the future is now
are people that lazy to need this
While Iâm sure there are people too lazy to spin a fork, keep in mind people like this person who may be suffering from arthritis or a neurological disease or nerve damage or a thousand other conditions that might impair their ability to do things as simple as spin a fork to eat spaghetti.Â
These are used with people who canât grip well:Â
This is for Parkinsonsâs:Â
For people who canât even bend their joints:Â
Hereâs a product that guides your hand from your plate to your mouthÂ
This one holds a sandwichÂ
Like I get it. I used to see things like the fork and think âthatâs fuckinâ lazyâ or that product that holds a gallon and you just tip it and pour. But then I started working around the disabled and impaired and found out that these products arenât meant for lazy people, theyâre meant for people who need help.Â
So maybe next time you see something, instead of thinking âWow, are people that lazy?â just be grateful that youâre able to do the things you do every day and take for granted, like being able to feed yourself and wipe your own ass because you have enough coordination and bendy joints to do it.Â
This isnât specualtion either; the majority of products from commericals that we think are funny or silly are autally MEANT for hte disabled.But they are marketed towards the abled because the disabled arenât considered a viable enough demographic on their own. the Snuggie for example? Created for wheelchair users.
This is actually really nifty.
oh my god of course the snuggie was for wheelchair users
The fact that anyone buys these products besides disabled people drastically lowers the price of them. These would normally cost hundreds if not thousands if dollars. Because if spent time and money creating it, the company wants to get more than that back. And they canât do that if they sell and market these primarily to disabled people for $20-$40 a piece or whatever. Theyâd lose money on production. If they can sell hundreds of them to everyone, they can lower the price drastically and therefore disabled people donât die while trying to scrape up the money to buy these things and be a bit more independent.
I never considered that last part and thatâs actually genius
So this type of product is a great way of demonstrating one of the biggest failures of capitalism as an economic system: they have to be bought by people who donât need them in order to stay solvent. People having things they donât need is wasteful in of itself, which hurts everybody due to the limited resources we have on this planet. But an item that is inherently only for a small group of consumers is going to be considered a commercial failure, despite being a product of real benefit to society.Â
As @a-can-of-mountain-jew said, if people who didnât need these things didnât buy them, the price for the disabled people who really did need them would be much higher. This is an absolute basic rule of supply and demand, the foundation of capitalism.Â
This doesnât just apply to disability assistance products, either. I am convinced that the greatest con of all time was a celiac person convincing the world that gluten is bad for you. Because unless you have celiacâs, gluten is no worse for you than any other random food. But because so many people are eating gluten free who donât need to, gluten free options are now much easier to get at restaurants, gluten free products are easier to find and cheaper to buy at supermarkets, the whole shebang. All because of an artificial demographic.Â
There isnât a solution to this. There are still lots of disadvantaged groups who canât get things they need easily or cheaply because producing options for them isnât worth it. The best option would be government subsidies, but I donât know of any government that would be willing to put the money into making lactose-free milk cost the same as cowâs milk, or to making utensils designed for people with Parkinsonâs Disease cost the same as a regular knife and fork. But capitalism isnât built for this.

















