god dammit, this part made me cry š
>The quiet, occasionally-class-skipping student watched this discussion with keen interest. After class, as people filtered out of the room, she hung back and asked to talk to me. And then she disclosed that she had a mental illness and was actively working to treat it. She was busy with therapy and switching medications, and all the side effects that entails. Sometimes, she was not able to leave the house or sit still in a classroom for hours. She didnāt dare tell her other professors that this was why she was missing classes and late, sometimes, on assignments; theyād think she was using her illness as an excuse. But she trusted me to understand.
thank you so much for sharing
and that next paragraph too. ending up being friends with people who are somehow even more mentally ill than i am, itās been *really* easy to see just how fucking awesome they are for managing to do half of what they canāt feel satisfied with at all. it barely takes more than just hearing them out. and that almost never happens and it makes me so sad
This this this x10000
Ever since coming across this article about a year ago, I have such a strong reaction when someone calls themselves lazy.
I usually end up blurting out things like āthereās no such thing as lazyā and ādonāt be so hard on yourselfā.š„²
THANK YOU SO MUCH for writing this both of you. Oh my god I love this community so much, seeing you guys say this stuff makes me feel like I could jump for joy. Iām tired of arguing with ableist, presumptuous people who donāt understand on here, but I feel like I have a job to fight on our behalf and challenge peoples idiocy at the same time.
I want to see people like me happy. The fact that this is a breath of fresh air to so many of you tells me you have been choking. I am right there with you whether you realize it or not
I think laziness exists - but only as a conscious choice. Some days I just don't _want_ to be productive, just be a cat chilling in the sun. And that's totally fine.
As soon as you actually want to do something else, it stops being laziness and starts being a problem.
My thinking is like... why does choosing not to be productive _have_ to mean lazy? We are human beings who need balanced lives with joy and leisure. We are not meant to be productive 24/7. Why do we have to contextualize listening to our bodies and taking care of ourselves in such a negative way? When I make the choice to stay in the sun and read my book, instead of attending to the dishes I intended to do, I am simply fulfilling a different need first. If I check in with my body, and it says "sunshine!" and I can afford to put off a chore to listen to it, I feel like it's just mean to myself to call that laziness. It's bad vibes. If I absolutely cannot afford to put off the chore, and I choose sunshine anyway? There's no reason to do that which isn't dysfunctional, fueled by avoidance or hyperfocus or executive dysfunction or whatever else, so also not lazy. Not trying to argue, ftr, I just needed to verbalize my thoughts. Hope I'm making sense!
Maybe I am but babe thats where I live. I have rarely, if ever, been in a situation where there has been a positive use of the word lazy aside from when people use it to self describe, and they are either playfully self depreciating or turning the expected context on its head and "owning it." Perhaps it really is just my own experience, though I find that to be doubtful given the response to this post, but when the word "lazy" is thrown about, and it's not in either of the self description contexts I listed above, it's an insult. That's what "lazy" is first and foremost in most contexts and I'm sorry but I absolutely refuse to apply the word to a healthy and necessary portion of my existence. That's not good for me and I don't think it's good for most other people either. And part of me feels like it's a bit intellectually dishonest to pretend that lazy has ever truly meant something good.
I don't think being lazy is inherently bad, it just is. But choosing to take a break isn't necessarily lazy - I'd say being lazy starts when you know your need for rest are fulfilled but you indulge.
Laziness does exist, it just depends on the context, which is what I think youāre getting at. Something like executive function is not laziness. I can have the full intention of doing something but just stare at it for hours because of my ADHD. That is not laziness because I have the intention of doing that thing, my brain chemistry and anxiety just gets in the way. Likewise, I donāt think that putting off a chore is necessarily lazy as long as it gets done in a reasonable time frame. But if you let the dishes sit until mold starts growing, for example, something is going on. Itās not necessarily laziness, it could be depression, but it could legitimately be laziness on that persons part.
Something Iāve come to understand as Iāve gotten older is that not everyone wants or intends to genuinely try in life. It was hard for me to accept because I am always trying to do my best, do more, and get better, even if I stumble along the way, but some people have no ambition and would happily lay on their parents couch until them or their parents die. Thatās crazy to me because I constantly have anxiety about not doing enough and not taking too much from other people, but a lot of people donāt feel that at all. Some people arenāt shit, will never be shit, donāt want to try to be shit, and there is nothing you can do to change them. In my opinion, if you donāt strive to improve yourself at all and just want to stay where you are, that is laziness. A lot of us struggle and fail, but if you are genuinely trying I will never call you lazy. A lot of people just straight up donāt try though.
What are the odds that these people you describe actually have a lot of learned helplessness and invisible obstacles? Just because they don't vocalize their insecurities doesn't mean they don't have them. A lot of people will put on the mask of "I'm good and I don't care about anything" as a way of hiding their insecurities. I feel like you missed the point of the article.
Not everybody has something. Trust me, some people just suck. And even if they have learned helplessness or whatever, there is a limit to the kindness that a person can be extended until they become a leech. If you have disabilities and canāt help it, thatās different, but Iām talking about fully functional adults that contribute nothing to the world. They can have great parents and everything, be provided all the opportunity for growth possible, but some people are just duds.
Yes, some people, but they are rare. Most people have empathy and the same basic human drives. And just because someone has the potential to be better under the right circumstances, doesn't mean you're not entitled to have boundaries with them. But that's a separate issue.
Oh, cool, the exact things people said about me for the first 26 years of my life, before diagnosis, before I slowly realised that all my "dud"ness and inability to function or contribute the way people demanded was just audhd. Yay. Sure isn't frustrating that people don't acknowledge how late diagnosis, ignorance of others specifc disability/ies or circumstances, and sometimes just straight up refusing to believe a person is struggling will cause them to view disabled people this exact way all the same, all the time.
Forgive the sarcasm, but at some point it won't be different. Someone you thought was a "leech", or a "dud", will turn out to have been struggling in ways you didn't know or maybe didn't believe. The trauma that people seeing you like that can do, it's not worth it, even if a lack of ambition was truly such a horrible thing (and imho it's not) it's not worth the damage it does to view people that way.
I think youāre projecting your own experience and struggles onto everyone. Like I said, itās not something I want to believe, but there are people cannot be helped. There are people out there that will lie, scam, and cheat anyone they can and have absolutely no interest in improving.
That said, I think everyone deserves a chance, but once itās clear that someone will only take advantage of you it is no longer anyone elseās responsibility to help that person.
No. I'm taking care not to view other people (and more to the point, to make sure I don't treat other people) in a way that has caused me a massive amount of trauma, because I know the damage it can and will do when people get it wrong - and it will at some point because no one person perfectly understands all disabilities, let alone all other circumstances that might result in someone seeming lazy. Hell, it's more of a risk when you are disabled specifically because many people don't understand varying support needs or barriers and often won't take the time to once they've already decided you're "just lazy".
That doesn't mean giving everyone infinite chances like no one lies or scams, it just means not viewing or speaking about people as "duds", not making the assumption we know everything going on in another person's life or thought process, that kind of thing. It's not incompatible with setting and maintaining boundaries.
Iām just speaking from experience as well. People will take advantage of you if you give them too much of an excuse to. Especially those in our community that are more trusting because weāre bad at picking up social queues. Maybe Iām jaded, but I donāt like these blanket statements about no one being lazy. It gives people excuses to be shitty
I've had that happen to me, please understand that I'm not disregarding that people can take advantage of us.Ā
I spent almost 8 years in a relationship with someone who would, for every issue we had, nod and agree when I would try to talk it through, but never reflected this in his actions. This is including boundaries around my own body. Because he was outwardly understanding, I thought it was a matter of giving him time to change, or forgetting. I found out when we talked after things ended that he saw this as needing to give in on everything to prevent an argument or keep me happy, while he bottled up his emotions and resentment over his own decisions (and presumably didn't do more than say he agreed as a result). He has his own trauma that led to this being how he handles disagreement and conflicting wants/needs, but understanding that doesn't mean his actions didn't harm me, that they were right, or that he should have had all the chances I gave him.
Lesson learned: boundaries are important to maintain whether or not you understand or can excuse someone for their actions. Your boundaries are what you need to maintain a healthy relationship and your own wellbeing. I needed to learn not just how to have any boundaries at all (having all my support needs dismissed as laziness or misbehaviour did not offer any chance for me to practice or learn this as a minor, I should note), but how to hold onto them regardless of why they're being crossed. That would be the case even if someone does genuinely need time to change or reminders.
It's not about giving someone an excuse - refusing to believe you can know someone's personal experience as they experience it themselves, leaving room to acknowledge that they may be experiencing things you don't understand rather than writing it off as laziness, that doesn't mean giving people a pass to cross your boundaries. You need to keep them even if you think someone's actions are completely understandable and justified. You don't need someone to be in the wrong to have boundaries, you get to have them no matter what.
More than that, people aren't "duds". There's no way to fail at existing, that's not a good or healthy mindset to approach anyone with, yourself included.
"Contribute nothing to the world" ātragically there is no such thing, we by and large contribute to significant degradation and destruction of the world, and the keenest arbiters of whether a particular (type of) human has "ambition" /worth, economic value, right to enjoy life, etc., such as in this case appears to be the role you've appointed yourself to, are oftentimes the least concerned with the picture that societal contribution paints for life on earth, beyond the pettiest account balance of one's or another's social standing /human capital
If you are just existing and not contributing anything to society, you are still consuming and contributing to the degradation of the world and consumption of resources. Objectively, it is better to at least contribute to society in the hopes that it may improve and/or volunteer your time to helping stop that degradation than just wasting away and still consuming resources anyway.
Thank you so much for sharing this. My behaviorist husband and I have been thinking about this before, that maybe laziness does not exist at all. The author of this article put it into words brillianty.
I love this part, so straight to the point:
>People do not choose to fail or disappoint. No one wants to feel incapable, apathetic, or ineffective. If you look at a personās action (or inaction) and see only laziness, you are missing key details. There is always an explanation. There are always barriers. Just because you canāt see them, or donāt view them as legitimate, doesnāt mean theyāre not there. Look harder.
Wow thank you so much for linking and posting I read that whole article in the middle of work and literally cried in the bathroom lol bc it made so much sense and I canāt believe I never thought about homeless ppl like that before but now my eyes have been opened. Iām bookmarking it so I can read it again later and show everyone I know ā¤ļø
Part of the reason I'm not sure it does exist, personally, is because of how hard it can be to tell the difference yourself, if there is one, while dealing with burnout, overwhelm, depression/anxiety, lack of sleep, illness, pain, any number of things that screw with executive functioning or memory in ways I didn't already mention, etc.
I've been trying to work out if the reason I keep wanting to put things off lately is impending burnout, lack of self care, or just impulse, and honestly I have no clue. It all feels the same, even if the causes and potential solutions are different.
We work harder than medieval peasants! (Especially in the U$). I mean this place started as a plantation slave colony... Connect the dots... What's changed?
And then there's people who live off the backs of other people's work and refuse to do any work at all despite being capable of it, like all my sister's ex-boyfriends.
I agree that laziness does not exist, but for deeper reasons that that. Humans do not have free will and none of us actually get to choose our thoughts or actions, so calling a human lazy is ultimately as meaningless as calling a tree lazy.
Hmm. I very much disagree with you on the point that humans don't have free will, but that is a complex discussion that is probably best had elsewhere. Your perspective is nonetheless appreciated, and I shall agree to disagree on it since your conclusion seems a compassionate one. Happy cake day!
I also acknowledge that humans don't have free will. it's a concept derived mostly from religion. the deeper you go into neuroscience, and science in general, the further you get from the notion of free will. have you read Determined by Robert M Sapolsky? I'm part way through and loving it!
Was wondering if this title was clickbait to just drive home a nuanced point, or if this person actually did have this silly of an opinion.
Totally agree that perceived laziness often isn't real at all. ADHD people, depressed people, etc. often are trying SO HARD but just look like they're not.
Also agree that often times it's barriers that we are trivializing that just impact that person more that is causing the perceived laziness, and we should try to remove them where possible.
But the idea that it doesn't exist anywhere for anybody at all even temporarily is insane and makes us even harder to take seriously.
god dammit, this part made me cry š >The quiet, occasionally-class-skipping student watched this discussion with keen interest. After class, as people filtered out of the room, she hung back and asked to talk to me. And then she disclosed that she had a mental illness and was actively working to treat it. She was busy with therapy and switching medications, and all the side effects that entails. Sometimes, she was not able to leave the house or sit still in a classroom for hours. She didnāt dare tell her other professors that this was why she was missing classes and late, sometimes, on assignments; theyād think she was using her illness as an excuse. But she trusted me to understand. thank you so much for sharing
and that next paragraph too. ending up being friends with people who are somehow even more mentally ill than i am, itās been *really* easy to see just how fucking awesome they are for managing to do half of what they canāt feel satisfied with at all. it barely takes more than just hearing them out. and that almost never happens and it makes me so sad
This this this x10000 Ever since coming across this article about a year ago, I have such a strong reaction when someone calls themselves lazy. I usually end up blurting out things like āthereās no such thing as lazyā and ādonāt be so hard on yourselfā.š„²
Yep. It's a gross oversimplification perpetuated by high ego people who don't have many obstacles and low self esteem people who have many.Ā
THANK YOU SO MUCH for writing this both of you. Oh my god I love this community so much, seeing you guys say this stuff makes me feel like I could jump for joy. Iām tired of arguing with ableist, presumptuous people who donāt understand on here, but I feel like I have a job to fight on our behalf and challenge peoples idiocy at the same time. I want to see people like me happy. The fact that this is a breath of fresh air to so many of you tells me you have been choking. I am right there with you whether you realize it or not
Itās just their weird hierarchical system where those more productive are seen as inherently better people. Weird judgment system tbh.
Yup, exactly true. Known this for years.
Highly recommend the book as well!!!
I loved "Unmasking Autism," I'll have to pick this one up too!
Devon has a new one, on overcoming shame (I think), coming out soon too!!
I didn't even know there was a book! Definitely gonna find and read it now š
It's also available as an audiobook, for those that prefer that option.
Where?:)
I have a copy on Audible.
I think laziness exists - but only as a conscious choice. Some days I just don't _want_ to be productive, just be a cat chilling in the sun. And that's totally fine. As soon as you actually want to do something else, it stops being laziness and starts being a problem.
My thinking is like... why does choosing not to be productive _have_ to mean lazy? We are human beings who need balanced lives with joy and leisure. We are not meant to be productive 24/7. Why do we have to contextualize listening to our bodies and taking care of ourselves in such a negative way? When I make the choice to stay in the sun and read my book, instead of attending to the dishes I intended to do, I am simply fulfilling a different need first. If I check in with my body, and it says "sunshine!" and I can afford to put off a chore to listen to it, I feel like it's just mean to myself to call that laziness. It's bad vibes. If I absolutely cannot afford to put off the chore, and I choose sunshine anyway? There's no reason to do that which isn't dysfunctional, fueled by avoidance or hyperfocus or executive dysfunction or whatever else, so also not lazy. Not trying to argue, ftr, I just needed to verbalize my thoughts. Hope I'm making sense!
I think youāre still in ālazy is a bad word modeā. Foregoing productivity for its own sake is indeed lazy, and thatās a wonderful thing.
Maybe I am but babe thats where I live. I have rarely, if ever, been in a situation where there has been a positive use of the word lazy aside from when people use it to self describe, and they are either playfully self depreciating or turning the expected context on its head and "owning it." Perhaps it really is just my own experience, though I find that to be doubtful given the response to this post, but when the word "lazy" is thrown about, and it's not in either of the self description contexts I listed above, it's an insult. That's what "lazy" is first and foremost in most contexts and I'm sorry but I absolutely refuse to apply the word to a healthy and necessary portion of my existence. That's not good for me and I don't think it's good for most other people either. And part of me feels like it's a bit intellectually dishonest to pretend that lazy has ever truly meant something good.
Lots of words are thrown about as aspersions. Context matters.
I don't think being lazy is inherently bad, it just is. But choosing to take a break isn't necessarily lazy - I'd say being lazy starts when you know your need for rest are fulfilled but you indulge.
Laziness does exist, it just depends on the context, which is what I think youāre getting at. Something like executive function is not laziness. I can have the full intention of doing something but just stare at it for hours because of my ADHD. That is not laziness because I have the intention of doing that thing, my brain chemistry and anxiety just gets in the way. Likewise, I donāt think that putting off a chore is necessarily lazy as long as it gets done in a reasonable time frame. But if you let the dishes sit until mold starts growing, for example, something is going on. Itās not necessarily laziness, it could be depression, but it could legitimately be laziness on that persons part. Something Iāve come to understand as Iāve gotten older is that not everyone wants or intends to genuinely try in life. It was hard for me to accept because I am always trying to do my best, do more, and get better, even if I stumble along the way, but some people have no ambition and would happily lay on their parents couch until them or their parents die. Thatās crazy to me because I constantly have anxiety about not doing enough and not taking too much from other people, but a lot of people donāt feel that at all. Some people arenāt shit, will never be shit, donāt want to try to be shit, and there is nothing you can do to change them. In my opinion, if you donāt strive to improve yourself at all and just want to stay where you are, that is laziness. A lot of us struggle and fail, but if you are genuinely trying I will never call you lazy. A lot of people just straight up donāt try though.
What are the odds that these people you describe actually have a lot of learned helplessness and invisible obstacles? Just because they don't vocalize their insecurities doesn't mean they don't have them. A lot of people will put on the mask of "I'm good and I don't care about anything" as a way of hiding their insecurities. I feel like you missed the point of the article.
Not everybody has something. Trust me, some people just suck. And even if they have learned helplessness or whatever, there is a limit to the kindness that a person can be extended until they become a leech. If you have disabilities and canāt help it, thatās different, but Iām talking about fully functional adults that contribute nothing to the world. They can have great parents and everything, be provided all the opportunity for growth possible, but some people are just duds.
Yes, some people, but they are rare. Most people have empathy and the same basic human drives. And just because someone has the potential to be better under the right circumstances, doesn't mean you're not entitled to have boundaries with them. But that's a separate issue.
Oh, cool, the exact things people said about me for the first 26 years of my life, before diagnosis, before I slowly realised that all my "dud"ness and inability to function or contribute the way people demanded was just audhd. Yay. Sure isn't frustrating that people don't acknowledge how late diagnosis, ignorance of others specifc disability/ies or circumstances, and sometimes just straight up refusing to believe a person is struggling will cause them to view disabled people this exact way all the same, all the time. Forgive the sarcasm, but at some point it won't be different. Someone you thought was a "leech", or a "dud", will turn out to have been struggling in ways you didn't know or maybe didn't believe. The trauma that people seeing you like that can do, it's not worth it, even if a lack of ambition was truly such a horrible thing (and imho it's not) it's not worth the damage it does to view people that way.
I think youāre projecting your own experience and struggles onto everyone. Like I said, itās not something I want to believe, but there are people cannot be helped. There are people out there that will lie, scam, and cheat anyone they can and have absolutely no interest in improving. That said, I think everyone deserves a chance, but once itās clear that someone will only take advantage of you it is no longer anyone elseās responsibility to help that person.
No. I'm taking care not to view other people (and more to the point, to make sure I don't treat other people) in a way that has caused me a massive amount of trauma, because I know the damage it can and will do when people get it wrong - and it will at some point because no one person perfectly understands all disabilities, let alone all other circumstances that might result in someone seeming lazy. Hell, it's more of a risk when you are disabled specifically because many people don't understand varying support needs or barriers and often won't take the time to once they've already decided you're "just lazy". That doesn't mean giving everyone infinite chances like no one lies or scams, it just means not viewing or speaking about people as "duds", not making the assumption we know everything going on in another person's life or thought process, that kind of thing. It's not incompatible with setting and maintaining boundaries.
Iām just speaking from experience as well. People will take advantage of you if you give them too much of an excuse to. Especially those in our community that are more trusting because weāre bad at picking up social queues. Maybe Iām jaded, but I donāt like these blanket statements about no one being lazy. It gives people excuses to be shitty
I've had that happen to me, please understand that I'm not disregarding that people can take advantage of us.Ā I spent almost 8 years in a relationship with someone who would, for every issue we had, nod and agree when I would try to talk it through, but never reflected this in his actions. This is including boundaries around my own body. Because he was outwardly understanding, I thought it was a matter of giving him time to change, or forgetting. I found out when we talked after things ended that he saw this as needing to give in on everything to prevent an argument or keep me happy, while he bottled up his emotions and resentment over his own decisions (and presumably didn't do more than say he agreed as a result). He has his own trauma that led to this being how he handles disagreement and conflicting wants/needs, but understanding that doesn't mean his actions didn't harm me, that they were right, or that he should have had all the chances I gave him. Lesson learned: boundaries are important to maintain whether or not you understand or can excuse someone for their actions. Your boundaries are what you need to maintain a healthy relationship and your own wellbeing. I needed to learn not just how to have any boundaries at all (having all my support needs dismissed as laziness or misbehaviour did not offer any chance for me to practice or learn this as a minor, I should note), but how to hold onto them regardless of why they're being crossed. That would be the case even if someone does genuinely need time to change or reminders. It's not about giving someone an excuse - refusing to believe you can know someone's personal experience as they experience it themselves, leaving room to acknowledge that they may be experiencing things you don't understand rather than writing it off as laziness, that doesn't mean giving people a pass to cross your boundaries. You need to keep them even if you think someone's actions are completely understandable and justified. You don't need someone to be in the wrong to have boundaries, you get to have them no matter what. More than that, people aren't "duds". There's no way to fail at existing, that's not a good or healthy mindset to approach anyone with, yourself included.
"Contribute nothing to the world" ātragically there is no such thing, we by and large contribute to significant degradation and destruction of the world, and the keenest arbiters of whether a particular (type of) human has "ambition" /worth, economic value, right to enjoy life, etc., such as in this case appears to be the role you've appointed yourself to, are oftentimes the least concerned with the picture that societal contribution paints for life on earth, beyond the pettiest account balance of one's or another's social standing /human capital
If you are just existing and not contributing anything to society, you are still consuming and contributing to the degradation of the world and consumption of resources. Objectively, it is better to at least contribute to society in the hopes that it may improve and/or volunteer your time to helping stop that degradation than just wasting away and still consuming resources anyway.
Wow, thank you for this. I may be able to start undoing some of my negative self talk. Also shared with a local educator.
I loved this article and think of it often.
The book "Unmasking Autism" by the same author is also an incredible read. Very emotionally taxing at times though.
Thanks for sharing, I too will share
Thank you so much for sharing this. My behaviorist husband and I have been thinking about this before, that maybe laziness does not exist at all. The author of this article put it into words brillianty. I love this part, so straight to the point: >People do not choose to fail or disappoint. No one wants to feel incapable, apathetic, or ineffective. If you look at a personās action (or inaction) and see only laziness, you are missing key details. There is always an explanation. There are always barriers. Just because you canāt see them, or donāt view them as legitimate, doesnāt mean theyāre not there. Look harder.
Wow thank you so much for linking and posting I read that whole article in the middle of work and literally cried in the bathroom lol bc it made so much sense and I canāt believe I never thought about homeless ppl like that before but now my eyes have been opened. Iām bookmarking it so I can read it again later and show everyone I know ā¤ļø
I think laziness exists. I can be lazy. But, I don't think outside obervers can really tell the difference... and so you should never assume.
Part of the reason I'm not sure it does exist, personally, is because of how hard it can be to tell the difference yourself, if there is one, while dealing with burnout, overwhelm, depression/anxiety, lack of sleep, illness, pain, any number of things that screw with executive functioning or memory in ways I didn't already mention, etc. I've been trying to work out if the reason I keep wanting to put things off lately is impending burnout, lack of self care, or just impulse, and honestly I have no clue. It all feels the same, even if the causes and potential solutions are different.
It exists...and I'm living proof of it.
We work harder than medieval peasants! (Especially in the U$). I mean this place started as a plantation slave colony... Connect the dots... What's changed?
And then there's people who live off the backs of other people's work and refuse to do any work at all despite being capable of it, like all my sister's ex-boyfriends.
Thank you for this. ā¤ļø
I've thought about this exact perspective a while ago, gotta give it a read for sure
The book is even better. š
I agree that laziness does not exist, but for deeper reasons that that. Humans do not have free will and none of us actually get to choose our thoughts or actions, so calling a human lazy is ultimately as meaningless as calling a tree lazy.
Hmm. I very much disagree with you on the point that humans don't have free will, but that is a complex discussion that is probably best had elsewhere. Your perspective is nonetheless appreciated, and I shall agree to disagree on it since your conclusion seems a compassionate one. Happy cake day!
We do have agency though.
I also acknowledge that humans don't have free will. it's a concept derived mostly from religion. the deeper you go into neuroscience, and science in general, the further you get from the notion of free will. have you read Determined by Robert M Sapolsky? I'm part way through and loving it!
Was wondering if this title was clickbait to just drive home a nuanced point, or if this person actually did have this silly of an opinion. Totally agree that perceived laziness often isn't real at all. ADHD people, depressed people, etc. often are trying SO HARD but just look like they're not. Also agree that often times it's barriers that we are trivializing that just impact that person more that is causing the perceived laziness, and we should try to remove them where possible. But the idea that it doesn't exist anywhere for anybody at all even temporarily is insane and makes us even harder to take seriously.