FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Was this woman running a "wheelchair scam?"
Old Jul 10, 2012, 1:14 pm
  #13  
Yaatri
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Originally Posted by oldpenny16
Yaatri, so true!

In the USA it is in fact illegal to ask what a person's problem may be.

However elsewhere in the world, the questions are asked and often to a great degree.
You are right tjat it's illegal to ask a petson about their disability, it does not prevent some jerks to insist anyway. They not only ask what it is but also ask you to produce proof, "How do I know you are not lying!".
I was told tha I would nit be allowed to go through the security ar that checkpoint unless I had proof. The Delta "meet & greet" rep for DM's was watching. So he ordered a wheel chair and took me through another checkpoint, even though I would have preferred that he fougjt foe me.
Our own federal agencies don't follow our laws. Other countries don't have the same laws, but have been treated more respectfully. sometimes I am often asked to show my leg, as I wear a knee brace without being offered private screening. In Japan, they offer me private room. In other countries, they take my word that I have a knee brace, and don't ask me to "show" it to them.
Laws mean little when people, especially those with a little power, choose to not obey thise laws.

In other countries, I have seen fights errupting. In one case, a woman was pushing her an older woman in a wheel chair to take her through security. A person behind me in the the queue objected to that because, he felt only the wheel chair bound, not the accompanying person, could bypass the queue. Others joined in an aggressive manner to force her to join the queue. When my attempts to convince them failed and it looked like it was going to turn ugly, I git tjr attention of an offucial to allow them to proceed to the front of the line. Bothe women were foreign and did not speak the local language. Some travellers figght aggressively, any way they can to seek and preserve "advantage" over others and view every one going around the queue with suspicion.
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