You are correct. But what we are talking about is not how to deal with a
specific case like this. But we should have  a philosophically correct
guide in our mind when we cope with this kind of problem. First thing we
need to remember is that we are a group. Whatever I do would affect the
the sighted people's impression about the blind. In this materialize and
scientific society, business won't do anything without benefit; people
won't believe anything without seeing it. If you are a congenitally blind
person, you can not perceive a visual beauty or a colorful object no
matter how much the sighted people describe it to you. So I would say that
indoctrination or a law force is not an efficient or best way to solve
this problem. It should be the last choice. The first question I often ask
myself and my friends is "did I do my best?"

Ren Wang


On Thu, 15 Jan 1998, Johan Roos wrote:

> Peter Seymour writes in part:
> "The true measure of a civilization is in its use of persuasion instead of
> force, wherever possible."
>
> Yes, indeed, wherever possible is the operative phrase.  If blind people
> are serious about their liberation they have a lot which can be learnt from
> other more successful minorities.  It is no coincidence that the social and
> economic position of the visually disabled is as bad as it is.
>
> The trouble with the proponents of the persuasion method is not that they
> are not civilized.  It is, however, that those people are still caught up
> in the belief that blind people must make themselves acceptable to society.
>  So far so good.  Of course blind people must make themselves acceptable to
> society, but their duty to do so does not arise from the fact that they are
> blind.  It arises from the fact that they are human.  Where attitudes of
> society are unacceptable and where the law says that they are unacceptable,
> it is outrageous to suggest that a lawsuit would be socially inapropriate.
> It is outrageous simply because if the guy has a case, telling him that
> relying on his rights are inapropriate is, quite plainly, uncivilized.
>
> Patric was quite right.  We did not receive a sufficient level of
> information.  Speaking for myself, I did not understand the first bit of
> what the problem was all about.  But it is lazy in the extreme to make
> presuppositions without information and moreover arrogant to tell other
> people what to do about a situation while one is basically uninformed.
>
> JR
>