Unworthy of beggers' attention

Walking through the underpass on the way home from work, passing a begger:

“Got any loose change please Sir? … Oh sorry mate I didn’t realise you’re blind, sorry mate”

Well, that put me in my place, I clearly came somewhere further down in his perception of the pecking order.

How to spot an expert

I’ve always felt uncomfortable about the way that some of those people who work with “the blind” actually interact with blind people ourselves.. However, it’s often very subtle and has been hard to put my finger on just what it is that produces the discomfort. Some of it is about the philosophy (at least the historical philosophy) of the charities, some of it is about the way that people in the “care industry” learn to view their service users and some can be directly related to the kind of information that people are given on so called vision awareness training courses.

Some indicators
v They often refer to us as Vis (visually impairds)
v They have an air of slightly over-confident familiarity
v They often speak just a little too loudly – possibly so that others won’t think that they’re blind too and will realise that they’re doing good work, possibly even that they’re wanting people to realise that they know a blind person (“some of my best friends are blind…”)
v They do everything just that bit too properly – they know how to ask you if you want something, how to describe things, how to guide you – but not in a way that shows real respect, care or interest
v They have a way of maintaining their act even when you don’t comply with it.
v They often fall back on poor counselling techniques when they feel a bit uncomfortable
v They have a way of asking in a very knowing and sincere voice “Are you partial or total?”

Right place at the wrong time/the blind leading the blind

I was walking through Stokes Croft, a young guy calls out to me, I go over, turns out he is blind.

“Mate, can you tell me where Picton Street is”
“Yeah, you’re really close, you’ve just passed the entrance, so if you turn round and follow the pavement back round to the left, it will take you straight into it.

“Cheers mate”.

He turned round and followed my directions, heading into Picton Street. I was going the same way and said:

“It’s difficult round this bit isn’t it, I’m blind too”

The guy stopped in his tracks, said
“Oh fucking forget it then”
He turned round and walked off in the direction he’d been going orriginally, away from Picton St.

Blind by association

Just read a short article by Damon Rose, who apparently edits a BBC disability web newsletter http://www.bbc.co.uk/ouch/columnists/damon/020206.shtml

I found the writing irritating, however I do understand something of his feelings and have had not dissimilar reactions when apparently associated with either “the stereotype” or with the behaviour of an individual blind person.

The article was telling a story of a blind man who, while shopping for clothes with his wife, apparently began to undress in the midst of the shop rather than use the changing room. I rather liked the picture that it conjured up, wouldn’t it be nice if everyone had such a low degree of self-consciousness. The inference is that the guy had such poor spatial and self-awareness that he didn’t know where he was.

The article writer was (I thought) slightly too perturbed by it and clearly worried that he too might be expected to undress next time he is in Gap.

I don’t want to disassociate myself from the embarrassment wholly though, I find myself irritated by this guy’s teenage tantrum style of writing, but I too can feel embarrassed at what I worry might be assumed of me because of the behaviour, lifestyle… whatever, of other blind people.

There is of course a societal dimension to this. Blind people have traditionally been kept out of the way in special schools, colleges, residential homes, workplaces (or types of work), social activities – in many ways, those less advantaged blind people still are and I think that it is those groups that give weight to the stereotype. For those of us who aren’t or hope that we’re not like that stereotype, what’s the embarrassment about? I think it’s about non-acceptance of our own blindness, these people who are on the edge, who don’t really seem like they are very aware of the world represent the thing we most hate in ourselves – blindness.

It’s the same at special schools, far from being places of support, mutual understanding, learning how to be “blind and strong” they are places where there are strong hierarchies of sightedness, even amongst totally blind people there’s a hierarchy of mobility (spatial awareness, confidence, training really).

It would be nice if we were all so used to seeing disabled people around, that the strange behaviour of one had no impact upon the external or internal expectations of others. It worries me most though when people like this guy who wrote the article unselfconsciously have such a big reaction to it without wondering where he is in the picture.

Which is more embarrassing I wonder, being associated with someone who (apparently) accidentally drops his trousers in public, or some loud mouthed over-self-conscious little guy having a tantrum in public. I know which of these two I’d rather be associated with.