Adam Spencer is an able and entertaining enough mathematician, but as a broadcaster, is just another, conventionally “woke”, taxpayer-funded leftist. So, while it might be tempting to have a good laugh at his comeuppance at the hands of the social justice mob, it really goes to show just how unhinged the inquisitors of “progressivism” have become.
Even good deeds are “offensive”, now.
Broadcaster Adam Spencer has become embroiled in a storm of outrage after he bought ice-creams for a group of disabled young adults.
That monster.
The tweet, which has since been deleted, read: “Want to feel unbelievably happy for only $20? Just saw 2 people looking after 4 special needs adults at the shops. Slipped the woman in charge a lobster & said “do me a favour, buy them an ice cream”. Trust me, best 20 I’ve spent in a long time. Not bignoting just planting a seed”.
Well, yeah, it is kind of bignoting. As AC/DC singer Brian Johnson famously said, “I don’t tell everybody they should give money…spend some of your own money and get it done”.
Still, so what? At least Spencer did something nice. But, while he thought he was fishing for easy Likes, he quickly found out that the online mob will find malign intent in everything.
But the Tweet drew a hostile response, with disability activists slamming Spencer over both his gesture and his language.
Mel Thomson, an academic microbiologist and disability activist who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2014, called Spencer “a bigoted a***hole” and said his original tweet was “dehumanising” of disabled people.
“Intentions don’t help disabled people get treated equally […] It’s not nasty to call out his ableism and express my disappointment.”
Social worker and self-described “wheelie” Sarah Linhardt said the experience could have been “hurtful” and “infantalising” for those with intellectual disabilities.
Or maybe they were just stoked to get some ice-cream?
Carly Findlay, who wrote a book, Say Hello, based on her experiences of living with icthyosis, said “disabled people aren’t charity objects”.
Well, that would be news to taxpayers who are forking out tens of billions to fund Julia Gillard’s National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Several Twitter users also took issue with Spencer’s use of the term “special needs”.
In subsequent tweets, Spencer said he had learnt a lot from the experience, particularly around the language of disability […]“Interesting times when a sly $20 to a disability career [sic] is the face of the evils of ableism.”
theaustralian.com.au/nation/adam-spencer-attacked-for-tweeting-about-giving-20-to-carer-of-disabled-adults-to-buy-them-icecreams
Spencer should have known: everything is offensive. Because it’s 2019.