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

Thu Apr 28 05:34:34 UTC 2011

This is scary... I was about to post a message saying the same thing!
I know that I don't judge people by their appearances, but sometimes I find myself unconsciously judging people by their voice. I think this can be even worse, because if appearances already tell you very little about a person, their voice is going to tell you just as little or perhaps even less.
On Apr 28, 2011, at 1:26 AM, Nicole B. Torcolini at Home wrote:

> I do find that blindness seems to have at least one benefit. I cannot judge people by their appearances without having someone describe them to me. Given that I don't walk around with a describer every day, most if not all of my friendships and acquaintances are made without knowing what a person looks like and without judging them by it. Yes, sighted people can ignore appearances, but it is different when you don't have a choice.
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Freeman" <k7uij at panix.com>
> To: "'National Association of Blind Students mailing list'" <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, April 27, 2011 8:53 PM
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] If the World Went Sighted..
> 
> 
>> But are these examples of the virtue of blindness or, rather, are they just
>> taking advantage of a group that exists?  And the fact that blindness caused
>> some innovation in the past doesn't necessarily mean that it will in the
>> future.
>> 
>> Examples such as the Blind Driver Challenge and Ray Kurzweil's OCR work,
>> while true, do not, in my view, constitute a reason for *preserving*
>> blindness.  After all, schizophrenics are often damned creative.  Does this
>> mean we shouldn't work for a cure or at least an amelioration of the
>> destructive symptoms of schizophrenia?  Before you reflexively say "yes".
>> Consider all the harm schizophrenia does.  I'm not saying blindness causes
>> harm; it doesn't.  but in a world structured for the sighted, I don't see
>> any great benefits of blindness in and of itself.
>> 
>> 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 7:57 PM
>> To: nabs-l at nfbnet.org
>> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] If the World Went Sighted..
>> 
>> Arielle,
>> 
>> I think blindness does serve a purpose. First of all, we learn more
>> about our species when there are differences among us. So for example,
>> blind people have been used as controls or experimental groups for all
>> kinds of neural research having nothing to do with sight as a means by
>> which to understand the human experience. Then, there's the fact that
>> we, because of our technological needs, push innovation. For example a
>> lot of people are thinking that the blind driver challenge will create
>> a lot of technologies that will help others. Similarly, the scanning
>> and reading technology the sighted take for granted came as a result of
>> Ray Kurzweil's desire to provide a reading medium for the blind.
>> Text-to-speech is another   example; we now use TTS for a variety of
>> applications having nothihng to do with blindness.
>> 
>> In general, I think disability is a good thing because it makes us
>> realize that there are multiple ways to live in the  universe and there
>> really is no such thing as total perfection and that we are perfect in
>> our imperfection. I know that may seem a little high-minded and crazy
>> to some, but it makes sense to me. As blind people, we are in the
>> unique position of getting people to think. When they see us, the
>> sighted go crazy. but that craziness has nothing to do with us, but has
>> everything to do with themselves in a fundamental way. To the sighted
>> (and I'm basing this on philosophical and art history research), we
>> represent everything from death to the unknown, everything from fear of
>> the dark to a feeling of being out of control. The sighted see us and
>> think, how in the hell can they live like that? I think we remind them
>> on some level that control is a mental illusion and that feeling out of
>> control is also a mental illusion. Again, another of Jedi's weird
>> ideas, but it makes sense to me. Basically, no human is ever really in
>> control, but at the same time, we have more control of our lives than
>> we think. So when a sighted person sees us (especially those of us who
>> remind them of themselves as normal people), we cause them to question
>> everything they thought they knew, and that's a good thing. That's the
>> value of having diversity in general. if we were all the same, we would
>> not learn nearly as much as we have.
>> 
>> Respectfully,
>> Jedi
>> Original message:
>>> 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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