'But I don't think it helps anyone for you to jump from there to assuming that what's going on inside their head is "[I don't] respect [this person] as a human

'But I don't think it helps anyone for you to jump from there to assuming that what's going on inside their head is "[I don't] respect [this person] as a human being".' Probably true. However, that's also applicable to most other forms of discrimination. A police officer responding with greater force to a black person than they would to white person is probably not thinking "I don't respect this person as a human being", but nevertheless, their actions and thought processes are different, and are legitimately -not- treating the person as, well, a full person, but as some sort of 'other' that does not demand the same respect, the same courtesy, etc. Eye contact is part of that; if they offer eye contact to able bodied people, the fact that they don't to the disabled, irrespective of the explicit thoughts going through their head, is indicative of them viewing the disabled as an 'other' that does not necessitate that same courtesy.