The stupid explodes: obesity now a disability

[The Atheist]

Thanks to a European Court of Justice judgement, obesity can now be considered a disability. http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/dec/18/obesity-can-be-disability-eu-court-rules

So, I guess we can take it that the ECJ no longer believes in personal responsibility and if that an employee chooses to be so grossly obese he/sha cannot fulfill their paid function, the employer must pay for it!

Homer Simpson, as I live & breathe.

You so want this to be a 1 April headline, but alas, the only hope is that every employer bands together, appeals the ruling and puts pressure on the entire EU to get rid of this kind of insane thinking.

And here was me laughing last year when some grossly fat disability commissioner in ZN cried that extreme fatness should be a disability.

Way to slap people with real disabilities right in their faces. Born with spina bifida? Hard luck, now you have to share resources with fat [/insert pejorative*]. Club foot driver? Sorry, the last disabled spot has been taken by a 500 lb behemoth.




*people can be as fat or thin as they like and I really don't care, but making it someone else's problem is insane.

 

[angrysoba]

I suppose there is a sense in which being genetically predisposed towards obesity either because of metabolism or some kind of addictive disorder is analogous to something like alcoholism or drug addiction although I wonder if being told that obesity is effectively out of someone's hands inhibits their ability to do something about it.

 

[Tatyana]

I think the ruling stated obesity in itself is not a disability, but the long term impact of obesity may be considered a disability with regard to providing things like access at work (larger chairs etc).

Obesity 'could be a disability' - EU courts rule
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-30529791

Obesity can constitute a disability in certain circumstances, the EU's highest court has ruled.

Judges said that obesity in itself was not a disability - but if a person had a long-term impairment because of their obesity, then they would be protected by disability legislation.

I guess the title should be 'what I interpreted the ruling as is the stupid explodes'.

I have to be honest, as much as I would like to blame the individual with obesity, which we know doesn't work, it is obvious that there are people who are permanently limited in their abilities due to obesity and that this is an issue that isn't going anywhere in the immediate future.

It is time to stop fat shaming.

 

[The Don]

It's not quite as The Atheist has painted it.

The ruling does conclude that obesity can, in severe cases, be considered disabling but it doesn't go as far as considering a protected characteristic against which all discrimination is prohibited. According to the ruling, the burden of proof falls equally on employer and employee. Obesity itself is also not a disability, the effects of it may be.

The employer needs to take "reasonable steps" to ensure that provision is made for an employee. As I understand it, if the employee can no longer perform their job, for example they are no longer able to perform a physically demanding job, the employer isn't obligated to redesign the workplace or redefine the role.

As the article, and other reports, mention there has been a mixed response. Employment lawyers are understandably elated but some obesity campaigners are concerned that this may add another barrier to obese people being able to find jobs (the obese already have a much higher unemployment rate in part due to the perception that the obese are lazy).


edited to add.....

Ninja'd by Tatyana

 

[The Atheist]

... the ruling stated obesity in itself is not a disability, but the long term impact of obesity may be considered a disability with regard to providing things like access at work (larger chairs etc). ...

See, to me that is a nonsensical difference that is no real difference. You're right that obesity isn't a disability in itself, but if it stops an employee fulfilling their role, it is.

It is putting the responsibility on employers instead of the individual.

Also, note I did specifically use the word "can" in the OP.

 

[The Atheist]

Employment lawyers are understandably elated but some obesity campaigners are concerned that this may add another barrier to obese people being able to find jobs (the obese already have a much higher unemployment rate in part due to the perception that the obese are lazy).

I have a boot in each camp - as an employer who employs employment lawyers, amongst other types of worker.

I find the idea utterly repugnant. What if someone doesn't like personal hygiene and stinks, making everyone else feel sick? Do we then need to provide gas masks for other staff? They can't all be Steve Jobs and employed after everyone else finishes.

I agree that it will destroy employment prospects for fat people. I know of several large employers who have an absolute rule that they will not hire fat people already.

 

[The Don]

I have a boot in each camp - as an employer who employs employment lawyers, amongst other types of worker.

I find the idea utterly repugnant. What if someone doesn't like personal hygiene and stinks, making everyone else feel sick? Do we then need to provide gas masks for other staff? They can't all be Steve Jobs and employed after everyone else finishes.

When a person's right to poor personal hygiene is covered under employment legislation then I guess we will find out. I'd be interested to know how a Trimethylaminuria sufferer would be treated under current disability legislation.

I agree that it will destroy employment prospects for fat people. I know of several large employers who have an absolute rule that they will not hire fat people already.

In which country is this ? On what basis do they make this decision, it is a hard BMI number or just a case of "too plump to work"? What kind of a business are they ?

I can understand not hiring morbidly obese employees to perform physically demanding roles or other roles where their weight presents a significant barrier to performing their job but it seems very shortsighted to refuse to employ someone because they are fatter than an arbitrary level when it has no impact on their ability to perform the role. I guess that as society gets fatter, their pool of prospective employees will shrink and business will suffer.

 

[Elagabalus]

Thanks to a European Court of Justice judgement, obesity can now be considered a disability. http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/dec/18/obesity-can-be-disability-eu-court-rules

So, I guess we can take it that the ECJ no longer believes in personal responsibility and if that an employee chooses to be so grossly obese he/sha cannot fulfill their paid function, the employer must pay for it!

Homer Simpson, as I live & breathe.

You so want this to be a 1 April headline, but alas, the only hope is that every employer bands together, appeals the ruling and puts pressure on the entire EU to get rid of this kind of insane thinking.

And here was me laughing last year when some grossly fat disability commissioner in ZN cried that extreme fatness should be a disability.

Way to slap people with real disabilities right in their faces. Born with spina bifida? Hard luck, now you have to share resources with fat [/insert pejorative*]. Club foot driver? Sorry, the last disabled spot has been taken by a 500 lb behemoth.




*people can be as fat or thin as they like and I really don't care, but making it someone else's problem is insane.

You're in ZN I take it? I wouldn't worry about it then. You know how many obese people there are in Europe? Not that many ... so there's that.

 

[SezMe]

<snip>

I can understand not hiring morbidly obese employees to perform physically demanding roles or other roles where their weight presents a significant barrier to performing their job but it seems very shortsighted to refuse to employ someone because they are fatter than an arbitrary level when it has no impact on their ability to perform the role.

I think that is a judgment call, not a given. For example, a salesperson who is out meeting clients (not phone selling) has a real liability if they are fat. Shame on society? Well, maybe, but facts are facts. If I was hiring a geotech firm for a job that involved field work and one of their team was 5'-5" and weighed 300 pounds, they wouldn't get the job.

 

[The Don]

I think that is a judgment call, not a given. For example, a salesperson who is out meeting clients (not phone selling) has a real liability if they are fat. Shame on society? Well, maybe, but facts are facts. If I was hiring a geotech firm for a job that involved field work and one of their team was 5'-5" and weighed 300 pounds, they wouldn't get the job.

I'm not an employment law specialist, but I understand that the ruling applies in limited circumstances, on a case by case basis and only when the employee has a disability relating to obesity.

As I understand it you are still entitled not to hire someone because they are too fat, whether this is because they cannot perform or simply because they don't fit with the company aesthetic. What you may have to do is, if you already employ someone, take reasonable steps to accommodate their obesity related disability. An example could be to allow someone to use an elevator or work on a floor served by an elevator rather than having to use stairs.

I am not an employment lawyer and I admit that I may have misunderstood the judgement and/or its implications.

 

[lonepinealex]

There's been a lot of classism in the UK reporting of this. Most notably the old buffer who was on the Today programme yesterday, ranting about how outrageous it is that people who've chosen to be obese should be called disabled. Unlike the worthy disabled* like his posh friend who fell off a horse and is permanently tetraplegic. Because naturally his friend was forced to get on a horse, no choice in the matter.

There are a lot of people who are disabled because of sports injuries and the like, and the exact same argument about choice can be made for them. Yet somehow they're not despised in the way fat people are. Even among the obese there are strata - posh, rich obese people (of which there are plenty), well dressed and groomed, aren't the ones compiled into montages on news reports. It's always lumbering proles in tracksuits in shopping centres, filmed from the neck down.




*shades of Brass Eye's good AIDS and bad AIDS

 

[bit_pattern]

If one is disabled by a condition - regardless of how it is acquired - it is by very definition a disability. I'm not sure of ANY definition of 'disabled' anywhere in the world that is predicated on the culpability or otherwise of the individual in acquiring their disability. Is a drink driver who crashes their car and ends up in a wheelchair not disabled? Is a person who acquires a brain injury because they did something stupid?

Your outrage seems to be simply a case of prejudice and little else.

I agree that it will destroy employment prospects for fat people. I know of several large employers who have an absolute rule that they will not hire fat people already

Well they better not have documented that policy because if labour laws there are anything like here then that would be discriminatory and illegal.

 

[marplots]

I'm not fat, but I've seen fat people. (I'm trying not to be racist here, but some fatties do stand out from the crowd.) Some of them have a hard time getting around. Some ride motorized carts to do their shopping. Some sweat a great deal and spend a lot more on food than I do.

Sounds like a disability to me.

 

[casebro]

I believe obesity has been considered a disability in America for some time. (So is alcoholism and drug addiction.)

It's not considered discrimination if the disability effects job performance.

I watched the series "Half Ton Man". It was about the guys that need to be fork lifted into a furniture van for transport to the fat farm. Two years of exercise and diet, and surgery to cut off a couple hundred pounds of excess skin after losing 500 pounds, the guy left at a healthy weight. The doctor's closing comment was "He'll be back". A subsequent episode a couple years later- yup, he was back. So obesity is a strong addiction that is incurable.

 

[bpesta22]

I believe obesity has been considered a disability in America for some time. (So is alcoholism and drug addiction.)

It's not considered discrimination if the disability effects job performance.

I watched the series "Half Ton Man". It was about the guys that need to be fork lifted into a furniture van for transport to the fat farm. Two years of exercise and diet, and surgery to cut off a couple hundred pounds of excess skin after losing 500 pounds, the guy left at a healthy weight. The doctor's closing comment was "He'll be back". A subsequent episode a couple years later- yup, he was back. So obesity is a strong addiction that is incurable.

Alcoholism is covered but it's no free pass (show up to work drunk, and you're fired).

Drug addiction is not covered (because drugs are illegal). Anyone currently addicted but not using is covered.

Under the ADA, you're disabled if the employer treats you "as if" you have a disability. This allowed morbid obesity to be a disability. It has to be morbid, versus, say, just my beer belly. And, the person still has to be able to do the essential job functions with or without reasonable accommodation.

I'm ok with this--for most jobs, how much you weigh is irrelevant.

 

[ThunderChunky]

If a rock climber breaks his leg falling off a cliff, he is considered disabled until he heals. I don't see the difference as long as a doctor is signing off that the person has a disability.

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

If one is disabled by a condition - regardless of how it is acquired - it is by very definition a disability. I'm not sure of ANY definition of 'disabled' anywhere in the world that is predicated on the culpability or otherwise of the individual in acquiring their disability. Is a drink driver who crashes their car and ends up in a wheelchair not disabled? Is a person who acquires a brain injury because they did something stupid?

Your outrage seems to be simply a case of prejudice and little else.

While I think your last sentence is correct I believe the perceived difference with obesity when compared to other self inflicted disabilities is that obesity is self curable too. If only the fatties would stop cramming pies in their faces, they'd get better.
There seems to be a wealth of evidence that while technically true, this is not actually achievable, so I'm OK with the ruling.

 

[NWO Sentryman]

Is The Simpsons beginning to seep into reality?

 

[TragicMonkey]

Is The Simpsons beginning to seep into reality?

It's not unpossible that such a craptacular thing could occur. Whether such embiggening is cromulent enough to merit classification as a disability is the question.

 

[abaddon]

It's not unpossible that such a craptacular thing could occur. Whether such embiggening is cromulent enough to merit classification as a disability is the question.

Well played.