[nabs-l] Stop Blaming the Economy & MLK JR. Rememberence & His View of the U.S. Economy

[Steve Jacobson]

Joe,

It is more than appropriate as we celebrate Martin Luther King's birthday to consider what African-Americans have 
endured over time and still endure.  I sometimes am a little uneasy when the parallels between what we have 
experienced as blind persons is drawn too closely to the experience of African-Americans.  To that extent, I agree 
with what you said.  Having said that, your statement that "Anyone who thinks the struggles of the collective 
blind are remotely similar to the struggles of African-Americans is severely misguided," also seems extreme.

There are certainly large differences between our experiences as blind persons and those experienced by other 
mistreated groups here in the United States and around the world.  The motivations are different for one thing as 
you also pointed out, and the level of endangerment is not the same.  The fact that we have a sort of safety net 
that other groups do not have is significant.  It is unlikely that a blind person in the United States would be 
left homeless or allowed to starve provided he or 
she new which services might be available. 

Still, to say that we are misguided to even think our struggles are remotely similar seems to ignore some of our 
history.  You should talk to parents who have had their children removed from their care simply because everyone 
knows blind people can't be safe parents.  They might have a remote sense of what it feels like to at least not be 
seen as an adult.  Talk to the man who, when taking his nine-year-old daughter and her friend to an amusement park 
was told that his daughter had to sit with him instead of her friend because they required that he have a 
responsible adult with him.  A "responsible adult" was defined as being more than four feet or so tall without age 
limits.  In case you have read about that and know that it happened twenty years ago, ask me how I felt when last 
summer a flight attendant ask my children to split up and each sit with their mother and father to take care of 
them on the flight.  Ask a close friend of mine how it felt to have the airlines force the stranger sitting next 
to her to be responsible for her.  Ask me how it felt to have a potential employer tell me that they would not 
hire me because they could not spare another employee to be on call to bring me too and from the bathroom.  While 
we are at it, ask me how I felt last week when a hospital staff person refused to give me directions to the stairs 
because they were not safe for me but would direct me to the elevator.  Ask 
someone I knew personally how he felt when the sheltered workshop for which he worked tested his speed to 
calculate his subminimum wages on machinery that was defective, and only as soon as he arrived or just before 
quitting time when he was likely to work least efficiently?  Ask another friend of mine how it felt to be denied a 
teaching position because the school district required a specific level of vision.  Ask the numerous blind people 
who, before the mid-1950's, were not allowed to apply for civil service jobs because they were blind, how they 
felt.  An African-American member several decades ago was involved in a protest over a policy that required blind 
people to sit in the very front "priority seating for the handicapped" seats on busses.  He remarked that he never 
thought he would have to fight for the right to sit in the back of the bus.  He understood that it is as wrong to 
tell responsible adults they have to sit at the front of the bus as it is to assign them to the back of the bus 
even if the motives were different.  

We face many barriers now.  Some of our accessibility issues with technology are very important to keep us from 
sliding back into the back rooms of society.  Yet, our battles are not all of the same significance, and it is 
right for us to take some care when drawing parallels.  Nevertheless, I have really just scratched the surface 
above, and most of my examples involve people I know personally.  How many other situations go unnoticed or 
unresolved.  Some of our battles are not as critical as others we have fought, nor are they of the nature of the 
battles faced by others.  I believe it is therefore reasonable for us to 
take some care as to how we draw parallels.  

Still, when I listen to Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech, it often brings chills and even tears.  He exhibited 
so much courage as he worked to change society.  I can remember the news coverage of the demonstrations when the 
Little Rock schools were ordered to integrate in the late 1950's, and it made Dr. King's dream seem real to me 
even though I am a very fortunate white American who did not have to face those struggles.  But I also found his 
words to fit my dream of blind people not having to worry about having their kids taken away or having the deck 
stacked against us when evaluating our speed in a workshop or being eliminated from consideration for a job 
because of an irrelevant visual requirement.  I have a feeling that Dr. King would understand that deciding for 
someone that they should sit at the front of the bus because of someone else's perceived sense of safety is at 
least remotely similar to having someone requiring that someone else sit at the back of the bus because of their 
race.  I believe he would see that there is a similarity between being required to use a particular drinking 
fountain and being required to use an elevator because someone else has decided the stairs were not safe.  Are 
these examples completely equal in their severity?  No, of course not, but I maintain that they are "remotely 
similar" to use your words.

Best regards,

Steve Jacobson

On Mon, 20 Jan 2014 12:26:41 -0500, Joe wrote:

>Anyone who thinks the struggles of the collective blind are remotely similar
>to the struggles of African-Americans is severely misguided. It is true that
>blind people are discriminated for being perceived as helpless, but
>African-Americans face, and in some cases continue to face, discrimination
>for being thought of as less than human. I think Martin Luther King would
>have appreciated laws that would have protected his people from employment
>discrimination. I think he would have loved laws that intercede in the
>interest of a child's equal educational opportunities. We may not have
>always counted on Braille bathroom labels, but we have certainly enjoyed
>equal access to them. Similarly, we may not count on these laws and policies
>always working, but the privileges we enjoy have always surpassed the
>disadvantages of a lot of other underserved and vulnerable populations. And
>yet, despite the challenges African-Americans faced, MLK used this very same
>speech you share to promote the hard work African-Americans were doing to
>build housing and create jobs throughout a troubled region traditionally
>rallied against them. If anything, you prove the point that it can be done.
>It seems grossly incompetent to pretend the challenges of a population that
>can receive monthly checks, special transportation, special hiring
>authorities, and in some cases free college tuition are anything like the
>struggles of our African-American peers.

>Joe

>--
>Twitter: @ScribblingJoe

>Visit my blog:
>http://joeorozco.com/blog