[nabs-l] Philosophical Terminology

[T. Joseph Carter]

Dezman,

There is something to that hierarchy of vision thing.  That I use a cane 
and that I describe myself simply as blind is these days used against me 
on a daily basis.  There really is something to it, though.

The question we have to ask ourselves is whether or not we're prepared for 
the consequences of being who we are or not--and no is an acceptable 
answer, if not one I prefer.

Joseph

On Sun, Nov 16, 2008 at 03:57:28AM -0600, Dezman Jackson wrote:
> I'll be volunerable here and say that when dealing with people in 
> general, I feel that the word blind often carries a harder punch than say 
> the phrase "visually impaired". I'll take for example instances where I'm 
> scheduling a job interview or trying to volunteer in the community. 
> Although I am totally blind and have no problem thinking of myself as 
> just simply blind, I sometimes struggle with saying such things as 
> visually impaired in such situations to lighten the blow so to speak. I 
> don't particularly have a problem with different phrases, but it's your 
> motivation behind the phrasing and for me it was to feed into the 
> public's perception of what James Omvig calls the hierarchy of sight. 
> This is basically the belief that your success in life is a function of 
> how much vision you have, the more vision you have, the better off you 
> are than someone who has less vision and vice versa. Of course, this 
> concept is contrary to our philosophy. Alright I'll stop babbling now.
>
> Cheers,
> Dezman
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Harry Hogue" <harryhogue at yahoo.com>
> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"  
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Saturday, November 15, 2008 9:25 PM
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Philosophical Terminology
>
>
> Thank you! This has always bugged me that people who are merely legally  
> blind or who read large print, or who are otherwise not completely blind  
> would call themselves blind. To me, if you have some vision you are 
> visually impaired. There is nothing negative about that at all. If you 
> have no vision you are totally blind. Nothing wrong with that either. And 
> if you have some light perception? If you can't read large print, you are 
> still blind. But at the end of the day, it really shouldn't matter what 
> you choose to call it, so long as you understand and accept within 
> yourself that you have trouble seeing, and this is what you need to do 
> alternatively (use a long cane, read braille, etc). What other people 
> choose to call it shouldn't matter either. Just as you pointed out, when 
> someone says they are deaf, I think of them as totally without the 
> ability to hear; when they say they are hearing impaired, I say, "well 
> they can hear some but
> they are not totally deaf." And the same with blindness. You can take  
> anything too far, and I am afraid the NFB and perhaps taken this a bit 
> too far--the distinction needs to be made when it comes to what people 
> need--if someone needs a cane fo steps, but can still read large print, 
> what's wrong with calling them visually impaired? Just because someone 
> has a cane does not automatically make them blind, although this is what 
> most people think. And here again, you cna't please everyone. I gave up 
> on that a long time ago.
>
>
>
>
> --- On Sat, 11/15/08, Chris Westbrook <westbchris at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> From: Chris Westbrook <westbchris at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Philosophical Terminology
> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"  
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
> Date: Saturday, November 15, 2008, 8:10 PM
>
> Also, I don't think that just because you call yourself visually impaired
> you are necessarily denying your blindness.  I will use an example with  
> another
> disability from my own life.  I am hearing impaired.  Notice I said hearing
> impaired, not deaf.  I choose not to call myself deaf, because deafness
> generally implies profound hearing loss, sign language, the inability to  
> speak,
> etc.  If any of you have been around me for a while, however, you no that 
> I do
> not deny my hearing loss.  I wear two hearing aids.  I also accept that  
> certain
> things are much harder if not impossible for me, such as street crossings 
> and
> socializing in crowded situations.  Why is it deemed OK for me to call  
> myself
> hearing impaired when it is not OK for a visually impaired individual to  
> call
> themselves visually impaired?  after all, even if you are totally blind 
> you are
> visually impaired.  The more I think about these things, the more I find  
> myself
> struggling with some of the stricter points of NFB philosophy.
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "T. Joseph Carter"
> <carter.tjoseph at gmail.com>
> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Saturday, November 15, 2008 8:24 PM
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Philosophical Terminology
>
>
>> I think you are all getting too hung up on empty words.  The NFB
> philosophy is about actions and attitudes.
>>
>> If you call me blind and mean by it that I am helpless, I will take
> offense.  If you call me impaired and mean that I just can't see much but am
> otherwise like anyone else, I'll accept your words as respectful.
>>
>> I can almost always tell the difference, and I bet you can too.
>>
>> Joseph
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 05, 2008 at 11:06:10PM +0000, Corbb O'Connor wrote:
>>> I didn't write the subject line, but I am assuming that was a
> blanket marketing e-mail. That is, it was meant to be forwarded around. 
> Just as
> we want to attract new members (as has been said by me and others), we
> wouldn't want to push people toward the delete button after only reading the
> subject line. Marketing, my friends, it's marketing. I agree with all of you
> -- we in the Federation are blind, even those of us with some residual  
> vision.
> Let's not push people away from our great organization before they even know
> who we are and why we use the words we do. I don't think we're
> undermining ourselves or our philosophy -- we're trying to find others out
> there who don't see as well as their peers (seniors, students,
> and...well...everybody else) to show them our positive philosophy on  
> blindness.
>>>
>>> -----
>>> Corbb O'Connor
>>> studying at the National University of Ireland, Galway
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Nov 5, 2008, at 10:33 PM, Janice wrote:
>>>
>>> Hello Karen, Terri and Listers,
>>>
>>> Wow, Karen!! I must say, thanks for calling us, as the nabs board and
> as
>>> nabs members,  out on this very interesting point. I have recently
> noticed
>>> something like this also. I think that Terri's point can be a good
> one. It
>>> might be important for the Federation to use terminology such as
> visually
>>> impaired or low vision, to try to attract a larger facet of people.
> These
>>> people might be uncomfortable with their blindness, they might not
> want to
>>> identify as blind... so, we say- Hey you visually impaired person...
> this
>>> group is for you too!
>>> Once we have their foot in the door so to speak, then
>>> we can teach them about our philosophy and educate them in the fact
> that we
>>> are all blind individuals> We can then wow them into believing that
> the visual hierarchy does not matter. Even if you
>>> are legally blind,    the key word is blind. One is not going to be
>>> recognized as a legally visually impaired person, are they?
>>>
>>> However, I do wonder in certain instances where the lines get blurred
> and if
>>> we are sacrificing what we are as an organization to try to get these
> new
>>> individuals into our door. For example, not  to pick on one specific
>>> facebook group, but I will use the 411 group, since it seems to be the
> most
>>> recent one and has sparked some debate. The salutation line-
> "Attention
>>> blind and visually impaired high school students!" This makes
> some sense
>>> according to Terri's argument. We want those who self identify as
> visually
>>> impaired to come to our group. Yet, why would we need to use the
> terminology
>>> visually impaired among ourselves and within our Federation family?
>>>
>>> Why would we use the words low vision, visually impaired, to refer to
> other
>>> Federationist? One such example I an talking about is the email
> subject line
>>> :"for the sake of ne, in which the group was actually announced
> to the NABS
>>> list. the official heading was something like- Blind and Visually
> Impaired
>>> Teen Group on Facebook. why not just use something like, "new
> blindness
>>> group of facebook!
>>> ? I am definitely not trying to point fingers at any specific group or
> person... I am really curious, because I have seen terms such as visually
> impaired, low vision, and high partial , in our literature recently, also. I
>>> am merely using the facebook post as the most recent and relevant
> example.
>>> Is this a new trend in Federation philosophy? or do we believe that
> perhaps
>>> trying to be all inclusive has caused us to become a little lax and
> blur
>>> the lines of philosophy? Are the philosophical boundaries of all blind
>>> members being equal, thus united we stand and divided we fall, not as
> solid
>>> , and binding, now, as when I first joined the Federation...?>
>>>
>>> I really am confused and would love to hear the philosophers among us
> debate
>>> this observation. What are the effects of these happenings, to our
>>> philosophy? Do we need to tighten our concepts about blindness and
> what it
>>> stands for within the Federation, or is inclusion the matter of
> importance?
>>>
>>> Thoughtfully yours,
>>>
>>> Janice
>>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Terri Rupp"
> <terri.rupp at gmail.com>
>>> To: "NABS list serve" <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
>>> Sent: Wednesday, November 05, 2008 2:25 PM
>>> Subject: [nabs-l] Philosophical Terminology
>>>
>>>
>>>> Karen and all,
>>>> The NFB is using different outlets to try to reach out to
> nonmembers.
>>>> Facebook is just one of them.  Although as you said, the
> philosophy of the
>>>> federation is based on the word "Blind", that word
> "Blind" is  sometimes a
>>>> negative things to those people struggling to deal or accept their
>>>> blindness.  It was only until a few years ago that I was one of
> them.  I
>>>> didn't want to associate with anything that labeled me as
> blind.  I felt
>>>> ashamed to be blind and called myself "visually
> impaired".  The acceptance
>>>> of one's blindness is a grieving process that each person goes
> through
>>>> differently.  What we have to do is serve as positive blind role
> models,
>>>> and show that being blind is no different than being short.  It is
> simply
>>>> a
>>>> characteristic.  Once we attract them to these groups, we can
> promote NFB
>>>> activities, scholarships, etc and reel them in with our
> philosophy.
>>>>
>>>> Yours,
>>>> Terri Rupp, President
>>>> National Association of Blind Students
>>>>
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