Mexican man with aspergers wins court battle against state

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Not sure this has been discussed here on the website or not--but when I read this article last week I was pretty disturbed by it: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-24556860

Not to put on a tinfoil hate or anything, but what's next? A resurgence of eugenics? Anyone else find it disturbing that a law like that taking away essential, basic rights from someone with a psychological condition arbitrarily?

It's a bit disturbing to me that a country neighboring my own (USA and Mexico have very close political and economic ties) would pass laws treating their citizens like that, especially when they themselves have a history of the Spanish Empire practising discrimination through social castes. If they're going to pass laws like the one discussed in that article then they'd might as well bring back the Spanish Casta system and nobility titles.

I'll stop ranting now. What's everybody else's thoughts on this matter though?

It's not just the Spanish colonial caste system era, it's any era; social pyramids and class systems are an intrinsic part of the human condition. It's been that way for thousands of years; Karl Marx's theories were all valid except for the last one, too fragile to work in practice, that the class system would be abolished. Or even diminished for that matter.

A country like Mexico has limited wherewithal to accommodate people with special needs - there needs to be more of a movement down there that if people with Aspergers are enabled, they could contribute to the betterment of the country through their unique gifts. Sort of like a return on investment, as it were. Unfortunately, this becomes a catch-22 situation where they're not given the opportunities to succeed that others are, out of fear of squandering resources.

This seems like more of a case of blunt discrimination; even if it's eliminated, more covert forms of discrimination will persist with the same aims and outcomes. Just look at African-Americans who were given the vote about 50 years ago, but then states (particularly southern ones!) started introducing mandatory high school education in order to vote, and even as early as last year, the Republican state govt of Pennsylvania tried to introduce a law for mandatory drivers license showing in order to vote - it was struck down as arbitrary and unconstitutional, thankfully, because WE ALL KNOW what they were really up to.

Mexico is very backward in many ways. The "justice" and police systems are built on bribery from the bottom up, and judges sentence a defendant to jail if he can't pay the bribe. If a defendant wins, the police shoot him anyway. Most land is owned by a few huge owner families, and the Catholic Church. Kids growing up on ranchos are kept uneducated so there will be a steady stream of menial labor. And then there are indigenous Mexicans, who are at the bottom of society and who are heavily persecuted. Most urban Mexicans have a fifth or sixth grade education; high school graduates are rare, and there are only a couple universities. They've had 500 years to improve their society, since they haven't, tough.

I think that if you live in Mexico, don't tell anyone in an official capacity that you are autistic.

I think we should neither underestimate the obstacles we face nor underestimate our own resilience and the power of civil rights movements.

(yes, uneven progress, and success will come in fits and starts and at times we least expect)

And while we're talking social justice, let me push a couple of my issues:

We as a society, and I'm primarily talking about my own society of the United States, should have more jobs*, more good jobs, and more jobs that take less of an authoritarian approach at that.

Our education systems should be multi-path. I mean, if I get a poor grade in chemistry but good grades in other subjects, I shouldn't be punished. Our education systems seem set up to only reward people who are 'well-rounded' in some narrow way.

* If there was a legitimate 5% shortage of insulin, people wouldn't be likely to say, Oh, this is a great market for insulin seekers, but yet this is precisely what we do with jobs. and/or we immediately jump to taking things from the employer's perspective.

Doing what? The way I see it, future jobs will likely revolve around agriculture.

I'm glad the kid won his case. It's a step forward for Mexican civil rights.