It's a slippery slope, isn't it?
You want to have compassion for the Down's Syndrome kid, but counterfeiting is not the way to do it. He needs to find what he can excel at and excel at it, not pretend.
I had a DS neighbor who became an MD! He wasn't pretending, his parent's didn't counterfeit a med school diploma, he did it!
Is this any different from the guys who falsely claim to be veterans, Special Forces, etc.? That's the future behavior these parents are training their kid for!
We need to stop shilling for special needs kids and actually work with them on their level and celebrate their own accomplishments. Otherwise we just dilute the meaning of other kids' experiences.
My grandson's ROTC drill team has one or more special needs kids on the team. It is all well and good to let this kid participate, but what does it do for the others? My GS's team was mostly sharp as a tack, but what good is it if one member is dragging his rifle along the floor by the sling? I guess this is an opposite case? Instead of pretending the special needs kid could letter we pretend that the other team members can't cut it.
It's a difficult topic.
