Barrier of the Invisible Difference

Barrier of the Invisible Difference

There you have the introduction to Kernel Book fourteen. Now, here is
my opening article. It is entitled "The Barrier of the Visible
Difference."

THE BARRIER OF THE VISIBLE DIFFERENCE

Catchy titles and clever phrases are the stuff of big business. As
every advertising agency knows, fortunes are made or lost by the way the public reacts to
a jingle or a slogan.

Once I heard a liquor distributor say that his company had a thoroughly
mediocre wine that was going nowhere, and then somebody got the bright idea of giving it a
sparkly name (I think it was Wild Irish Rose). After that, he said they couldn’t make
enough to meet the demand, operating three shifts a day.

Whether that story is true or false, the underlying message is right on
target. It is not just what a thing is but how it sounds and feels that sets the tone and
gives the value.

When most of us come across the term "visible difference," we
think of the trademark of the beauty expert and cosmetics manufacturer Elizabeth Arden.
"Visible Difference" is the brand name of moisturizers, lotions, and other
products. But for the blind the term means something else. It represents a barrier and a
hurdle to be surmounted. Let me illustrate.

When I was a boy of about four, my mother and I were sitting in the
front bedroom of our home. Even though more than sixty-five years have passed, I still
remember every detail. It was a summer evening just after dark. My father and brother were
sitting on the porch, and the night sounds (the frogs and crickets) were coming into full
chorus. It was oppressively hot with a lot of dust in the air.

In those days we didn’t have electricity, so my mother had just
lit the oil lamp. The smell of the burning kerosene began to blend with the regular odors
of food and plant life that permeated the four-room house. Of course, all of the doors and
windows were open.

When my mother finished lighting the lamp and adjusting the wick, she
sat down and put her arm around me. Then she kissed me on the left side of my face. Since
she was sitting on my left, this was a natural (almost an automatic) gesture. Then she
said:

"Do you like for mother to kiss you?" Now, this put me into a
real dilemma-for I very much liked for mother to kiss me, but I felt shy and embarrassed
to say it.

Hunting a way out, I thought perhaps I could say yes by shaking my
head. From conversations I had heard, I knew that other people shook their heads to mean
yes or no, but I didn’t know which way the head should move to indicate which
meaning. It had never before occurred to me to wonder about the matter since I had never
needed to know. My mother or anybody else around the house would undoubtedly have been
perfectly willing to tell me if I had asked, but that didn’t help in the situation I
was then facing.

Using the best logic I could muster, I thought that since my mother was
sitting on my left, maybe if I moved my head that way, it would indicate yes.
Unfortunately it didn’t, and my mother (not understanding my embarrassment and lack
of knowledge) thought I was saying no. She was hurt and cried, and I didn’t know how
to explain.

So what is the moral of that little story, that minor tragedy of
childhood? It is not that blind people are less competent than others of their age and
circumstance. It is not that blind persons are slow learners or inept. It is that
sometimes something that can be seen at a glance must be learned a different way by a
blind person. The learning can be just as quick and just as effective, but it won’t
happen unless somebody thinks to explain, to help the blind child cross the barrier of the
visible difference. There is no great problem in knowing how to shake one’s head or
in doing a hundred other things that sighted children learn without ever knowing that they
have done it. It is only that the blind child must either be unusually persistent and
inquisitive or have somebody constantly at hand who thinks to give information. Otherwise,
insignificant details will multiply to major deficits.

And this is not just a matter of childhood. After seventy years I keep
learning new things about the barrier of the visible difference. Recently when I told a
blind friend of mine who is a lawyer about my head-shaking episode, he asked if I knew how
you are supposed to hold your hand in a court when you are told to raise your right hand.
I said that I had never thought about it but had always assumed that you simply raise your
hand above your head, which is what would seem logical in the circumstances.

"No," he told me, "that isn’t the way it is done.
You raise your hand to shoulder level with the palm out." He went on to tell me that
when he was being sworn in to be admitted to the Bar, he had raised his hand above his
head and that later, one of his classmates had told him how the customary ritual is
performed.

It is important to understand the significance of this incident. There
is nothing better about raising the hand to the shoulder than over the head. It
doesn’t make one a better lawyer or a better witness in court. My friend is an
excellent attorney, and I have testified in court on more than one occasion. We are simply
dealing with a custom of society, a visible difference.

More than anything else (at least, unless one is aware of it and thinks
about it) meaningless visible differences can lead to confusion and misunderstanding, and
sometimes even to misplaced feelings of superiority or inadequacy. A thing that looks
beautiful to the eye, for instance, can feel ugly and dirty to the touch. Again, let me
illustrate. Once when I was four or five, my mother and father took me to the county fair.
This was a big event.

We lived about fourteen miles from the county seat, and we didn’t
have a car. Very few people did in those days, so friends and neighbors pooled their
transportation and helped each other with rides.

On this particular occasion my mother and I were standing at one of the
booths at the fair. In retrospect it must have been one of those places that give prizes
for throwing darts, tossing rings, or something of the sort. Regardless of that, the woman
in charge gave me a small statue of a horse. As I think back on it, she may have done it
because I was blind, or simply because she thought I was a cute kid. For purposes of my
story, it doesn’t matter.

The horse must have been quite pretty, for both the woman and my mother
kept exclaiming about it. It was apparently covered with some sort of sparkly gold paint.
To the eye I assume that it was extremely attractive, but to me it just felt dirty and
grungy.

Now, I had never before had a small gold horse or, for that matter, any
other kind of horse, or very many nice toys of any kind-so I was pleased and ecstatic with
my treasure. But I thought I ought to clean it up and try to make it look nice.

Therefore, while my mother and the woman were talking, I busily
scratched all of the rough-feeling gold paint off of it. It was quite a job. By the time I
had finished, my horse felt clean and attractive. I was proud of it. Imagine, then, my
disappointment and chagrin when my mother and the woman noticed what I had done and were
absolutely dismayed. I couldn’t understand why they were unhappy, and they
couldn’t understand why I felt that the horse was better for my effort. Again, I had
bumped head-on into the barrier of the visible difference.

Unlike the head-shaking incident, this was not exactly a matter of
learning correct information. If a thing looks better to the eye and feels worse to the
touch, that doesn’t make it better or worse. It simply means a different point of
view, a visible difference.

I thoroughly understand that we live in a world that is structured for
the sighted, so if a blind person intends to get along and compete in society, he or she
must learn how the sighted feel and what they think is beautiful and attractive. But this
has nothing to do with innate loveliness or quality. It is simply a visible difference.

As a matter of fact, although I wouldn’t scratch the paint off of
it if I met it today, that horse of my childhood would feel just as dirty to me now as it
did then. A few years ago when I went to Athens, I was invited (no, urged) to handle a
variety of sculptures. They may have looked beautiful, and I have no doubt that they did;
but they didn’t feel beautiful-at least, not to me. They felt dirty, and I wanted a
good hand-washing after feeling them. Hopefully this does not mean that I am either a
barbarian or a boor, only that my way of appreciating beauty may have something to do with
the fact that I touch instead of look.

Do not make the mistake of thinking that it is only the blind who get
stuck on the barrier of the visible difference. The sighted do it, too-repeatedly, every
day. Recently when I was in the hospital, I was being taken to the x-ray department for
tests. On the way I had to stop to go to the bathroom. As I came out, a hospital official
(I think she was a nurse) saw me and exclaimed, in what I can only describe as panic:

"Catch him! He’s going to fall. His eyes are closed."

My wife explained to her that I am blind and that my eyes are usually
closed. It made no difference.

"It doesn’t matter," she said. "Hold him. His eyes
are closed. He will fall." This woman is not abnormal or unusually jumpy, nor (at
least, as far as I can tell) is she stupid. She is simply so accustomed to the fact that
sighted people look about them to keep their bearings that she cannot imagine that sight
and balance have nothing to do with each other. If I had thought it wouldn’t have
upset her, I would have asked her if she believed she would be unable to stand up in a
totally dark room.

During that same hospital stay, when I stepped into another bathroom,
the nurse turned the light on for me even though I told her in a light and pleasant tone
that I didn’t need it. She said she would turn it on anyway. It was clear that she
felt uncomfortable to have me in the bathroom in the dark. Obviously this is not a major
matter. It simply shows that we feel uneasy when something violates (even benignly) our
routine patterns.

And these are not isolated instances. Every day letters and articles
come to my attention to prove it.

A journalist from Ohio writes to say that the blind need special
fishing facilities-and he will lobby the government to help make it happen. He
doesn’t say why we can’t fish in the regular way like everybody else, which many
of us do all of the time.

A locksmith from Wisconsin believes the blind would benefit from
specially shaped door knobs (oval and textured, he thinks), and he is willing to design
them. A pilot from Pennsylvania thinks we should solve any problems we have with the
airlines by setting up an airline of our own, and he will help fly the planes.

A man from Minnesota believes that blind alcoholics cannot benefit from
regular programs used by the sighted and suggests separate services. Some years ago the Manchester
Union Leader, one of New Hampshire’s most prominent newspapers, said that the
governor of the state was so bad that only the deaf, the dumb, and the blind could believe
he was competent.

These few illustrations are not a complete list, of course, but only a
sampling. Moreover, I am not talking about all of the sighted. An increasing number are
coming to understand and work with us. They give us some of our strongest support.

Nor am I saying that the sighted are hostile toward us. Quite the
contrary. Overwhelmingly the members of the sighted public wish us well and have good will
toward us. It is simply that they are used to doing things with visual techniques, and
when they look at a blind person, they see something to which they are not accustomed-what
I call the barrier of the visible difference.

Most sighted people take it for granted that doing something with
eyesight is better than doing it some other way. Visual techniques are sometimes superior
to non-visual techniques, and sometimes not. Sometimes the non-visual way of doing a thing
is better. Usually, however, it isn’t a matter of better or worse but just
difference.

This brings me to my experience with the National Federation of the
Blind. I first became acquainted with the Federation almost fifty years ago, and it has
done more than anything else in my life to help me gain balance and perspective-to
understand that the barrier of the visible difference need not be a major obstacle, either
for me or my sighted associates.

With more than fifty thousand active members throughout the nation, the
National Federation of the Blind is leading the way in making it possible for blind people
to have normal, every day lives. We of the Federation seek out parents and help them
understand that their blind children can grow up to be productive citizens. We work with
blind college students, giving scholarships and providing successful role models. Blind
seniors make up an important part of the organization, helping and encouraging each other
and exchanging ideas and information. We develop new technology for the blind and assist
blind persons in finding jobs.

All of this is what we of the National Federation of the Blind do to
help ourselves and each other, but the chief value of the organization is the way it helps
us look at our blindness and the way it helps sighted people understand and accept. We who
are blind know that with reasonable opportunity and training we can earn our own way in
the world, compete on terms of equality with others, and lead ordinary, worthwhile lives.
We do not feel that we are victims, or that society owes us a living or is responsible for
our problems. We believe that we ought to do for ourselves and that we also should help
others. These attitudes are the heart and soul of the National Federation of the Blind.
They constitute its core beliefs and reason for being.

We go to meet the future with joy and hope, but we recognize that we
need help from our sighted friends. If we do our part, we are confident that the needed
help will be forthcoming. We also know that both we and the sighted can surmount the
barrier of the visible difference and reduce it to the level of a mere inconvenience.

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