[kerkeslager]

As usual, Hacker News presents the anti-human take in the top few most upvoted comments. Although this is an unusually subtle one.

I say this as a guy who still works a Starting-Strength-based program. Power lifting is great--it changed my life. But it's NOT a solution to disability and it's NOT a foolproof prevention. The implication that "if people just got off their asses and did some exercise they wouldn't be disabled!" is disgusting.

[nwiswell]

This is an extremely cynical take. (As usual, Hacker News!)

> The implication that "if people just got off their asses and did some exercise they wouldn't be disabled!" is disgusting.

I don't know how you got that implication. It seems like you agree that lifting is great. Many people don't do resistance exercise. The article itself is about the process of aging, and resistance exercise helps as a prophylactic. We all understand it's not a solution to all disability. But if it turns some people on to lifting, then net-net there's less disability in the world.

Great! What's the problem? (While we're talking about implications, your comment does seem to imply you haven't read the linked article.)

[kerkeslager]

> The article itself is about the process of aging, and resistance exercise helps as a prophylactic.

Aging is relevant to the author's case of disability because they mention that they " tried something that, looking back now, maybe [they're] too old for". But a lot of disability has nothing to do with age.

I think the point of bringing up age is that a lot of able people are selfish and assume that disability is someone else's problem, when in fact, the vast majority of people will become disabled in their lifetimes.

Do you really not see how bringing up a way to prevent disability (which is at best, a small-percentage probablistic solution) sounds like an attempt to refute that point?

> But if it turns some people on to lifting, then net-net there's less disability in the world.

Sure, and that would be a good thing. But you've gotta understand that in every conversation about disability, many people's only contribution to the conversation is to talk about how people could be less disabled, with almost no non-disabled people willing to engage with actually accommodating disability.

It's at best extremely condescending, as if people who are disabled aren't trying their best to not be disabled. There are exceptions, of course, but even in those cases, I tend toward more compassion because there's likely underlying mental illness going on there.

Fundamentally, there just isn't a massive societal problem with people not doing enough to not become disabled. The problem is we don't do enough to accommodate disability. Constantly bringing up ways we can avoid being disabled is insensitive and distracts from the real problems and real solutions.

At a more basic level: stop trying to present your solutions to a problem you don't have, and listen more to people who have the problem. This is particularly true if your "solution" is to arrogantly tell people how to not have the problem.