Miriam, while I understand that you are not looking for a pat on the
back, nonetheless, I want you to know that you have inspired me more
often than you know. Your posts often challenge me to think in
different ways, and the articles you post help to keep me on track.
That being said, getting old is a challenge all by itself. What's the
old quote? "go gentle into the night"? Well, I'm going kicking and
snorting. Adjusting to blindness was one huge challenge. But I was
just turning 30, and believed I could slay dragons. At 83, I am
learning what real challenges are all about. Presently my situation
is not as difficult as yours, but life is certainly different than it
was only a few short years ago.
As difficult as it has become for you to continue on Blind Democracy,
I am thankful for the effort you make.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/17/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Penny,
Thank you. That's very kind. I suppose that all these people, the ones I'm
talking about, are personnel in the medical offices I visit. (smile).
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Penny Reeder
Sent: Monday, December 17, 2018 12:59 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Ah Sweet Memories...and Some Not So Sweet
Miriam, anyone who knows you even a little bit would be foolish, indeed, to
think of you as "no account!" You are a fierce advocate, and despite your
personal misgivings, a woman who is strong when she needs to be, and a
person who is kind to others and strives to understand and accept human
frailties.None of these aspects of your character can be discounted or
ignored!
Penny
On 12/17/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Undoubtedly, we who are blind, are just as good as any other human being.
But there are two separate issues here. One is the emotional feeling
of being different, of being unacceptable, that many of us absorbed
growing up, from the spoken and unspoken messages that we received from
sighted people.
And however inaccurate those messages were, they were truthful in one
respect. They told us that from the point of view of most sighted
people, we were unacceptable. We made them uncomfortable. They didn't
want to be intimately involved with us. They didn't want us in their
daily lives. That is a fact and it has to do with their fear and panic
about blindness.
Because it has to do with their feelings, there's not a thing we can
do about it, except to try to help them feel a bit more comfortable.
The other issue is that blindness is not just a nuisance. It is a severe
disability.
Different people adjust to it differently. Some people are extremely
capable human beings. Some are not. But however capable and adept one
is, and however well one learns to compensate for lack of sight, it's
imperative to have sighted folks in one's life to help out. I've
encountered blind people who've swallowed the NFB mythology as
completely as Evangelical Christians accept the mythology taught to
them. And some of these blind people then feel bad because they can't live
up to the standards set for them.
As for me right now in 2018, I have numerous disabilities and medical
issues which interact with a loss of just about all of my useable
vision. All I have is some ability to see shadows through a very thick
fog and light perception. My cornea is deteriorating. And my glaucoma
medication is no longer working properly to control the pressure in the
one eye that works.
Last week, I had laser surgery which brought tne pressure down a bit,
but not nearly enough. Given the fact that I can't stand without
holding onto something, or walk without a walker, that my hearing is
bad, that my short term memory is bad, I'd say that I'd be doing a
hell of a lot better if I could see more than I do. And because I am
an old woman with so many disabilities, I have no agency, no social
power. People are kind to me, patronizing, but they think that I am of
no account. Given my stubborn nature and my tendency to rebel, it's a
rather untenable situation.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Monday, December 17, 2018 10:48 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Ah Sweet Memories...and Some Not So Sweet
Miriam,
Yes. I believed I was not visually impaired as a child. Even wearing
bifocals and not being able to read without them. Even not being able
to read the blackboards in class. Even having to stand for several
minutes against the wall when entering a dark room or a theater until
my eyes adjusted so I could make out shapes. Until I had a detached
retina at 17, and a blind man came to the door while I was recovering
from unsuccessful eye surgery and told me I could probably attend the
Washington State School for the Blind, I had never before considered my
eyes to be, "That Bad".
Later my mother told me that the school nurse had also suggested that
I should attend the Sight Saver Program at Warren Avenue school. My
mother met with someone at the school and toured the class. She told
me many years later that she could not put her son in a class of such
weird children.
Today if I had the same amount of sight, I might be considered a very
high partial, or mildly visually impaired. But because of the
cataract surgery I had at the age of four, my eyes took a very long
time to adjust to light changes.
I could not drive at night because the headlights of passing cars left
me in absolute blackness for several seconds. After the retina
surgery I had only one eye, which affected my depth perception. Not a
great deal, but enough that even though I took and passed driver's
training, I never applied for a driver's license.
Probably my sight was less dependable than I thought, but I believe,
looking back, that I made every effort to pass for "normal".
Once I became totally blind, I bent every effort to "look normal".
Those were my words at the time. I was afraid people would see me and
"know I was blind". So the NFB was a natural fit for me. Jacobus
tenBroek's speeches moved me, and Kenneth Jernigan's brilliance as a
promoter drew me right in. I owe the NFB a huge thanks for the
emotional support I received, and the connections that gave me entry
into my career in the field of work with the blind.
As an adult, I met a number of those children my mother thought were
so weird. And yes, some of them grew up to be weird adults. But they
are also my friends and associates in the struggle to ensure that
today's blind children are raised in a more positive environment, so
they avoid the ignorance that was the basis for their own behavior.
I will always thank my mother and dad for all that they did to assist
me in living the life I have lived. But even Saints have feet of
clay. In an effort to teach me to stand on my own two feet, my
mother...and to some extent my dad, implanted the impression that
being blind was something to be avoided at all costs. Of course the
sighted public also helped drive the message home.
But today, after a long wandering trip, I can honestly say that I am
every bit as good a human being as anyone...including Mother Teresa.
And so are you, Miriam.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/16/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Carl,
I was thinking about you and the fact that you've said that you were
visually impaired as a youngster. I'm not denying that fact, but from
what you've written, you were not nearly as disabled as I was as a
child. My early childhood memories are filled with visits to the eye
doctor and eye surgeries. And when I didn't have actual surgery, I
was examined in an operating room under ether because it was easier
for the doctor to examine my eyes when I was under anesthetic. I was
profoundly affected by those experiences. I was phobic, for one thing.
I was terrified of shoe stores because back then, shoe salesman wore
light colored jackets and I thought they were doctors. I was
frightened of a lot of other things as well, walking on a lawn, at
one point. For years, in high school, college, and graduate school,
when I was in a class where certain medical conditions or procedures
were described, I'd feel faint and have to leave the room. At one
point, many years later, I was with my husband at a doctor's
appointment and I smelled ether and felt panicky. And I believe that
having always seen myself as different and damaged, had a very
negative effect on my outlook on life. You are upbeat. I am not. Of
course, there are other things as well.
You're male and part of the white majority, and it is only in
retrospect, that you define yourself as a visually impaired child.
But when you were a child, you didn't see yourself as different or
damaged. I'm female and knew that I was a member of a minority group
that was disliked by a majority of Americans during my formative
years. When you became blind, you joined an organization that taught
its members that blindness isn't a handicap, only a nuisance, and
that message was drummed into its members just as relentlessly as
Christianity was by the church you joined. But my first encounter
with blindness was when I was seven years old and my parents enrolled
me for piano lessons at the Lighthouse in Manhattan, and I then began
attending the children's recreation program. And within a year I went
to the summer camp run by the New York Institute for the Blind. I
won't go into what that summer camp was like because it would take
too long to do so right now. But as a naïve partially sighted child,
encountering totally blind children, some of whom were very weird, to
put it mildly, for the first time, was a shock. And it caused all
kinds of identity issues which didn't become resolved for decades.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, December 16, 2018 8:27 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: The New York Times' Shameful Obituary
of Historian William Blum
In order to save costs, newspapers used very cheap paper and cheap
ink. The result was print that was not clean. It also rubbed off on
the hands. After going through a paper the size of the NY Times, or
the Seattle Times, my hands would be black. In 1945 I carried the
Seattle Star, a six day a week paper. No Sunday edition. After
folding a paper and tossing it onto the customer's porch, my shirt
would come untucked and I'd shove it into my pants. After about
forty papers were delivered I headed home. I can remember looking
down at my shirt as I rounded the last turn and heading for the door.
Black!
My shirt front was black. I had not noticed it until I was just
about home, where I would encounter the wrath of my mother.
Of course she laid into me, telling me of how hard it was to keep
running the washing machine, and how I should think of all that when
I was getting my hands all dirty. Naturally I hadn't thought about
it, or I wouldn't have touched my shirt, thus avoiding the strong
lecture and the slaps. But as an adult I passed much of the blame
back to mother...not that she had any control over our poor income.
But mother bought my shirts at the J. C.
Penney bargain basement and at a couple of dime stores that carried
some cheap clothing. Woolworth and Kress. I was long in the waist
and the cheap shirts had almost no shirt tail for tucking in.
Because we had to be frugal and buy on the cheap, I wore holes in my
socks, holes in the soles of my shoes, and wore my shirts and pants a
second year. Since I was growing straight up like a weed, by the end
of the first year my sleeves were already above my wrists, and my
pants were above my ankles.
We lived in a very small, poorly built house on the side of a very
steep hill. A switchback path snaked up the hill from the highway,
past our kitchen door and on up to a dirt road above us. We did have
a grand view of Lake Union and beyond Capital Hill we looked at the
snow capped Cascades.
That highway went from Canada to Mexico, highway 99. It sounded like
an angry river during the day. At least we lived high above it, out
of range of the fumes that blackened the houses along the sides.
Growing up as a visually impaired boy, long before anyone ever said,
"visually impaired", and being among the very poor in a community of
upper middle Class families, had its hard times, but it also
toughened me up, something I would need in later life.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/16/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I grew up as a legally blind person who couldn't see well enough to
read newspapers. Using a magnifying glass was too difficult,
although it helped with reading books. I suppose that the newsprint
was too small. At any rate, I always felt locked out of this really
important source of information until the CCTV reading machine was
developed.
And then, I couldn't afford one until the Ethical Humanist Society
to which we belonged, loaned or gave me the money. I can't remember
which. But that must have been in the mid 1960's. And even then, the
newspaper was too unwieldy to put under the machine. A friend of
mine used to cut out articles for me. It took me a very long time to
discover that the newspaper wasn't necessarily a font of wisdom. One
of the podcasts I listen to is "Citations Needed", and it's all
about how we're manipulated by propaganda that is implanted in the
points of view of news stories. One of the hosts is a reporter for
FAIR, which is a media watchdog. Fair has a podcast called
Counterpunch, a much less sophisticated podcast about the media. But
ever since I began using the computer to read articles and even
before I joined the Blind democracy list, people were sending me
material from alternative news sources and I was also reading
mainstream media stories and was able to understand how facts can be
emphasized or omitted so that my opinions could be manipulated.
After I began reading the material that Sylvie was posting and also
listening to Democracy Now, I began to discover that I could trust
certain journalists more than others, and that I could listen to and
read a number of articles about an issue, and come to my own
tentative conclusion about what the reality might be.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, December 16, 2018 11:05 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: The New York Times' Shameful Obituary
of Historian William Blum
According to undocumented scraps of yellowed notes in my dad's
folder, a distant cousin was one of the founders of the New York Times.
Henry Jarvis Raymond (January 24, 1820 – June 18, 1869) was an
American journalist, politician, and co-founder of The New York
Times, which he founded with George Jones.
Obviously Henry Jarvis Raymond came from the wealthy, conservative
side of the family forest. The "Pure" Jarvis stock had been settled
in the Grafton, (West)Virginia since the mid 1750's...at least.
They were mostly working class. Farmers, miners and Trackers. But
in those days it was not uncommon to be the distant cousin of just
about everybody. I've mentioned that my several times Great Uncle
was Jefferson Davis. An aunt who lived in the Grafton area was Anna
Jarvis, founder of Mother's Day. My grandmother Jarvis' brothers,
Samuel and James Hickman, and a cousin John Hickman were all pastors
of large congregations. But my direct linage consisted of miners,
loggers, farmers and Radicals. Searching back to John Jarvis, a
farmer in (West)Virginia, I seem to be the first Jarvis in that
line, who attended college.
But back to the New York Times. It was nicknamed, "The Gray Lady".
I used to buy a copy at the news stand on my way home from the
Drapery Factory. If I found a seat on the bus, I'd read the
Editorial section and leave most of the paper on the bus. The
majority of the NY Times was about as bland as the Seattle Times(no
connection) only bigger.
Going back to the mid 1950's, I can't figure out how that paper
earned the label of Liberal Press. For much of my youth, I trusted
the major papers, believing that they reported All the news. But as
I grew up, I saw how the Press could manipulate the news, and which
news was published, and which was not. I saw honest, caring people
crucified because they held different opinions than those of the
Nation's Masters. I saw my name and my fiancee's name(later my
wife, Cathy)dragged through the Seattle PI. I watched as close
friends of my parents were labelled Communists, and fired from their
jobs. And later, I watched as close friends of Cathy's and mine
were attacked by so called investigative reporters, and left wounded
by the side of the road. I learned to never trust a word I read
until I have proof that it represents factual information.
Seldom has the Working Class had a national Public Platform, a
People's Press.
And the experiment called PBS has been corrupted by the private
sector until it no longer, if it ever did, represents the voice of
the people.
If we are going to fight for Truth, then we must explore everything
we hear.
Find the source. Learn what is driving the people behind the news.
Engage one another in dissecting the day's news. Find out why
certain news reports are not put forth.
Protecting our freedom is constant hard work. Not that we should
turn our backs on the joys of life, but we must be aware that if we
do not maintain a free press, we will lose what free choice we still
have.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/15/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well, there are two things to consider in relation to this. First,
the guy who wrote the obituary is not a Liberal. He's a Conservative.
Second, if the New York Times were ever a liberal paper, it changed
quite a while ago, certainly by the time it unquestioningly
supported W. Bush's story about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
Actdually, I think perhaps there's a third point to make, which is
that probably The New York Times was never as liberal as everyone
thought it was.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Saturday, December 15, 2018 5:11 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: The New York Times' Shameful
Obituary of Historian William Blum
So Donald Trump believes the Press is Liberal?
Carl Jarvis
On 12/15/18, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The New York Times' Shameful Obituary of Historian William Blum
Jens Schott Knudsen / Flickr
You know you’ve lived well-well enough to rattle the
establishment-when the New York Times smears you in the obituary
it runs about you (FAIR.org, 6/20/13).
That distinction was achieved by William Blum, historian and
critic of US foreign policy. Once a State Department computer
programmer who aspired to “take part in the great anti-Communist
crusade,” he quit government in
1967 out of disgust with the Vietnam War and became a founding
editor of the Washington Free Press, one of the first alternative
papers of the New Left.
In books like The CIA: A Forgotten History (re-released as Killing
Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II) and
Rogue
State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower, Blum documented the
violent and anti-democratic record of the US empire; he was a
reference that FAIR frequently turned to when noting what was
missing from the corporate media’
s version of history.
How did the New York Times (12/11/18) frame this remarkable life?
With this remarkable headline:
William Blum, US Policy Critic Cited by bin Laden, Dies at 85
Yes, to the Times, the most important thing about Bill Blum’s life
is that Osama bin Laden once remarked to Americans, in a tape
released from hiding, that Rogue State would be “useful for you to
read.”
“Blum denounced the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in New
York and Washington,” obituary writer Sam Roberts acknowledged,
“and said he would not want to live under an Islamic
fundamentalist regime.”
But, Roberts scolded,
“
he did not disavow the recommendation or express regret that bin
Laden, the orchestrator of those attacks, shared his disdain for
the policies carried out by the department where he had once worked.
It’s unclear what formulation Roberts was looking for from Blum;
should he have denied that his book would be “useful…to read,” or
wished aloud that bin Laden had been a supporter of the State
Department policies? There are certainly some policies where you’d
find the State Department, Al Qaeda and the New York Times on one
side, and Blum on the other-such as the invasion of Afghanistan
that bin Laden hoped to provoke with the 9/11 attacks, and the
protection of Idlib, Al Qaeda’s last stronghold in Syria, from
Syrian government attack. Should the Times “express regret” that
it finds itself on the same side as the 9/11 orchestrators? The
editors would no doubt protest that they backed the invasion of
Afghanistan and the defense of Idlib for very different reasons
than Al Qaeda would, but that’s a distinction that they don’t
grant their ideological enemies.
If it wanted to give a better sense of the relationship between
William Blum, the US foreign policy establishment and Islamic
extremism, it might have noted that it was William Blum who
spotted and translated (with David
Gibbs) the interview Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Jimmy Carter’s
national security adviser, gave to the French publication Le
Nouvel Observateur (1/15/98). In the interview, Brzezinski boasted
of launching a secret program in 1979 to undermine the government
of Afghanistan, a covert operation that he correctly predicted
“was going to induce a Soviet military intervention.” Asked by the
interviewer, “Do you regret having supported the Islamic
fundamentalism, having given arms and advice to future terrorists?”
Brzezinski responded:
“
What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or
the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Muslims or the
liberation of Central Europe and the end of the Cold War?
When Brzezinksi died in 2017, his New York Times obituary did not
bear the headline, “Brzezinski, Official Who Boasted of Promoting
Al Qaeda, Dies at 89″-though surely that is more relevant to
Brzezinski’s legacy than bin Laden’s book review is to Blum’s.
The Blum obit achieved what former FAIR staffer Peter Hart
described as “peak NY Times” with this petty put down:
“
He also reiterated his unpopular, but not unique, position that
American intervention abroad had been breeding enemies and
inviting terrorism.
It’s not clear how “unpopular” Blum’s views were-in a 2013 YouGov
poll,
61 percent agreed with the statement, “In the long run, the United
States will be safer from terrorism if it stays out of other
countries’
affairs”
-but what is certainly “not unique” was the Times’ attempt to use
an obituary to settle ideological scores.
Jim Naureckas / FAIR
#al qaeda #cia #jimmy carter #killing hope #new york #new york
times #osama bin laden #
