[nagdu] Re Guide Dog Forced to Ride in Trunk

[PICKRELL, REBECCA M (TASC)]

A beautiful post Elizabeth. Love every word of this!

-----Original Message-----
From: nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Elizabeth Rene
Sent: Tuesday, June 07, 2011 11:24 PM
To: nagdu at nfbnet.org
Subject: [nagdu] Re Guide Dog Forced to Ride in Trunk

I am more than a little concerned about a seeming tendency to judge the 
woman whose taxi driver forced her to put her guide dog in the trunk of his 
car.

This tendency toward censure has arisen before with regard to other guide 
dog users encountering problems in the past, and I, for one, want to 
discourage it.

Thankfully, I have never been faced with this woman's "Sophie's choice." 
But I have been abandoned by taxi drivers more than once over the years, 
and, like many others of my blind brothers and sisters, have probably faced 
my share of humiliating infringements of my civil rights.

The view that I want to express is that it is wrong to judge the victim of 
crime, no matter how much more responsible or effective or independent we 
think we might have been in similar circumstances.

No one lives at the height of vigilance at every moment of  life.

The victims of sexual assault, for example, have had to struggle for years 
not to be blamed for crimes against themselves.  Rape victims are blamed for 
irresponsibly walking late at night, for dating the wrong partner, for 
drinking at the party, for selling their bodies, for dressing provocatively, 
for being where they don't belong, for failing to set their own limits, to 
guard their own boundaries, to fight back more fiercely, etc., etc.  But 
rape is still a vicious crime, the offender is guilty, and the victim 
deserves our support and our compassion no matter how much better we may 
have behaved, or think we may have behaved with similar choices before us.

When I practiced criminal law, I was counseled to remove women from juries 
in sex cases because they were more likely to acquit.  If they could 
separate themselves from the victim--if no way could they ever be caught the 
way she was by virtue of their own good choices--then they could leave the 
courtroom in confidence and go home feeling safe.  If only bad girls got 
attacked, then nothing could happen to them.  Women were expected to judge 
other women harshly in order to quell their own fears.

I think it is fear that makes us judge other blind people for falling short 
of our own self-expectations when they become victimized.  The idea might be 
that if we are perfect, no one will hurt us; if we are perfect as a group, 
no one will even dare to try to hold us back.  WE might say to ourselves, 
"I'd never let the movement down by acting like that."

I'm all for independence, safety, effective self-advocacy, and responsible 
living.  But perfection and control are illusory goals.  They're impossible 
standards to maintain.

If we judge and find wanting those who have been victimized rather than 
holding  wrongdoers truly accountable for their illicit acts, then we become 
victimizers too.

I think we can be stronger than that.

No one deserves to be victimized, ever.

Period.

Elizabeth, a former prosecuting attorney, and Ingram and Fiesta, who took a 
bite out of crime.




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