So what’s with Barry Schmidl?

June 2, 2007 updated August 9, 2009

Yesterday I was wheeling up hill against the wind on Queen Street. At the Richmond Street intersection one of PEI’s business elite stopped and talked for a minute. He is a man of few but well chosen words.

Related story Barry Schmidl part 2

Passing the Guild building, I could see Barry Schmidl, the executive director of the PEI Council of the Disabled, coming toward me. He was walking with a woman. He seemed to be avoiding eye contact with me.

people often experience discomfort in the presence of individuals with physical disabilities…These negative reactions are evident in emotions such as disgust and anxiety…in a host of subtle and not-so-subtle nonverbal forms of behavior, such as the tendency to physically avoid contact with disabled individuals Park, Faulkner, Schaller UBC

He looked into an empty store, up a wall, into a doorway, anywhere to his right to avoid eye contact with the man coming toward him in a wheelchair. This seemed like strange behavior for the person who is the head of an organization representing people in wheelchairs.

It was obvious that, if I allowed him, he would pass me by without a nod, wink or hello. So I called out his name in a friendly manner. He muttered something about “Hello Stephen” as he passed by.

He didn’t stop to pass the time of day. He didn’t ask how I was. He didn’t make a comment on the weather, politics, how’s the chair working. He didn’t do anything but rush on by. I would have turned and talked to him but it was quite obvious he wanted to ignore me.

Having known Barry for 6 years, that’s about what I have come to expect. For example, when Trisha Clarken was suffering from hypothermia outside the Premier’s Office in the winter, Barry was standing there more or less silent.

If I call him on a disability issue, I get his voice mail and no returned call. If I send him an email, no reply. This has gone on for 6 years. You might think I call him to rag his butt: nope, I call him to ask for help with an issue like CP Disability eligibility, the Disability Tax Credit or the DSP.

Once last month I called looking for the Council’s employee in Summerside to help a disabled person in a hospital. This was obviously the kind of issue that is time sensitive. Barry did not return the call or the email.

So what’s with Barry Schmidl? Does he not represent me as a member of the Council of the Disabled? I’ve been a member since the early 90’s. I used to be on the Board. I’ve been a disability activist for years and sit on other boards. OK so he doesn’t like long term disabled people, who are activists, sitting in wheelchairs and might be on boards or not.

Maybe its my hair, sort of longish. Naw he has long hair and beard.

That’s not the answer. He won’t return calls or emails to almost any Islanders with disabilities I’ve asked. Someone suggested I persevere. Getting Barry’s attention must be like trying to get an audience with the Queen.

Well except the media. Barry will take calls from reporters. I know because he gave Ron Ryder of the Guardian a quote for Friday’s story.

I’m just an average person. My thoughts, feelings, likes and dislikes are the same as yours or the next persons. When I come to a conclusion, its usually one that many others share.

So what’s with Barry Schmidl? Does he represent the disabled on PEI or what?

Does he like us or do we appear unappealing to him? Is he a closet disability bigot? Don’t laugh, there are people who don’t like to look at people with disabilities. It makes them nervous like they think we’re contagious or they might get unlucky.

Researchers Justin H. Park, Jason Faulkner, and Mark Schaller of UBC say

“Despite the achievement of a certain degree of public tolerance, people often experience discomfort in the presence of individuals with physical disabilities, which presumably underlies the persistence of discriminatory behaviors directed toward these individuals. Researchers have demonstrated that the perception of disability clearly elicits pity, compassion, and desires to be helpful, but that it also elicits distinctly negative and antisocial reactions as well. These negative reactions are evident in emotions such as disgust and anxiety, in attitudes and judgments such as the tendency to blame individuals for their disabling conditions (Ryan, 1971), and in a host of subtle and not-so-subtle nonverbal forms of behavior, such as the tendency to physically avoid contact with disabled individuals (Snyder, Kleck, Strenta, & Mentzer, 1979).

University of British Columbia Journal of Nonverbal Behaviour 2003

I’ll send this to Barry by email for his response.

True to form, Barry has not responded more than 24 hours later. If I waited until Christ returned I’m pretty positive Barry Schmidl would not have replied. (Ed: I didn’t send Barry the UBC research as I only located it this morning. I have similar material in What Phsychotherapists Should Know About Disability)

So what’s with Barry Schmidl?