I'd love to be a volunteer - but nobody will LET me!!!
Dear Scope.
I've been here with you lot before on this one, and with other sites, and with charity shops ad nauseam..... There's 2 things involved - as I can rant all day about this, I'm keeping it short. Firstly, referees. I'm always asked for 2 referees. Please believe me when I say this - I do NOT HAVE two passable people I could use for references. They do not exist in my life. They probably never have done. So when I get given the voluntary forms to fill out and tell the form-givers this, their eyes narrow, they hum and haw, take the forms back with those boxes unfilled and that's the last I ever hear from them. I have been trying to volunteer for many years and the above problem's one of two insurmountable stumbling blocks.
The second one seems to be - and I say 'seems' because I don't really understand this - the fact that I, myself, am classed as learning disabled. But with me it's on a technicality - I've got visio-spatial problems. When they give me I.Q. tests I do well on everything until maps, pictures, shapes enter the questions, then I die noisily. SANS those categories I'm 170, which I don't think is too bad. WITH those categories, I end up at 68 every time - those three categories slay me. So the 'me' on paper differs from the 'me' in reality and able-bodieds seem unable to get their heads around it.
Thirdly - I'm a short, fat ugly bar steward. The sheer AMOUNT of exception people take to that fact, which I cheerfully admit, is absolutely breathtaking. I've been banned from places because people don't like looking at me. (I can prove that!) I get accused of things I can't believe, like I'm banned from Brighton Pier because I bumped into a woman by accident - I walk odd because of the disabilities - and she told one of the bouncers I'd touched her up on purpose. He turned up with all his friends and they told me to walk off the pier or they'd chuck me off bodily. I don't even know who it was, the pier was very crowded. I'm living in Brighton because I was being beaten up/mugged/burgled so often where I used to live, I got moved out of the town - and that's followed me, I've just had all my Christmas money stolen by someone I could've sworn was a friend. I'll stop there or I'll hit rant mode!
Fourthly and finally - able-bodied people do not want disabled people as volunteers on an equal footing with them. They want to be the Benevolent Do-gooders we all give Adoring Smiles to, to bolster their egoes. Proof? When was the last time you saw a disabled person working in a charity shop? And if you can actually REMEMBER seeing one, it's because it's such a rare occurrence it's stuck in your memory.
If you can think of a way for me to get past the 'I-do-NOT-have-two-referees' thing, I'll happily be a volunteer (as long as being one doesn't cost me any money - I don't see why I should have to PAY to help out!)
Yours respectfully
Chris.
