Ask Ms. Jessica Issue 27 – Mutant Accommodations

(The content for Ask Ms. Jessica comes from real questions from real people sent to AskMsJessica@gmail.com)

Ms. Jessica,

What kinds of accommodations are in place or available for mutants? I imagine it's hard to find cars for taurs and building access must be a nightmare for those too large to enter doorways. All of that is saying nothing about finding clothing for all the different possible shapes mutants can come in.

Well, that’s going to differ depending on where you live. Here in Port Solei we have a high mutant population so you can find a lot of mutant accommodations. In general, major metropolitan areas always have advanced mutant accommodations too. However, smaller, more rural towns with lower mutant populations get iffier.

Luckily, a lot of accommodations are easier to make than you think. Specialty clothing shops, for example, are not all that hard to set up. Mutant clothing, unfortunately, cannot be mass produced, so there are a lot of specialty tailors that will make clothing to order. It’s a bit expensive, but that’s just the price of specialty clothing. A lot of mutants will also buy standard human clothing items and take them to tailors for modification. It’s actually not that hard to cut a few new arm holes in a top, or to stitch two pairs of jeans together for a four legged girl. Any experienced tailor can do it.

Cars are also not so bad. We were making specialty cars for handicapped people well before mutations became common, and the same rules apply here. Taurs tend to get big card, like mini-vans or SUVs, because it better accommodates their long body. However, given this space, it’s not all that hard to create an extra wide door, and to take up a single spot in the back seat for your second set of legs. 

Most human sized doorways accommodate mutants just fine. Some exceptionally large mutants might struggle, but for the most part the same laws that are in place to prevent discrimination against the handicapped prevent discrimination against mutants. Hallways have to be wide, stairs have to have an accompanying ramp, entranceways have to be wide and sometimes double doored, all this stuff was in place way before humans started to mutate. 

Progress in this area kind of happens on a case by case basis. If a mutant shows up that struggles with the infrastructure that we have in place, then governing bodies usually turn to scientists to answer a few questions. How many people share this mutation? How difficult is the mutants life?

If the mutation is relatively rare then it’s usually more cost-effective for the mutant to get a special prosthetic or medical device to help them adapt. Once again, medical insurance programs vary from country to country, but most modern day insurance programs make prosthetics like this very affordable. Just don’t try to get one in the U.S.A. They will charge you an arm and a leg. It’s a good thing mutants got them to spare! HAH! Just a little joke.

If the mutation is relatively common, or if multiple mutants with different mutations will still struggle with a piece of existing infrastructure, then cities will usually start thinking about changing the infrastructure. Unfortunately, these changes can take years to enact, so there usually has to be some stop gap measures put in place in the meantime.

I’d like to get deeper into this, but we are straying into the realm of social policy, and my specialty is biology. You’d have to ask another professor for more details.

Dr. Jessica Park

AskMsJessica@gmail.com