Is NOBODY wrong in the post ? POST : I know, what a clickbaity title.

So I'm gonna start out by saying that I made a post here recently about an issue I had previously at work. This one is a separate issue, but at the same workplace. I honestly just want some opinions and advice on how to handle this.

Just to start off, I work in a kitchen as a Line Cook/Trainer. This kitchen is one inside a movie theater. A kitchen job is already highly stressful, but at a theater, it's kinda 10 times more stressful (we can compare an average 200 seating for dinnertime to 1000 seating with less turnover). If anyone knows, working in a kitchen requires a lot of attention to detail, a lot of cleanliness, and a lot of flexibility.

That said, I have a co-worker I had been working with for 8 months now. I was the one to train him in the station he works at. Over the months working with him, I've noticed just how bad he is at the job. He has no awareness of cross-contamination (I always see bits of cheese in food containers that shouldn't have it and I've caught him several time not changing his gloves when he touches the medium cooked steak we serve), he has no awareness of what good food product should look and taste like (even though I've taught him what it should several times, I still find rotten food on the station), his knife skills are terrible (seems mean to say, but I've tried to show him how to do certain cuts several times, no change), he's unimaginably slow-paced (which sucks when we have a lunch rush or dinner rush, I usually have to jump in to help him do his tickets), and he starts panicking when he accumulates up to 3-4 tickets on his station (his station gets the least traction, the other four stations get up to 10 tickets per minute while it's usually 1 or 2 every 5 minutes for him).

At this point, many would ask, "Why not just fire him?". Well our company doesn't believe in giving up on people and that it is possible to teach people such skills. I agree, but nothing has changed within these 8 months, it took me only 3 months to actually get good at my job when I first started (and I didn't have to have someone constantly pointing out problems to me). I used to try and help him with advice and other things, but because I saw no difference (it felt like he just didn't care), I kind of just gave up and left him alone.

So just a month ago, I had brought up this problem with one of my shift leads and he told me that the kid had revealed to a supervisor that he did have Asperger's. Just hearing kinda shifted things into making sense, and I also felt like an asshole for how much I had judged him. Now though, I'm still worried. I get not wanting to fire the kid or demote him to something simpler like dishwasher (which gets the same $11 per hour that most line cooks start at in this kitchen, same benefits too) because you feel sympathy for him. But if he can't do the work, it's only making things worse for the employees and our guests. He still serves rotten food, he still cannot handle a few tickets during a rush which pulls me away from helping another station that actually needs it more, and I feel like we are just tying a hand behind our back when there are better solutions.

So my question is, AITA for thinking this guy should just be demoted to dishwasher so he can't serve bad food? AITA for not feeling like the guy cannot change his ways because of the previous 8 months? Is there a way to approach my manager about this without seeming like an asshole?