Dyslexia Misinformation in Scotland

The president of the Scottish Young Lawyers Association has called for dyslexics to be banned from studying or practicing law.

"I would not go to or send my children to a blind surgeon. A blind man or woman cannot become a surgeon. That would be bonkers. So isn't the idea of a dyslexic lawyer bonkers? I am clear that it is."

Quick, somebody tell David Boies that he's unfit to practice law.

This is just ignorance on the part of Alistair Bonnington. 

When David Boies stands up to speak today to lawyers in Miami, he won't use a text, and the odds are that he won't refer to the single-page outline that he always commits to memory when he gives a speech.

That's because Boies -- who temporarily brought Microsoft to its knees in antitrust combat, waged war on behalf of Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election vote battle in Florida, advised John Kerry's presidential campaign last year, has written several well-received books, argued many landmark cases and ranks as one of America's top litigators -- has pretty much learned to do without the written word.

He had to. He's dyslexic.

"Dyslexia never leaves you," he was saying the other day from Salt Lake City, where he was addressing a meeting of the American Bar Foundation. "You develop a variety of coping techniques. I trained myself to listen well. That's a very important technique in the law and in life."

Dan Malloy, an attorney, ran for govenor of Connecticut. He's dyslexic.  Emerson Dickson, attorney,  has a marvelous website on learning disabilities of all kinds. Do read his story.  Bill Samuels, the president of Maker's Mark, is an attorney.

At Vanderbilt Law School, Samuels spent a lot of time in study-group discussions. "That's how I learned the cases," he says. His friends helped with the reading; he paid for the beer.

Peter Wright is dyslexic and has had a successful career as an attorney.

 

Comments

[Reg]

Well shoot, I hear Tom Cruise can get him cured anyway. So what's the problem?

[Reg]

Aww man! I just read that and did it sound obnoxious. Quick, anybody know how to unthrow a rock?

[Liz]

But it made me laugh, Reg. Snarky is goooood.

[Whitney Hoffman]

I am also a lawyer, and I have ADHD- People with learning disabilities are not stupid or incapable- many of them are brighter than average because they have had to work around their own quirky wiring!

[William Van Zwanenberg]

One might like to point out to the President of the Scottish Young Lawyers Association that to bar dyslexic students from applying to study law, would result in each and every Scottish law School being in breach of the Disability Discrimination Act and that potentially this could lead to a collective action on their part against the Scottish Law Association as well as the Scottish Bar.One assumes that this is not something that they would relish. As as lawyer himself, I would have thought it reasonable to assume that he would be aware of this.

As it is, I find his comments utterly extraodinary if only because his assertions are self-evidently wrong. If he were asserting that a blind man should be barred from applying to train as an airline pilot, I might find myself agreeing with him but of course that is not what he's asserting.

His comments smack of ignorance and lack of understanding. They assume that the ability to read with an above average level of competency is a requisite and essential skill needed to become a lawyer and therefore that the law is justfied in wanting to bar those that that do not possess this particular skill. I would agree with him if only that were true.

As the many lawyers cited in the original article will attest, whilst the task of learning the common law is significantly harder if one is dyslexic, it is not impossible. It is not impossible in the same way say that it is impossible for a blind pilot of a jet aircraft to see where he is going and therefore avoid a collision or crash.

As a dyslexic law student myself, I regard his comments offensive in the extreme. Thus far, I have found my llB course to be a challenge (it was never going to be easy. I estimate that I have to put in double if not three times the effort required to achieve the same thing as that of non-dyslexic peers and to keep pace with them. The salient point however, is that I have been consistently achieving good marks in my assignments and have every expectation of passing - if not passing with flying colours. To suggest that I am someohow incapble of becoming a lawyer is just plain wrong. I have been able to achieve this degree of success by developing my own startegies to cope and applying my own iniative.

Such comments as thos made, warrant in my view the President's resignation.

[Anthony Cavuoti]

From my book Parrallity

It is about me and my experience with dylexia

The five year old I sits in the classroom not knowing what is going on. While the other children are reciting the alphabet out loud in unison, the five year old I cannot tell a b from a d and a b from a q. He tries to pay attention, but, dinosaurs, stars, planets, caves, whales, where the galaxies came from, and playing football is all that he can think about. It seems as if he is always asleep in class and the only time he wakes up is when the class topics are about dinosaurs, planets, rainbows and whales. But the five year old I is very excited this day because today his class will be learning about science. He knows this is his big chance to impress the girl in the class who he has a crush on. She is sitting in the front of the class wearing a yellow outfit.

That day the teacher has the five year old I stand in front of the class and tells him to spell his name, he cannot. He cracks his knuckles compulsively. Still facing the entire class his shame escalates as he painfully observes the teacher noticing that his shoes are untied. She tells the five year old I to tie his shoes. He tries but cannot. Then she has one of his class mates go up to the front of the class and has that child tie the five year old I's shoes for him. The teacher says to the five year old I, "I do not know how many times I tried to teach you this." Then the teacher ask one of the other students to spell his name and he does with the greatest of ease. The five year old I endures standing in front of the entire class while all of the children spelled their names effortlessly. Many of whom are his friends who he played football with yesterday. As he looks into their expressions that do not conceal their laughter at him, and their fear of the teacher. It seems that the miracle that they all experienced together yesterday never happened. Then the five year old I realizes that he is the only black child in the class.

The teacher has the five year old I sit in the far back of the class while she explains to the rest of the children why it is hotter in the summer then in the winter, but this is too advanced for the first grade class and the teacher cannot get the children to understand. The five year old I is so mad that he wants to rip his light blue shirt off. He wipes his nose hard as he compulsively sniffles in. Inside the five year old I knows that the teacher is only seeing his bad and none of his good.

Then the five year old I yells out, that the earth tilts towards the sun during its summers so the countries above the equator are leaning towards the sun during their summers and the countries below the equator are tilted away from the sun during their winter, and the opposite happens when it is the other way around. But the bottom half of the earth obits closer to the sun during its summer and further away during the winter, so the places below the equator have hotter summers and colder winters. The earth does not move around the sun in a real circle, it moves in a elliptic.

The teacher looks at the five year old I with an expression that holds both great astonishment and outrage. His classmates are also amazed, but fear prevents them from conveying it. The teacher makes the five year old I sit facing the wall in the back of the class. After school the five year old I is to ashamed to tease the girl that he has a crush on. The teacher makes him stay after school.

[M]

How sad . I have had similar expreiences . I am also a black male, I had a blue uniform and but instead of being told to stand at the back of the class I was told to just stand up. Yes the teacher disregarded whatever I said without even looking into it or analysing it.