Comments on: A horror of pity http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm Talking about Body Integrity Identity Disorder - Just another disability! Fri, 09 Jan 2009 23:14:44 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7-beta2 hourly 1 By: lucien http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm/comment-page-1#comment-3333 lucien Mon, 02 Apr 2007 02:34:24 +0000 http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm#comment-3333 I have run into this same problem as you, except I seem to be blessed with the knowledge of: at least someone knows, and that someone also understands it and is ok (that someone is a mom). We get along really well. I know how hard it was to tell her how I actually wanted this to happen, how I felt perfectly normal while doing it, but she took it nice and easy. I was so embarrased, I wrote a note while she wasn't in the room, gave her the note all folded up, and went outside and walked around. When I came back in, we had a nice discussion about it, and she said it didn't bother her. My dad, unfortunately, did not take it nicely. He actually went searching through my history folder, then tried to cover up his dissapointment and anger with a common: the internet is a bad place, and now is definitely not the time to have free run of it. However, my dad is the type of person who does not easily understand things that are different from him, so I wasn't surprised. I guess my point is that the reaction you get totally depends on what the person that you are telling believes and is ok with. Knowing them well makes it a million times easier and less stressful. I have run into this same problem as you, except I seem to be blessed with the knowledge of: at least someone knows, and that someone also understands it and is ok (that someone is a mom). We get along really well. I know how hard it was to tell her how I actually wanted this to happen, how I felt perfectly normal while doing it, but she took it nice and easy. I was so embarrased, I wrote a note while she wasn’t in the room, gave her the note all folded up, and went outside and walked around. When I came back in, we had a nice discussion about it, and she said it didn’t bother her. My dad, unfortunately, did not take it nicely. He actually went searching through my history folder, then tried to cover up his dissapointment and anger with a common: the internet is a bad place, and now is definitely not the time to have free run of it. However, my dad is the type of person who does not easily understand things that are different from him, so I wasn’t surprised.
I guess my point is that the reaction you get totally depends on what the person that you are telling believes and is ok with. Knowing them well makes it a million times easier and less stressful.

]]> By: rorschach http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm/comment-page-1#comment-526 rorschach Mon, 15 Jan 2007 11:04:05 +0000 http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm#comment-526 To get a bit nitpicky, I think you're giving pity a bit of a bad rap. I understand your view that pity can be damaging, and I agree that in too great a quantity it can. It seems as if society has corralled the disabled into a few arenas in which they may be appreciated pity is definitely one of them. However; pity in itself is rather positive. To begin with it is, as compared to the wide range of emotional responses available, take an extreme like hatred for example, quite preferable. Pity, despite its sorrowful elements also includes an element of sympathy. I see a lot of people in the world mistreating one another often without reason; and so it is with this contrast that I have found it much easier to swallow the somewhat bitter pill of pity. To borrow and modify a line from Bob Dylan, in this world of steel eyed death and men who are fighting to be warm, pity is shelter from the storm. I think a lot of the "pitifying", if you'll let me create that word, of the disabled is due to the effect groups such as Hallmark have had (The Hallmark Effect). It has been found that sap sells, and because of this the disabled have been exploited. There exists a class of people who will respond quite strongly to a variety of emotionally products, such as tear jerkers, feel goods etc. Due to this natural tendency to sympathize, and the accompanying tendency to pay money to do so, the disabled have become easily exploited. A lack of an adequate and competitive media presence which would offer alternate representations of the disabled has whittled the public perception of the disabled down to a few marketable characteristics, their “need” for pity being at the forefront. Overall, yes the current situation is one out of balance; however, all things considered pity by itself is not such a bad feeling to have. To get a bit nitpicky, I think you’re giving pity a bit of a bad rap. I understand your view that pity can be damaging, and I agree that in too great a quantity it can. It seems as if society has corralled the disabled into a few arenas in which they may be appreciated pity is definitely one of them.

However; pity in itself is rather positive. To begin with it is, as compared to the wide range of emotional responses available, take an extreme like hatred for example, quite preferable. Pity, despite its sorrowful elements also includes an element of sympathy. I see a lot of people in the world mistreating one another often without reason; and so it is with this contrast that I have found it much easier to swallow the somewhat bitter pill of pity. To borrow and modify a line from Bob Dylan, in this world of steel eyed death and men who are fighting to be warm, pity is shelter from the storm.

I think a lot of the “pitifying”, if you’ll let me create that word, of the disabled is due to the effect groups such as Hallmark have had (The Hallmark Effect). It has been found that sap sells, and because of this the disabled have been exploited. There exists a class of people who will respond quite strongly to a variety of emotionally products, such as tear jerkers, feel goods etc. Due to this natural tendency to sympathize, and the accompanying tendency to pay money to do so, the disabled have become easily exploited. A lack of an adequate and competitive media presence which would offer alternate representations of the disabled has whittled the public perception of the disabled down to a few marketable characteristics, their “need” for pity being at the forefront.

Overall, yes the current situation is one out of balance; however, all things considered pity by itself is not such a bad feeling to have.

]]> By: Sean http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm/comment-page-1#comment-439 Sean Sat, 06 Jan 2007 06:38:19 +0000 http://transabled.org/thoughts/a-horror-of-pity.htm#comment-439 Piss on pity! Piss on pity!

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