[nabs-l] If the World Went Sighted..

[Mike Freeman]

I guess I don't necessarily see any virtues to being blind.  But that
doesn't make blindness more than a damned nuisance in a world structured for
the sighted.  If everyone was blind, sight well might not be a virtue.  Ever
read H.G. Wells' story on this?

Mike


-----Original Message-----
From: nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Jedi
Sent: Wednesday, April 27, 2011 8:23 PM
To: nabs-l at nfbnet.org
Subject: Re: [nabs-l] If the World Went Sighted..

Mike,

How is that? We talk about the virtues of being sighted that make it 
useful. So why not discuss the virtues of being blind, too. Either way, 
we're all clear that either condition is caused by a characteristic and 
that neither is more special or worse than the other.

Respectfully,
Jedi

Original message:
> I don't think we're going to have to worry about the problem for a long,
> long time.  And I contend that if we say that blindness has inherent
virtues
> predominantly structured for the sighted, we are giving blindness special
> status beyond its just being a characteristic.

> For myself, I don't see blindness having such outstanding virtues that
it's
> worth bucking the majority and insisting that the world be restructured
for
> us (as we must do, at least with respect to technology).  So if becoming
> sighted could be painless and it could be guaranteed that the retraining
> period would be relatively brief, I see no reason to avoid becoming
sighted.

> I don't even think I'd worry about human cloning for nurture plays just as
> much a part in who and what we are as nature does.

> But, as I say, all this strikes me like the scholastic disputation as to
how
> many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

> Mike Freeman


> -----Original Message-----
> From: nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf
> Of Jamie Principato
> Sent: Wednesday, April 27, 2011 3:00 AM
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] If the World Went Sighted..

> I think the easiest way to consider this question without letting our own
> emotional biases sway our response is to ask ourselves the same question
as
> it relates to another disability. I know what my snap-answer would be to
> whether blindness should be eradicated from society on the grounds of
making
> the world a better place... but now slow down, back up and ask, is the
> answer the same if we're talking about deafness? How about down's
syndrome?
> or cerebral palsy?

> On Wed, Apr 27, 2011 at 12:36 AM, Mike Freeman <k7uij at panix.com> wrote:

>> I think the question is unanswerable.

>> Mike Freeman


>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
>> Behalf
>> Of Arielle Silverman
>> Sent: Tuesday, April 26, 2011 9:08 PM
>> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
>> Subject: [nabs-l] If the World Went Sighted..

>> Hi all,

>> We recently had a discussion about how we would react if some of our
>> blind friends could become sighted, and we asked whether it would be
>> reasonable for a sighted person to want to go blind. This made me
>> think of an interesting, although a bit painful, question:
>> Would the world be better off, worse off, or about the same if
>> blindness were completely eradicated, through genetic engineering
>> and/or mandatory treatment of all causes of blindness?
>> The question may sound silly, but for many vision researchers,
>> eradication of blindness is a real goal. But does the presence of
>> blind people in our society have any benefit to the society or the
>> world as a whole?

>> Certainly there are costs of having a small group of people in society
>> who read and travel using different techniques than the rest. These
>> specialized techniques have to be taught, technology has to be adapted
>> to their use and negative public attitudes prevent this minority of
>> people who do things differently from having full access to societal
>> goods and opportunities. So would it be cheaper and less
>> resource-demanding if everybody could use the same visual techniques
>> to accomplish life tasks?
>> On the other hand, you could perhaps argue that having people who use
>> different senses to do things in society is advantageous. Technology
>> is forced to innovate to become usable by those who don't have vision
>> as well as those who do. And conceivably, if a darkness plague struck
>> the planet, it would be better for the species if some of its members
>> could fully function without light.

>> What do you think? Should we as a society make an effort to get rid of
>> blindness? Or does blindness serve any kind of social function?
>> There obviously isn't a right answer here, but it's something that,
>> for better or for worse, could become relevant to us someday.

>> Arielle

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