of the need to have a candid public policy discussion on the costs of keeping alive some of the least productive and most expensive to upkeep citizens.
After all, there’s no reason , if they’re being blunt, that they should be compelled to begin fresh in their progressive Utopia hamstrung by a bunch of sickly old codgers and youthful defectives, right?
Still, if that kind of candid and dispassionate assessment, truthful though it may be, bothers those of you still in thrall to the myth of individual human worth, well, then they apologize for your being unable to handle simple facts about the statistical sacrifices a benevolent liberal fascist state must be willing to absorb should they wish to efficiently manage the herds.
(h/t Dan Collins)
I often suggest that disabled children be put down like rabid animals when I get hot under the collar. WTF
Apology not accepted. Resign in disgrace.
I think it is much more a matter of expense than productivity. Even Democrats have a limit to how much they will spend on a vote.
Even Democrats have a limit to how much they will spend on a vote.
That would be the price of a cell phone in some constituencies.
I’d say “Unbelievable!,”but this kind of talk has become quite common. Totally believable. See NHS’s Liverpool ‘Care’ Pathway.
It sure sounds like Brewer would be on board with Germany’s infamous T4 Euthanasia Program to to kill incurably ill, physically or mentally disabled, emotionally distraught, and elderly people.
(I know, it’s impolite bring up Nazi references. Not helpful).
I teach 18-22 yr. old students with disabilities how to work. If that clown had said that in my presence this 63-year old overweight diabetic would have kicked his MFing ass. Then I would have shot him and set fire to him.
It amazes me how many of my co-workers and SPED teachers vote for Obama. He loves him some serious abortion and so much of it is done on the fetuses diagnosed with a disability. It’s key to understanding his soul, or what passes for one.
Thing is, I’m rather sympathetic to the guy being forced to apologize. There are some people that I’m just not willing to spend heaps of money on. Certainly not when times are tight and I have much higher priorities to take care of.
This guy isn’t the monster, here. Well, maybe he is, but he’s a pretty weak monster in the scheme of things. The real scary, evil monsters are those who established the system that puts people like Mr. Brewer (and myself) in charge of making life-and-death decisions for other people’s families. Frankly, I applaud people like Mr. Brewer for making these issues a lot clearer. Not that I hold out a lot of hope of it happening, but it’s always possible that people will see sentiments like this as a warning that putting the lives of themselves and their loved ones in the hands of the bureaucracy is a really bad idea!
But no, the program is always touted as “free” and “compassionate” and lots of other words that make people feel good, so like Hansel and Gretel, they’ll just walk right in to the confectionery house. Because they believe the lies they are told, and never stop to consider the personalities of those who will sit on the death panels.
The Party of Death indeed.
Squid nails it again.
That Squid is one wise fellow.
In other words, he was trolling. In meatspace, that doesn’t generally work out well.
Squid 2016.
@Libby: yes, that was my first thought. How does this differ from the “Liverpool Care Pathway”?
@Squid: quite right. If it’s coming out of my pocket, I have a vested interest in controlling my neighbor’s medical care (also his lifestyle choices). I’d rather not do that.
Squid, I have to disagree. At best that’s a defense that he’s just following orders and absolves him of his own culpability for being part of the monster. The system sucks, no question, but that doesn’t absolve any participants from their own responsibilities for participating in it.
And to abuse another analogy, it reminds me quite a bit of the hippie who beat Jenny in Forrest Gump and excused it by saying that Johnson and the fucking war were making him crazy.
I don’t think Squid is absolving Brewer. The guards at Buchenwald, though petty monsters, were indeed monsters who would have done monstrous things with or without the Nazi Party — but the leaders of the Nazi Party enabled and encouraged their monstrous acts and made them more efficient at their work.
Being less of a monster than the Beast doesn’t absolve anybody — but that doesn’t mean you don’t acknowledge there is a greater monster leading them.
it’s always possible that people will see sentiments like this as a warning that putting the lives of themselves and their loved ones in the hands of the bureaucracy is a really bad idea!
More likely they’ll be relieved that Someone Else is taking care of such things, because those disabled people are really kinda creepy, ya know?
Yes, they’re more difficult to take care of than the healthy and independent. They also cause the least amount of harm to society: the disabled don’t build gas chambers and gulags nor do they provide rhetorical cover for those who do. Those kinds of atrocities are the exclusive province of the educated, intellectual class.
If it’s coming out of my pocket, I have a vested interest in controlling my neighbor’s medical care (also his lifestyle choices). I’d rather not do that.
This is precisely the argument I’ve been making to family and friends since ObamaCare was first threatened upon us. I’ve been hammering away for years that anytime a politician or pundit says “the State” or “the Government” or another such construction, they should substitute the word “Squid” in its place.
Thus, it’s not “the public” paying for your slutty niece’s birth control; it’s Squid. It’s not “the Government” deciding how much money you’re allowed to earn or where you’re allowed to invest it; it’s Squid. It’s not “the State” who will decide what medical care you get; it’s Squid. Those who know me well understand that it’s a really bad idea to waste my money and then hand me control of their lives.
As to the status of Mr. Brewer, he may very well be a monster. The fact that he sits on the Council tends to lead one to that conclusion. Doesn’t change the fact that his constituents have willingly put themselves under his “care,” and must suffer the consequences. Who’s the real monster — the guy who abuses children, or the parents who leave their children in his care, knowing full well what the likely consequences will be?
…the disabled don’t build gas chambers and gulags, nor do they provide rhetorical cover for those who do.
They might not provide rhetorical cover with their own tongues, but they’re for damn sure going to be used as props to manipulate the emotions of the electorate to grant the “educated, intellectual class” the power they need to build their “re-education centers.” And given recent patterns, I’m pretty sure the disabled vote overwhelmingly for the Proggs. Probably several times per election, because hey — who’s gonna throw a disabled person in prison for election fraud?
Two very apt quotations:
“Few of the great tragedies of history were created by the village idiot, and many by the village genius.”—Thomas Sowell
“It is terrible to contemplate how few politicians are hanged.”
– G.K. Chesterton in the Cleveland Press, 3/1/1921
[…] As Jeff comments: […]