[nabs-l] Security in ourselves, acceptance in others

[Chris Nusbaum]

You make a lot of sense! I'm still trying to get rid of my 
blindism, and sometimes I would get a little annoyed when Mom 
always "got on my case" about it.  She told me that, like it or 
not, the world around me is mostly sighted and wrong or right, 
they make judgments on people based on what they see.  So if we 
want to change what it means to be blind (hint hint, NFB says 
that all the time) we need to convey that positive image about 
blindness not only in what we say, but in what sighted people see 
visually from us.

 Chris

"A loss of sight, never a loss of vision!" (Camp Abilities motto)

--- Sent from my BrailleNote

 ----- Original Message -----
From: Daniel Romero <djdan567 at gmail.com
To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list 
<nabs-l at nfbnet.org
Date sent: Thu, 26 May 2011 14:27:53 -0400
Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Security in ourselves, acceptance in others

I think the reason why this might go down is because of the view 
that
we get from the public in general.  Most people who are sighted 
are not
used to a blind person.  You have to understand that one blind 
person
being seen is a huge thing.  They're now reliable for what a 
person
thinks about blind people.  They are the ones setting an example.  
So if
you have a blind person who smells bad, rocks, pokes their eyes 
or
just do not have the proper skills, the outside person will make 
an
assumtion and say that all blind people are like that.  i'm not 
saying
it's right for blind people to call out other blind people with a
skills set that is lower then theirs, they're just calling them 
out
because they are representing blind people.  It puts a bad label 
on us
blind people who do take care of ourselves, have the skills to be
independent and succeed.  like i said, i'm not saying it's right 
but I
don't think us who do have the skills want to have a negative
conotation.  Not all blind people poke their eyes, rock, hop,
twitch,bump into everything, smell bad, do not clean their own
clothes, or anything like that.  So to be part of a group that's 
going
to display such a view that is negative to the public, we fall 
right
behind that.  Am I making sense?

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