Workers of the World!

[Blue Monkey] I don't think that knife-and-fork usage has got anything to do with being left-handed - my girlfriend is right-handed, and all the left-handed people I know hold the knife and fork in the normal way. As for the attempts to punish left-handers for doing things the "wrong" way around, surely that doesn't happen today? It's the sort of thing that went on in the nineteenth or early twentieth centuries, akin to anti-onanism devices and suchlike.
 
Left-handed workers of the world unite! You must find common cause to join your left hands together and throw off the oppressive yolk of the right-handed elite. Do not allow yourselves to be humiliated any longer by the snobbish superiority of the right ones. Take your left hand from behind your back, do not be left behind, raise your left hand into the air. Raise the left-handed fist of defiance and cry out, "I am not an animal! I.. Am.. A.. Man!"

Unless your a women. In that case, keep your darn hands down and go get us men some food.
 
And we expect nothing less from our resident theologian, thank you very much.
 
Plotinus said:
[Blue Monkey]As for the attempts to punish left-handers for doing things the "wrong" way around, surely that doesn't happen today? It's the sort of thing that went on in the nineteenth or early twentieth centuries, akin to anti-onanism devices and suchlike.
Click to expand...
1960s is hardly "early" 20th, which is when I remember being whacked with a ruler on several occasions for not writing like everyone else. If punishment is strictly physical torture then why does everyone have a problem with what went on in Abu Ghraib? Daily pain and early exhaustion from forced use of backwards tools, as well as the mental stress of living in a mirror world, can at some point be considered punishment. Left-handed tools can be had; usually at 50-100% more cost than what is referred to as the "standard" version, not to mention the difficulty in finding them in the first place. I'm not going to recite the whole list of items I'm aware of that are dextrous by design. But do contemplate the use of screws and scissors. Most of those who haven't experienced things like having their cut and paste Mother's Day cards be the butt of ridicule through no fault of their own year after year wouldn't understand the humiliation of having your essential nature repeatedly and ubiquitously attacked by objects as well as persons. At least I "got" Kafka and PKD in middle school.

And we're talking about discrimination against a whole category of persons, not just random individuals. Frere points out that one of the most effective tools of the oppressor is to get the oppressed to see each other as the enemy, or at least focus on each others as competitors. As an educator I'm sure at some point you've been in those lecture halls with the fold-up writing table or in a classroom where you slide in from one side of the desk because it has a similar writing table. I never saw one in the US in which 12% were left-handed, to match the student population. Try doing 11 years of college when the facility itself hampers your ability to succeed. In one of my doctoral seminars at Columbia University I had to compete with three other left handed students for the single left-handed desk. If I wasn't in the room 1/2 hour to 45 minutes before the professor, I'd end up sitting sideways to use a right-handed desk at an angle where I couldn't both see the board notes and write. Furniture doesn't care about your ethnicity or religion. How's that for punishment?

I'm taking a break from the forums until about the 28th due to RL demands. I look forward to more enjoyable postings both on and off topic by all my never-met friends, and the chance for continued pleasurable collaboration, on my return.
 
I sure you do realize that this is just humor. And yes, our humor is offensive to a certain group of people, but then again... isn't all humor that way?

lighten up! :)

BTW, look forward to see you again
 
No, I don't think humour needs to be offensive - the claim that it does is just the sort of thing that certain kinds of people say to defend the likes of Bernard Manning. And I don't think telling someone who feels discriminated against to "lighten up" is very helpful, no matter what you may think about the justifiability of the grievance.

Anyway, enough of this.
 
I understand left handed scissors, as I tried to use one and made a right mess, but I will never understand the need for left handed items which are simetrical, like pens, or mugs...
 
Blue Monkey makes some very valid points. I was fortunate that I was never punished for using my left hand but I know that even today their remains a strong stigma against left handed people. I served my country in the US military and let me ask anyone that has ever fired a rifle before what side the spent cartridge ejects from? If you are left handed the answer is right across your face. I wasnt aware they made left handed pens and mugs though.
 
Well, I can let you know that I'm finishing off the next batch of workers right now. It's a terribly long process though. Also I've just found that one of them looks terrible if the civ colour is anything other than blue, which means I may have re-render the whole thing, which is a real pain and delays everything.
 
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