6 ms·

It's not the service animals that are the problem, is the "emotional support" animals, or more specifically, their owners.

akiselev 6y ago
Which is a problem for legislators. Taxi drivers should not be the arbiters of whether an animal is a true support animal or not.
adoxyz 6y ago
100% agree. "emotional support" animals are basically a free pass for shitty people to take advantage of the system and take their non-trained, horribly mannered animals with them wherever they want, which sucks for people that have actual need for emotional support and service animals.
arenaninja 6y ago
I was out for breakfast for the first time since the pandemic started this weekend (I'm fully vaccinated now) and in walks a guy with a dog sporting a "Service Animal" sash that in tiny letters said "emotional support". I was paralyzed - I was traumatized by my interactions with dogs when I was a kid; where's my say in having untrained animals in my vicinity? This kind of shit needs to be ended but there should be NO issue with blind people with actual service animals receiving service anywhere
- jschwartzi 6y ago
  Yeah my brother's wife will completely shut down and start screaming if a dog comes within 5 feet of her. Where she grew up in China dogs were wild animals that would viciously attack you if you got near them, so it's a pretty understandable reaction. So I'm not sure why you're getting downvoted here. Also having personally seen how poorly trained most peoples' dogs are I would be very uncomfortable having a random stranger's dog near me. A lot of the dogs I encounter on the street are neurotic wrecks incapable of passing without barking, leash pulling, or lunging.
  - arenaninja 6y ago
    I'm downvoted because it's an unpopular opinion in the US that people shouldn't force their pets on others who are uncomfortable interacting with them or just being around them and HN readership is largely US-centric. In my experience many recreational dog owners in the US are incredibly selfish people
- Bedon292 6y ago
  Legally an actual service animal must be trained. Emotional support, for a variety of reasons including things like PTSD and anxiety attacks, is a completely valid use of service animals. How do you know they were not trained? If they were misbehaving, that's reason for them to be rejected, training or not. If not, legally allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. Though Uber should certainly attempt to pair the rider with a different driver first, if they have registered that allergy / fear ahead of time.
  - LocalH 6y ago
    >If not, legally allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. This should change. Especially on the allergy front. Forcing someone to suffer an allergic reaction because a customer has a service dog is immoral.
    - morelisp 6y ago
      All 15 of your employees have medically serious dog allergies?
      - LocalH 6y ago
        If a small business owner happened to be that unlucky, how would you propose it be dealt with? If I were such a business owner, I would honestly attempt to arrange the customer be handled by a competitor, if it was legit a situation where everyone at my company happened to be seriously allergic to dogs.
        morelisp 6y ago
        I think that business owner should realize by employee 12 or 13 they probably need to diversify a bit in order to stay legally compliant. It is not a complicated or difficult thing to handle.
    - Bedon292 6y ago
eloisant 6y ago
The article is specifically about a blind person, so clearly service animals are not well accepted by many Uber drivers.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
kaylynb 6y ago
How do you tell if a dog is a service dog though? The ADA already allows excluding misbehaving service animals, which should cover a good portion of 'fraudulent emotional service animals' considering how well most people mistrain their animals. There are legitimate service animals for a wide variety of real conditions that a lay person could not be expected to consider. Dogs that can detect incoming seizures or problematic psychological states, and they could look very similar to an 'emotional support animal' but actually be a legitimate service animal.
Bedon292 6y ago
Emotional Support animals are not by default considered service animals by the ADA. (IANAL and State / Local laws may say different things.) They must be trained to perform at least one specific task in order to qualify as a service animal under the ADA. You are allowed to ask two specific questions about dogs: "Is the dog a service animal required because of a disability?" and "What work or task has the dog been trained to perform?" It seems like something that Uber could allow a user to input, and prevent their drivers from rejecting those users for the presence of the animal. Animals do always have to be under control of the owner though, so if one is not under control that is an acceptable reason to reject them. And I believe the latest guidance is that basically only dogs fall under the service animal category, so random other animals people use for emotional support would not qualify either. The exception seems to be miniature horses for specific limited cases. https://www.ada.gov/regs2010/service_animal_qa.html https://www.ada.gov/regs2010/service_animal_qa.html https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm

akiselev 6y ago

Which is a problem for legislators. Taxi drivers should not be the arbiters of whether an animal is a true support animal or not.

adoxyz 6y ago

100% agree. "emotional support" animals are basically a free pass for shitty people to take advantage of the system and take their non-trained, horribly mannered animals with them wherever they want, which sucks for people that have actual need for emotional support and service animals.

arenaninja 6y ago

I was out for breakfast for the first time since the pandemic started this weekend (I'm fully vaccinated now) and in walks a guy with a dog sporting a "Service Animal" sash that in tiny letters said "emotional support". I was paralyzed - I was traumatized by my interactions with dogs when I was a kid; where's my say in having untrained animals in my vicinity? This kind of shit needs to be ended but there should be NO issue with blind people with actual service animals receiving service anywhere

jschwartzi 6y ago
Yeah my brother's wife will completely shut down and start screaming if a dog comes within 5 feet of her. Where she grew up in China dogs were wild animals that would viciously attack you if you got near them, so it's a pretty understandable reaction. So I'm not sure why you're getting downvoted here. Also having personally seen how poorly trained most peoples' dogs are I would be very uncomfortable having a random stranger's dog near me. A lot of the dogs I encounter on the street are neurotic wrecks incapable of passing without barking, leash pulling, or lunging.
- arenaninja 6y ago
  I'm downvoted because it's an unpopular opinion in the US that people shouldn't force their pets on others who are uncomfortable interacting with them or just being around them and HN readership is largely US-centric. In my experience many recreational dog owners in the US are incredibly selfish people
Bedon292 6y ago
Legally an actual service animal must be trained. Emotional support, for a variety of reasons including things like PTSD and anxiety attacks, is a completely valid use of service animals. How do you know they were not trained? If they were misbehaving, that's reason for them to be rejected, training or not. If not, legally allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. Though Uber should certainly attempt to pair the rider with a different driver first, if they have registered that allergy / fear ahead of time.
- LocalH 6y ago
  >If not, legally allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. This should change. Especially on the allergy front. Forcing someone to suffer an allergic reaction because a customer has a service dog is immoral.
  - morelisp 6y ago
    All 15 of your employees have medically serious dog allergies?
    - LocalH 6y ago
      If a small business owner happened to be that unlucky, how would you propose it be dealt with? If I were such a business owner, I would honestly attempt to arrange the customer be handled by a competitor, if it was legit a situation where everyone at my company happened to be seriously allergic to dogs.
      - morelisp 6y ago
        I think that business owner should realize by employee 12 or 13 they probably need to diversify a bit in order to stay legally compliant. It is not a complicated or difficult thing to handle.
  - Bedon292 6y ago

eloisant 6y ago

The article is specifically about a blind person, so clearly service animals are not well accepted by many Uber drivers.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

kaylynb 6y ago

How do you tell if a dog is a service dog though? The ADA already allows excluding misbehaving service animals, which should cover a good portion of 'fraudulent emotional service animals' considering how well most people mistrain their animals. There are legitimate service animals for a wide variety of real conditions that a lay person could not be expected to consider. Dogs that can detect incoming seizures or problematic psychological states, and they could look very similar to an 'emotional support animal' but actually be a legitimate service animal.

Bedon292 6y ago

Emotional Support animals are not by default considered service animals by the ADA. (IANAL and State / Local laws may say different things.) They must be trained to perform at least one specific task in order to qualify as a service animal under the ADA. You are allowed to ask two specific questions about dogs: "Is the dog a service animal required because of a disability?" and "What work or task has the dog been trained to perform?" It seems like something that Uber could allow a user to input, and prevent their drivers from rejecting those users for the presence of the animal. Animals do always have to be under control of the owner though, so if one is not under control that is an acceptable reason to reject them. And I believe the latest guidance is that basically only dogs fall under the service animal category, so random other animals people use for emotional support would not qualify either. The exception seems to be miniature horses for specific limited cases. https://www.ada.gov/regs2010/service_animal_qa.html https://www.ada.gov/regs2010/service_animal_qa.html https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm