[nabs-l] Blind Verses Legally Blind

[Elizabeth Mohnke]

Hello All,

Thank you for the responses thus far. However, how do I
 even answer a question that I really do not know how to answer myself? Why 
should I spend five minutes trying to stumble through some sort of answer 
with a stranger I am most likely never going to see again? I do not know why 
strangers are asking me if I am blind or legally blind except to figure out 
how much I can see or not see.

But I am just wondering what difference that really makes when the NFB 
teaches that blind people are really no different than sighted people, and 
with the right tools and attitudes, we can do pretty much anything that a 
sighted person can do. If these beliefs are true, then what difference does 
it make as to how much I can see or not see.

It just seems to me that when people ask me these questions they are trying 
to imply that I must have some sight because how could a person be able to 
function without any sight. It is almost like people are trying to tell me 
that the more eyesight a person has the better off they are in life. How 
exactly am I suppose to deal with these kinds of questions when my encounter 
with these people is rather brief, and I would rather not deal with what 
seems to me like some form of idiotic line of thinking?

What exactly should I say to these people if what I am saying is the wrong 
thing, and I really do not know how to briefly describe what I can and 
cannot see, or even wish to describe it in the first place? I would give a 
specific example of how I encountered this situation from the other day, but 
I am afraid it would only spear the conversation away from the real heart of 
the issue.

Again, this is just something I have been struggling with lately.  So I was 
just interested in how other people deal with these kinds of questions from 
other people in their lives.

Elizabeth