Diversity in the Workplace No Pity, Joseph P. Shapiro No Pity is an eye opening book that looks at the lives of people with disabilities, the culture of various disability groups, the growth of the disability rights movement and its political impact. The author demonstrates how unlike other minority groups people with disabilities have different needs and constituencies, the disability rights movement is a mosaic with diversity as its central characteristic.
             The book begins with an analysis of the stereotypes that the non-disabled use to view those with disabilities. One can see through Shapiro's interviews with former poster children how the stereotype oppresses and plays on people's fears that the same could happen to them. It also becomes clear through the narrative that this discounts the disabled's own experience and their desire to be accepted as they are. As with other minorities, the disabled have become more sensitized to how they are portrayed in the media and popular culture and this has led to a raised consciousness on this issue.
             The author goes on to demonstrate how our society automatically underestimates the capabilities of people with disabilities especially in the work place. This leads to one of the first premises of the disability rights movement, it is not so much the disabled individual who needs to change, but society.
             Chapter 2, entitled From Charity to Independent Living, follows the story of Ed Roberts as a demonstration of the title. After contracting polio as a child Roberts story shows time and time again how he had to fight for the chance to "be normal."" This included going to high school, graduating with out the required physical education requirement, and living on campus at a four-year college. His struggle serves as a metaphor for the movement where he had to overcome stereotypes and bureaucracies and continue to redefine the argument for an even playing field. It is in...