A man with a facial disfigurement says he was asked to leave a restaurant in south London because staff said he was “scaring the customers”.

Oliver Bromley has Neurofibromatosis Type 1, a genetic condition that causes non-cancerous tumours to grow on his nerves.

Speaking to the BBC, he said when he had gone to place an order at a restaurant in Camberwell, staff told him there had been complaints about him.

“It’s a horrible thing to happen. I took it very personally on the day,” he said.

  • @SkunkWorkz
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    2 months ago

    It seems that some British hate handicapped/disfigured people. Just read this article about a kid in a wheelchair being excluded from the school photo. https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/mar/29/aberdeenshire-pupils-with-complex-needs-erased-from-school-photo

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/apr/04/school-photos-disabled-children

    or people complaining about seeing a tv host with a missing arm. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/feb/21/tv-presenter-cerrie-burnell

    It’s just good old British Classism that never went away.

      • @SkunkWorkz
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        122 months ago

        To some degree. Never heard of handicapped kids being excluded from school photos in my country though.

        • @linearchaos
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          2 months ago

          And if you were asked to leave in the US because of a facial disfigurement you could fully expect to have a business closing lawsuit won against you in no time at all. Wa are as litigious AF for better or worse, usually worse.

        • @[email protected]
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          02 months ago

          Never heard of it. It’s difficult to know how much of the difference is the actual occurrence and how much is the reporting of it.

      • @[email protected]
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        2 months ago

        Maybe it’s just where I was raised, but I don’t see this at all in my day to day life in the US. Things have come a very long way.

        I’m sure there are still things that are shitty that I probably wouldn’t notice as I’m not in that position… But in general, most people here don’t seem to give a shit these days.

        To be clear, I’m not referring to classism. That still exists to a degree, though it’s mostly been supplanted by racism.

        • ObliviousEnlightenment
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          2 months ago

          We have out problems, but were actually really good about ableism, so silver lining. Still feel for that guy though, hope he gets all the good things he deserves

        • @TriflingToad
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          42 months ago

          I see people with prosthetic legs all the time at my work (grocery store) and I think nothing more of it than “that guy could do an absolutely dope robot costume for Halloween”

          I did see someone with double prosthetic legs and that was cool.

          • @[email protected]
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            32 months ago

            As a guy with a prosthetic leg that walks in grocery stores. Yes, we can do awesome costumes. Yes, a lot of horrific discrimination still happens in the US to non-abled bodied and non-neurotypical peoples.

      • @Smoogs
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        2 months ago

        Oddly enough Australia is one of the most accepting countries I’ve been in when it came to PWD. Elevators for every train platform and if one broke they fixed it straight away. They also didn’t exclude lower income people no where near as much as they do in the US, Canada or UK.

        That said, the way they treat women, First Nations and POC or just about anyone who isn’t australian leaves much room for improvement.

    • @Zess
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      12 months ago

      Wonder if it’s got anything to do with thalidomide disfiguration.

    • @feedum_sneedson
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      -72 months ago

      No, fuck off, that’s got nothing to do with nationality.

      • @[email protected]
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        32 months ago

        This is just a case of some people being cunts.

        For a community that prides itself on not being reddit, an unfortunate amount of reddits opinions and (lack of) values made it here alright.

        Or maybe that has nothing to do with the community as a whole and is just a case of some people being cunts?

      • @eskimofry
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        02 months ago

        Nah… the british have a propensity for treating different people badly.

        • @feedum_sneedson
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          32 months ago

          Yes, the species is prone to it, it’s a damn shame.