Blindness Today: The Problems; The Progress; The Possibilities

Blindness Today: The Problems; The Progress; The Possibilities

Future Reflections Fall 1987, Vol. 6 No. 3
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BLINDNESS TODAY: THE PROBLEMS...THE PROGRESS...THE POSSIBILITES
An Introduction to the 1987 Fall/Winter Issue of Future Reflections
"Let anyone try, I will not say to arrest, but to
notice or attend to, the present moment of
time. One of the most baffling experiences occurs.
Where is it, this present? It has melted
in our grasp, fled ere we could touch it, gone
in the instant of becoming."--William James
"Time present and time past Are both perhaps present in time future,

And time future contained in time past."--
Thomas Stearns Eliot
A little boy is approached on the school
playground by a group of his playmates. "Hey
Chaz," the ringleader yells, (feet shuffle, snickers
tremble soundlessly) "You're BL-I-I-ND!" The
little boy turns and faces his would-be tormentor.
Without missing a beat, head held high, he
retorts, "So what!?" then walks away with all the
dignity a five-year-old can muster.
Children, it seems, have a way of getting straight
to the heart of things. The essence of all that can
be said about the problems, progress, and possibilities
of blindness today was contained in that
simple playground episode.
That encounter, by the way, actually occurred to
our blind son four years ago. It was, perhaps, the
first time he had to face squarely the real problem
of blindness. That problem was first defined
nearly fifty years ago when the National Federation
of the Blind was organized. Dr. Jacobus tenBroek
and the other founders of the NFB realized
that the basic problem of blindness was not
the loss of sight but the mistaken public attitudes
about blindness. With training and opportunity blind people could compete on the basis of
equality with their sighted neighbors. It was the
pity, shame, and belief in the inferiority of the
blind which ultimately kept blind people down,
not the lack of sight.
The problem cuts across time. The incident on
the playground happened in my son's "time past."
Yet, it is also a part of his "time present" and "time
future" for as long as my son lives--as a child playing
and learning, as a young man seeking a job
and his place in the world; as a mature man raising
a family and taking part in his community; and
as an old man imparting wisdom to the next
generation--he will have to respond to all the
nuances and meanings our society gives to that
remark, "You Are Blind."
Public attitudes about blindness unite the
young and the old in a common cause.
Public attitudes about blindness unite the young
and the old in a common cause. I once received
a letter from a parent who didn't like one of the
articles I had written. She thought I was wrong to
criticize a parent organization because of its ties
to an agency that has done a great deal of damage
to the blind. She seemed to feel that the problems
of blind children and the problems of blind adults
were separate and distinct. She didn't understand
why the difficulties of blind adults today had anything
to do with her blind child;
The answer to that, of course, was pretty simple.
Peter Pan is a myth. Children do grow up. You
cannot tie up in separate little packages the child
that "is" and the man or woman that "will be."
They flow one into the other. They overlap, they
are intertwined.
And so it is with the blind, children and adults.
The obstacles encountered by the one are impediments
to the progress of the other; advancement
for the one is betterment for the other. And
both young and old will share the future we are
shaping with the actions we take, and the
decisions we make today. This is why the National
Federation of the Blind is so important to all
of us.
Like William James, I, too, find it hard to pin
down the present. But I think that the articles in
this issue, when read together as a whole, give an
accurate sense of blindness today. As you read
you will notice that, although public attitudes
remain the basic problem of blindness, there
have been changes in emphasis and increased
complexities.
For example, where "You are Blind" once meant
total exclusion from society, it now more commonly
means conditional acceptance.
At one time it was just assumed that blind people
couldn't--couldn't work, couldn't keep house,
couldn't go to school with sighted children--just
"couldn't." Today, the tone is more of a "Yes,
but..."
--"Yes, I believe that you can work.. .but not in
my business."
--"Of course you can ski in a special
program...but don't take weight-class at
school. You'll hurt yourself."
--"You can go to college...but we'll hire and supervise
the readers and make all the special arrangements
for you."
--"Yes, your son can go to public school.. .but our
Vision teacher has never taught Braille, and
she can see him only once a week."
--"I suppose it's all right for you to have a family.
. .just don't watch my kids."
The problems this new element of conditional acceptance
poses for the blind--and the progress
the blind are making through the National
Federation of the Blind--are addressed
throughout the articles in this issue. It is expressed
with particular poignancy in "Whose
Blindness Is It?" the story of a young blind
mother's struggle to be accepted as an equal.
There are other problems facing the blind which
are also signs of progress. It is well known, for example,
that progress toward first-class citizenship
has never been made for any minority group
without some hostility, even violence. The blind
are no exception.
It is well known, for example, that
progress toward first-class citizenship
has never been made for any minority group without some hostility, even
violence. The blind are no exception.
This is hard for many people to understand. Pity
and charity have so long dominated the thinking
of the public regarding the blind, that most
people find it inconceivable that anyone could
act with ill will or physical force against the blind.
It is true that most members of the public--if
properly educated- -are willing to give up their
feelings of pity and superiority and accept the
blind as equals. But others are not. Out of insecurity
and fear they react with animosity, even
violence, to this new "breed" of blind people who
don't know their "place." The article "Air Travel
and the Blind: What is the Problem, What is the Remedy," describes this new element in the
problems and advancement of the blind today.
But this new struggle in the progress of the blind
would not even be possible if enough blind
people had not rejected society's concept of the
blind as inferior objects of pity. This repudiation
of the element of shame among the blind themselves
is a direct result of the activities of the National
Federation of the Blind.
For many years the National Federation of the
Blind has been working to make the theme "It is
respectable to be blind" a reality for blind people
in this country. The theme is a direct attack on
the element of shame and inferiority that continues
to haunt the blind. It is behind every public
education effort, every civil rights suit, every article
in the Braille Monitor and Future Reflections.
It is the driving force behind legislative efforts,
seminars for parents of blind children, seminars
for blind adults, and the tons of free literature
distributed each year.
And it is working. The little boy on the
playground, my son, is one example. Because of
the National Federation of the Blind, Chaz has
been raised to believe that it is O.K. to be blind.
Blind adults have been always present for him as
role models. They have been his baby sitters, they
have cooked for him, played with him, read to
him, disciplined him, and have been there to
show him, in all ways, that it IS respectable to be
blind.
Many of these blind adults are, like him, partially
sighted and can use their vision to read large
print or do other tasks visually. He has also seen
how these adults use blind techniques when their
vision isn't efficient. More importantly, he has
seen for himself that they are not ashamed to be
identified as blind.
His response on the playground that day was, I
believe, a direct result of the kind of positive exposure
he has had to blindness. Without it, his
reaction would have been quite different.
I believe he could have accepted the comment
"You're BL-I-I-ND!" as the accusation and putdown
that it was intended to be. "I am not!" he
could have yelled; his voice full of anger, fear, and
shame. And inside his head the wheels would be
turning. "It's bad to be blind. You aren't as good
as everybody else if you are blind. Maybe if I deny
it and fake sight, nobody will know that I'm not
as good as they are. But what if they don't believe
me? What if I lose more sight some day and can't
fake it anymore? What will happen to me then?"
And why do I believe that this is what could have
happened? Because that is the story I have heard
from literally hundreds of blind, partially sighted
adults who grew up with those very feelings.
Their parents did not have, as parents today have,
the resouces of the National Federation of the
Blind to draw upon. They did not have Future
Reflections, the Braille Monitor, and the NFB
Parents Division to help them understand that it
is respectable to be blind.
Other blind children and adults are also shedding
the legacy of shame and denial with the help of
the National Federation of the Blind. Read the
presidential report in this issue which outlines
the progress made by the NFB in 1987; read the
article about the blind youngster in Boone, Iowa;
and read the story of the mother in Illinois. But,
the progress is not universal. For many blind
children and adults the only way out from under
the burden of shame our society places on the
blind is denial. Tragically, this unhealthy
response to blindness is actively perpetuated by-of
all groups-- the very professionals who purport
to serve the blind.
In education, for example, teachers are no longer
teachers of the blind or Braille teachers. They are
not even called teachers of the visually impaired-they
are "vision" teachers! The new title accurately
describes both the emphasis and attitudes
educators today take toward blindness. If
a technique is visual, it's good. If it's a blind technique--such
as Braille--it is inherently inferior
and you don't teach it unless you have to. Their
attitude toward blindness is as obvious as if they
shouted it from the rooftops, "Blind people are
inferior."
One of the consequences of this attitude is a
generation of blind children who are being
denied the opportunity to learn Braille and are,
therefore, functionally illiterate. This dangerous
trend, and what the National Federation of the
Blind is doing about it, is discussed in the article
"A Taste of Rarebit" by Dr. Jernigan.
Yet, despite these problems, the progress the
blind have made is tremendous. And so are the
possibilities. The opportunity for employment
and full participation in the community is greater
than it has ever been for the blind. But the blind
have not come to this point through accident or
chance. Life is better for the blind because the
blind, working through their own organization,
the National Federation of the Blind, have made
it so.
Life is better for the blind because the
blind, working through their own
organization, the National Federation of
the Blind, have made it so.
And any progress made in the future will come
the same way, through the hard work and commitment
of blind people and their sighted friends
and relatives--including, and especially, the
parents of blind children.
Join your local and state chapters of the National
Federation of the Blind. If there is an NFB
Parent's Division in your area, join it. If not, help
us organize one. Our collective efforts can bring
about so much faster all the brightest hopes and
aspirations we hold for our children who happen
to be blind.
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