I’ve spent most of my adult life working with mentally handicapped adults, and I know that this kind of discrimination exists. I’ve witnessed them treated like small children, pitied and spoiled. They’ve been mocked, avoided, and even refused vital services most of us take for granted. This is the result of fear and a lack of understanding in regards to their disability.

The mentally and developmentally disabled have come a long way over the years, but it is still disheartening to see them gathered aside, segregated into their own group, as if they’re not each an individual human, with individual ideas, morals, beliefs, and opinions.

There are those in this community who can brighten a room just by walking into it, who have a smile for everyone, who are friendly, fun to talk with, and genuinely caring. There are those who are selfish and spoiled, who are materialistic and unpleasant to be around. There are those who like to gossip. There are those who like to moralize. There are those who are scrupulous and those who are lazy. And there’s that one person who’s always, always late.

It’s funny, but that sounds like a lot of people I know, all of them of normal intelligence.

Of those who are mentally handicapped, pleasant or unpleasant, each individual has acquired his personality traits from something other than his disability. In fact, I can’t recall when the term mentally handicapped was ever considered a personality trait. Putting all the mentally disabled people under the same banner is as absurd as claiming that all brown-haired people act the same, think the same, and look the same.

People unaccustomed to the mentally and developmentally disabled are often uncertain. Most of them mean well, but don’t know what they’re dealing with. This is normal. Strangers are scary. We don’t know what to expect from them, and a mentally handicapped man paying for his groceries is even more frightening.

The key is familiarity through exposure. This comes from integrating the mentally and developmentally disabled into the community.

There is a town I know of where a lot of mentally handicapped individuals live and work. The community of people within that town have become so accustomed to having these individuals frequenting their stores, restaurants, churches, and concerts, there’s hardly a second glance. A lot of these people know the mentally handicapped by name, stopping to discuss the weather, their health, or the latest big news story, just like any small town community. Through exposure, they’ve come to realize that every mentally and developmentally disabled person is an individual.

A small community is ideal for this type of setting, but even the bigger communities can benefit. Being exposed to a variety of people with this sort of handicap teaches us how to distinguish the person from the disability. It teaches us to develop the social skills needed to communicate with the person, instead of being frightened by the strangeness of their speech or appearance. We gain a higher understanding of the human population in general if we open our communities to a segment of people very much a part of this world.