Lazy Bastards Pushing Buttons

If you could walk, would you willingly choose to get around in a wheelchair?

I don’t think you would. Maybe you would consider it if someone else were pushing the wheelchair, thereby saving you the energy. Perhaps you’d be even more tempted if that person pushing you were attractive, though they’d spend most of their time behind you, making their looks a moot point. But I digress.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt, I trust you’re familiar with automated doors. You know the ones: you approach and they slide open, just like on Star Trek. (For the record, I am not a fan of Star Trek.) As far as automated doors go, these are the best. One walks through a door that opens without its user having to raise a finger or even an eyebrow. Yes, that door will open for you just like your mother’s legs opened for me.

You should also be familiar with the semi-automated door, requiring the push of a button to have it open. I realize this seems like a lot of effort, especially after you’ve just learned about magical doors that sense your presence and open up lovingly just for you. But there are semi-automated doors and they are nothing to scoff at as such. The push of a button swings doors open triumphantly, allowing one to walk through feeling like a God. Well, maybe not a God… I’m sure the doors of God always open up for them automatically. (Another great band name: The Doors of God – I call royalties!) But I’m sure that semi-automated door could make one feel like the Assistant Regional Manager of a medium-sized, relatively successful paper company. Or Assistant To The Regional Manager. It really depends on how low your self-esteem is that day.

And of course, our disabled friends have the option of pressing a button and magically opening a door that would otherwise need to be pushed or pulled using human strength. There’s nothing wrong with some people simply being unable to use certain doors due to a disability. That’s how life goes sometimes. Luckily for them, most doors are equipped with an automated door opener especially designed for the disabled.

Anyway. Here’s my point: If I had a dollar for each time a healthy and fully capable person used the automated door opener meant for the disabled, instead of just opening the door with the slightest human effort, I’d be rich enough to afford to take every last one of those people, drag them into the street, and shoot them. Who the hell are you – walking up the stairs with your two healthy legs and two healthy arms, carrying a briefcase or bag in one healthy hand and a coffee or cell phone in the other healthy hand – that you can’t push open a door? I’ll tell you exactly who are. You’re a fucking waste of human space. You’re a disgrace to the human race. (That rhymes, which makes it more credible.)

Each time I see someone pushing that little blue square with the universal handicap sign, only because they don’t want to exert any effort opening a door, I want to hurt them. Really, it makes sense if you think about it: They don’t want to open the door using their own force, even though they are perfectly capable, so why not take that force away from them? Put them in a position where they have no choice but to use that handy little button and we’ll see how long before they’re dreaming of opening doors with their own two hands. I suggest any of the following:

• The breaking of arms, legs, fingers, kneecaps, elbows, shoulders, collarbones, and/or entire limbs
• The amputation of some, or all of the above
• That’s pretty much all I’ve got without writing something more vulgar and obscene that will surely come back to haunt me later when I run for public office, but you get the idea

If you’re one of these lazy people, I’d love to hear your reasoning for not opening doors of your own volition.

I’m carrying a lot of stuff! Bags, drinks, keys, a phone, my iPod… I physically cannot open the door unless I put it all down!

I’m sure you have pockets and a bag in which to carry all of that, but I will concede that at times, your hands may be full. That’s fine. You’re allowed.

It’s just easier to press a button than to use physical force.

It’s also easier to drop dead than waste precious oxygen and earthly resources. If you’re too lazy to open a door, you’re too lazy to be a contributing member of society.

That’s why the buttons are there. Yes, they’re for the disabled but not limited to them. If it makes your life a little easier, then why not?

Wheelchairs make life a little easier and technically they’re not limited to the disabled either. But I don’t see any able-bodied people living it up while sitting it down. I wish I did though, because that would be a great excuse to punch someone in a wheelchair. Not that I’d ever do something like that, but I’m sure there are people who would.

People like you?

Next question.

Don’t you think you’re overreacting a little? Why do you care if other people are lazy?

What the fuck. If you’re too lazy to open a goddamn door, who’s to say you don’t carry that attitude over into other aspects of your life? People who push those buttons are the same people who take an elevator from the lobby to the 2^nd floor, the same people who fight for a seat on the bus or subway when they get on, even though theirs is the next stop, and the same people who get on the moving sidewalks at the airport and stand there like they’re at Disneyland. They are L-A-Z-Y. I don’t want some lazy motherfucker as my waiter or chef when I go out to eat, I don’t want some lazy motherfucker to check me out when I go the doctor’s office and I don’t want some lazy motherfucker walking up to a door and then stopping for 10 seconds to push a button and wait for that door to open as a line-up of angry and frustrated people swells behind his sorry ass. Or hers. I’m all for equality.

So what’s the bottom line here? You hate lazy people? I’ll bet you’re pretty lazy yourself.

Maybe so, but I open my own doors and will continue to do so until I lose both my arms. Hell, even then I can still kick open a door. And I probably will.

Look, all I’m saying is: why not use what we have while we still have it? With more than a couple broken arms under my belt (what?), I know how it is to be unable to perform simple everyday tasks you take for granted. And when the ability to perform those tasks returns, so too does the realization that being fully able-bodied is a privilege one should cherish strongly. If you use your own power to open doors, I commend you. If you push a button to open doors you could handily open yourself, I sincerely hope you lose those arms to leprosy and have to resort to pushing that button with your nose. And then I hope your nose gets cut off in a random subway attack. Maybe then you’ll learn. You lazy piece of garbage.