Trisha,

I've grown up with and met a fairly large number of high intelligence one
percentiles, and if as you claim you are one, then from my point of view,
you occupy a niche of your own.  There are two things about your rant that
strike me as a step forward.: 1) You properly name your usual level of
contibution as the rant it is: one of the nearly acurrate assessments of
your writings I've seen from you.  Congratulations.  2) Other than your
usual confusion and torment with the world as it is, is that you've finally
revealed your contempt and dislike of many of us for not kowtowing to your
totalitarion notions of how "we" should think, feel and behave.

You have still to accept and offer recognition of us adults with Cerebral
Palsy for our lives and experiences historically and currently.  You seem to
assume that who we are and what we know and feel is a result of our
attitudes and outlooks, not our bodies, experiences, economic, social, and
political circumstances  You might not have noticed that you're dealing with
adults here.  I suspect from your attiudes and behavior that you still don't
know what being adult is about, certainly not what being an adult with CP is
about.  You came here to learn.  I doubt that you have.  Indeed, you've done
much to attempt to change and fight with anyone who doesn't agree with you
and much going on before you showed up.  This has not been for the better.

There are many good people here Trisha, that's why I stay.  I trust my
judgements about them and their ways far more than I do yours.  I care about
and respect them far more than I do you.  That's amazing because I'm
tolerant and egalitarian.  I'll keep a light on for you Trisha.  I'll even
say a prayer for you, to my Semitic God, of course.

And Trisha, last I looked ranting Angels wind up in Hell.  Calling yourself
angelic doesn't make you so.





----- Original Message -----
From: "Trisha Cummings" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, May 22, 2000 9:55 AM
Subject: Angels want to rant too!!


>      Well as everyone else rants -
>      I have od'ed on all the hate and exclusionism people love to express.
> You know the my way or the highway, and the everyone is against us. Kinda
> curious how they got the ego to think we have nothing better to do in our
> lives than make theirs miserable on purpose. I find it all too easy to get
> caught up in the web of anger they both exude out of their pores and the
> anger they light in us by making us feel bad and have the need defend
> ourselves. We tend to practice exclusionism until our worlds are very
small
> and we find the facts that fit our way of thinking. I am so far out of
step
> with humanity - its not funny - I look for what I have in common with
folks,
> I accept almost everyone and don't label them by one aspect of their life
(*
> see fotenote) - It comes under the heading of life being like a mirror and
> what reflects back is what you put out. If you seperate yourself with a
> label and ,boy we have lots of little factions with labels and the
> anti-label group - Gays versus Straights,  Disabled versus able bodied -
> Male versus Female - Christians Versus the other 67% of the worlds
religous
> and non religous population, Whites versus Blacks - name a trait you have
> and there will a be factional difference even within the factional
> differences. People seem to have the biggest inferioty complexes and shore
> up themselves up by putting down others. There seem to be three kinds of
> folks - those who takes what happens to them and learn to live with it,
> those who loathe and and hate what happens to them and spend a lot of time
> whining about how awful stuff and people are and how everyone is against -
> and those who look events in the eye and turn them into success stories.
And
> we love their success stories - and then the majority of us go back to
> whining - we missed the point. Just becasue you are brilliant even if you
> are able bodied doesn't mean you get a great job or even a chance at a
great
> job - am fairly abled bodied have an IQ in the top .XX% ( less than 1% of
> the population) and I don't rule the world. Most of us are as focused on
our
> own lives as you are on yours - sorry to tell you - we aren't out oppress
> you - in fact we could give a rats ass about you - becasue like you - we
are
> all about ourselves. If you weren't disabled you wouldn't be screraming
> about disabled rights - you would be screaming about something else being
> unfair. As far as I know life isn't fair for anyone. And you can view life
> from - I coulda been a contender or  I have accomplished x,y,z. I think
the
> more positive focused folks are happier. So often times we don't see the
> lives we touch or the changes we make or the good we do, we can't bring
> everyone online to our way of thinking, but we can always put love and
> positive stuff out there if we have learned enough compassion to realize
how
> fear limits people and that making them fell bad - and it doesn't further
> our causes. The worship of false Gods - Money, Possessions, The Right Way
to
> Think, Act or Believe - doesn't promote unity. Its the love and compassion
> in our hearts that makes the changes and it can't exist in an atmosphere
of
> fear and hatred. I have been a disabilities rights person since I was 12 -
> when I met my friend Tommy - who was thalidimde baby and had those
truncated
> arms. When she moved in to the quarters the kids where afriad to touch her
> and she had joined in out on the playground. I didn't want to touch her
> anymore than anyone else did - but my need to not hurt her feeling was
> stronger than my fear. So, I reached out and took her hand and drew her
into
> our circle and them the other kids accepted her too. No one can ever
> understand life from where you stand - you are unique - but by the same
> token you can't understand it from where they stand either. Normal is a
> point of view - there was point where I looked at regular kids who could
use
> both arms and hands as freakish - becasue normal to me was my one
> armed/handed kid. So I guess the crux of the matter here is - we are
trying
> to remove the splinter in someone else's eye and ignoring the mote in our
> own. Having said all that - there are some real assholes out there - and
> amazing enough - each of us occupies that position to someone else - so be
> humble - the jerk you are putting down - is just you with a different
> subject heading.
>
>                                                       Brightest Blessings
>                                                             Angel
>
> * The exception being - of course  Born Again Christian - or Southern
> Baptists or any other radical fundamentalist group of any religion - I
pity
> them from the bottom of my heart becasue they have turned their backs on
> God, Love and Peace).Llest anyone think I have a problem with all of the
> Once Born Christians) - I only have a problem with the Once Born who have
a
> problem with me. Its that mirror effect.
>