[Blindtlk] Raising a Cane

Sun Sep 27 22:46:51 UTC 2015

Yup; body language and eye contact.

Mike

-----Original Message-----
From: blindtlk [mailto:blindtlk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of River Linda
via blindtlk
Sent: Sunday, September 27, 2015 2:31 PM
To: Blind Talk Mailing List
Cc: River Linda
Subject: Re: [Blindtlk] Raising a Cane

Okay. I was not understanding the point of the raised cane. My O&M was based
solely on listening for cars and not on what a driver is saying to you. I am
glad Chris asked the question because I had never heard of the raised cane.

On Sunday, September 27, 2015, Arielle Silverman via blindtlk <
blindtlk at nfbnet.org> wrote:

> Christine does use a cane, the issue is being told to hold the cane up 
> while waiting to cross the street, as a signal, then putting it down 
> and crossing with it. As to Mike's comment, How do sighted pedestrians 
> signal that they are crossing, without a cane or a turn signal? I 
> assume they use some form of body language. I consider extending my 
> cane slightly in front of me to be an appropriate form of body 
> language. Like Christine I don't see the additional value of raising 
> my cane up off the ground. Further, I agree with what I think she was 
> saying, which is that we want cars to drive normally rather than 
> stopping in the intersection or doing other weird things because we 
> are blind. If they depart from normal car behavior, they give us 
> confusing information about whether or not it is safe to cross. Of 
> course if I am in the middle of crossing I want cars to stop. That 
> goes for any pedestrian, blind or sighted.
> Arielle
>
> On 9/27/15, River Linda via blindtlk <blindtlk at nfbnet.org 
> <javascript:;>>
> wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > Are you saying you can see well enough to cross the street without 
> > using
> a
> > cane? Or, you just do not want to use it because you are embarrassed 
> > to
> use
> > it and you do not want the attention from people? The cane is for 
> > your safety. As you have described holding your cane vertically off 
> > the ground in front of you, the cars coming from behind you will not see
your cane.
> I
> > was taught to keep the cane tip on the ground and hold it out 
> > diagonally from you so that cars coming from all four directions can see
it.
> >
> > As for people grabbing you, you have to tell them how you want to be 
> > treated. When people grab me, I tell them to wait and let me show 
> > you how to help me. When people make that comment about me being 
> > amazing because
> I
> > can cut my food and eat it, I simply respond with "you, too".
> >
> >
> > On Saturday, September 26, 2015, Szostak, Christine via blindtlk < 
> > blindtlk at nfbnet.org <javascript:;>> wrote:
> >
> >> Hi All,
> >>   Ok, this might be a very odd question, but I was just thinking 
> >> about this and to me, it  seems really illogical.
> >>
> >>   When I was getting O&M to help with transitioning to a cane, 
> >> every
> time
> >> we stopped at a curb to cross a street, the instructor would have 
> >> me
> hold
> >> the cane directly in front of me and hold it up in the air 
> >> vertically about
> >> 2-3 or so inches off the ground. The explanation given to me for 
> >> this
> was
> >> so that others would see that I am blind and am using a cane.
> >>
> >>   The reasons that this seems a bit odd to me as a good practice are:
> >>
> >> 1)  I do not want a car to stop at a stop sign and wait for me to 
> >> cross as I have always been taught not to trust in drivers that 
> >> say, go ahead I will wait because they may not see other cars 
> >> coming that could hit me if I follow their advice. Also, just 
> >> because they stop, it does not mean that they see you so the signal 
> >> you are assuming they are giving you, may not be the case.
> >>
> >> 2)  I do not necessarily want to bring attention to my blindness.
> >>
> >> 3)  I tend to look younger than I am and thus people, to my 
> >> consternation, always try  to grab my arm... to help me. When I was 
> >> in training for one of my prior guides, my instructor always joked 
> >> that I was a really
> touchable
> >> person because total strangers would try to drag me across the 
> >> street since they just assumed that I did not know  how to cross a 
> >> street with a light:). This happens to me, regardless of whether it 
> >> is with traffic or even in places like restaurants, total strangers 
> >> will frequently grab my arm, put their arms around my shoulders... 
> >> and tell me how amazing I am to be eating so well:). Since I really 
> >> do not want this type of attention,
> I
> >> tend not to want  to use methods that are likely to induce it:). 
> >> Since I could see holding a cane in the air as one good way to get 
> >> this type of attention, I am not overly eager to keep up this practice.
> >>
> >>   Thus, do others here hold up their canes while standing on curbs 
> >> and
> if
> >> so, what has been your experience with respect to the above issues? 
> >> I really, personally do not like this practice as it would seem to 
> >> me that if you are a competent traveler who follows the  rules of 
> >> the pedestrian
> and
> >> knows what you are doing, then you should not need to do this as it 
> >> simply tells someone, this person is blind so stop and wait for 
> >> them as they will not be a safe traveler or is trying to signal 
> >> that they need your help.
> >> Perhaps I am completely misunderstanding the point of doing this 
> >> but I just really feel like this is an out-of-date practice, one 
> >> that tries to heavily point out blindness which would seem to lead 
> >> to increasing the stigma rather than showing that we are competent 
> >> individuals, and something that could actually be dangerous rather 
> >> than helpful to a cane traveler.
> >>
> >>
> >>   I can understand this type of practice if you want for some 
> >> reason to indicate that you are blind or have a VI (i.e., when  you 
> >> are concerned that you may trip... and do not want individuals to 
> >> just think that you are
> >> clumsy...) so please know that I am not trying to discount these 
> >> types
> of
> >> situations rather it is just on the curb side if you are just 
> >> trying to cross the street  and have any of the above three reasons 
> >> for not
> wanting
> >> to do so that I am asking about and feeling this way about.
> >> Happy weekend all!
> >> Chris
> >>
> >> Dr. Christine M. Szostak
> >> Assistant Professor of Psychology
> >> Department of Social Sciences
> >> Shorter University
> >> Rome, Georgia
> >> szostak.1 at osu.edu <javascript:;> <javascript:;><mailto:
> szostak.1 at osu.edu <javascript:;> <javascript:;>>
> >> cszostak at shorter.edu <javascript:;> <javascript:;>
> >>
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