You Can't Make this stuff up: Armless, legless girl and wants to cheerlead

Actually, I did answer you, but I suppose you want me to elaborate further. If you look at cheerleading from the aspect of the competitions we see on television, there is no way you can expect this young girl to compete in such a squad. If you take all of that away and just look at it from the standpoint of girls standing in front of the crowd at a football, basketball or baseball game, it still requires the use of arms and legs.

"Two bits, four bits, six bits a dollar, all for the Podunks, stand up and holler," is accompanied by arms moving and legs kicking, and followed by jumping up in the air. Without that, (I am going to get flamed hard for this) you are just a girl sitting in a wheelchair hollering at the crowd with a megaphone. If you consider hollering in a megaphone enough skill to be a cheerleader and this girl had enough spirit to carry that off, then perhaps they could have made her a mascot. Beyond this, I find it hard to believe that she could have actively participated as a cheerleader.

 

I'm not necessarily disagreeing or arguing with you, btw. I was truly curious. I think it is a funny situation. I do think cheerleading squads make "cuts", at least they did at my school. Not everyone who goes out "makes" the team. This could be for budgetary reasons if nothing else, but I figure the cut criteria is more based on a combination of looks, personality, physical ability, and who the kids' moms and dads are.

I am just envisioning a scenario of sitting at a game with the wife and the conversation goes: "Oh look, a little cheerleader girl with no arms and legs, isn't that sweet they let her on the squad! Was your little Sally not into the whole cheerleading thing?"

"Uhh, no. Actually she had her heart set on being a cheerleader but she got cut."

[Awkward silence...]

 

It's an opportunity lost for the school and the other cheerleaders. Not from a PR standpoint, but from the idea that making sacrifices for others who are less fortunate is just the right thing to do.

The girl didn't have to take anyone's spot. They could have used her in a limited role and retained the normal number of cheerleaders for a core team that competes, even if that means excluding her from halftime performances that serve as tune-ups for competitions. You want high school activities to be about character, teamwork and all the other mumbo jumbo we spew to justify their existence? There went your chance, and it can't come back.

So I disagree with how the school handled it.

I disagree more with the lawsuit.

I don't see how it's going to help anybody: the school, which no longer has the chance to genuinely do the right thing; the girl, who now can never be genuinely included as a cheerleader; or the other students, who would have to watch adults belatedly act with extra kindness only because there was a legal gun put to their heads. Maybe it will help some kid down the line, but I'm not sure it's worth taking cheerleading tryouts to court

 

The one thought I keep coming back to is I wonder how much of this the kids actually give a shit about and how much is parents saying "MY KID GETS WHAT SHE WANTS, SCREW YOUR KID!!!" With the corollary that nobody really knows how much each girl "wants" this stuff versus how much they want to please their parents by making the team. This goes for the parents of the girl in the wheelchair as well as the parents of the mythical last girl cut. I doubt that the 16th girl on the squad is going to feel like her future is ruined, and I doubt that the armless, legless girl wants to be set apart so controversially from people that she's probably hoping will accept her as a friend and classmate.

But parents just amp everything up to 11 and beyond.

 

i agree wholeheartedly with the post above. let's put it this way: i've got ZERO problem the the parents of a handicapped young person fighting heaven and earth to get anything it can to help make their child happy, or feel like she's enjoying the life of a 'normal' teenager, yada yada yada. all of my sympathy, empathy, support lay with this family.

any parent waging a fight AGAINST this child so THEIR child can take her spot? A POX ON YOUR HOUSES.

forget how parents in this category see the world; they're likely a lost cause in that dept. if the child they're 'fighting for' isn't mortified about it, urged them to drop it, well, that's the person-in-training i'm most concerned about.

 

I would respect a parent much more who instilled in her daughter the knowledge that being included in something out of patronage is not a victory at all.

She's in the band. She has friends. She is probably more involved in extra-curricular activities than the typical high school junior. So to say this one setback is denying her from feeling like she's enjoying the life of a "normal" teenager . . . I disagree 100 percent. Part of the life of a normal teenager is disappointment and sharing your disappointments.

Being included in everything you try out for is not normal at all.

 

no, of course it isn't. but this child was robbed at ANY chance of 'normal' from the get-go. call it charity. call it knidness. call it 'unfair' if indeed a spot she takes someone else's spot in ANY ACTIVITY she's courageous enough to try and expose herself to in front of audiences.

hey, for all i know the attention this has received leaves her wanting no part of being on this squad any longer. i'd reckon the fight is not for this girl any longer, it's to establish how such situations should be handled in the future, should they occur. and if, say, three years from now a tragically impaired girl is on this squad, this girl and her family will be cheering her on with tremendous pride.

and rightfully feeling they had played a significant role and left a mark for generations to come.

 

The one who didn't make the team, or are you saying that a handicapped people are excempt from being gracious?

 

It sure reads to me like the squad has a roster limit. If not, they wouldn't be making cuts.

You are assuming the school can just make an exception. The problem is then they have to draw a line where the exception is made. Roster limits are there for a reason, usually budgetary.

But hey, piss on teaching the girl how to deal with reality, right?

 

In the future if there are two limbless girls who want to cheer, do they try out against each other for the pity slot?

 

The tiebreaker is mental disabilities.

 

the girl with no limbs has been taught all the leesons in 'reality' she has to already. the one hammered home here: this world in an unfair place.

i kinda think she's known that from the get-go. and i've got zero problem with another girl being taught that lesson.

by the way, if there was a limit of 15, do the girls ever know who was '16th,' or next in line? 'final cuts' for ANY team are always team are always multiple in number; in a large part so they can ALL think of themselves as 'the next up' to explain to idiots who wonder, 'didn't your kid try out?'

well, here's the perfect 'out' for parents who are embarrassed their little mary didn't make it: 'well, yeah, but they thought it would be nce to have that girl on the team instead.' yippee! everybody's first runner-up!