It happened right here in the Good Ole U.S of A, in the Midwest, the “Heartland of America.”
The group was from a town about 35 miles south of here. It was one of those outings arranged by senior citizens’ centers.
The two guys were about 65 to 70 years old, white, and judging by their accents, they were “locals.” In a sense, their culture is mine, and I was taught that it’s the height of rudeness to call attention to another’s physical impairments. (As my momma always told me, “If you can’t say anything nice, say nothing at all.”)
Believe it or not, Gest, there is a culture in which these men’s actions would be perfectly acceptable. It’s a tribe known as the Ik, where kindness and love are despised and cruelty is the norm. The weak are preyed upon by their neighbors, children are thrown out of their homes almost as soon as they can walk to fend for themselves, and the old are often cast out to starve on the edge of the villiage. It’s basically every man for himself.
Their culture has only changed to this outlook relatively recently. Massive economic and social upheavals have pretty much destroyed their traditional way of life, leaving the Ik without their social foundations.
I’m a bit diappointed, but I’m not shocked. The small amount of outright nastiness (this discounts stares & weird questions) that I’ve encountered has always come from younger people, but I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that some people either stay nasty for their entire lives or descend into nastiness as they age. Luckily, many more people are kind-hearted, even if some are a bit…misguided.
Well, that narrows it down somewhat. They may be a part of a group that is situationally insensitive (outlaw bikers, nuvo riche, or some such), but it’s more likely that they were somehow intoxicated or just plain old assholes.
For the Ik, this was an environmental adaptation. Living in an extremely harsh environment where the weak would only threaten the lives of the stronger, they adapted a way of life that assisted nature in weeding out the weaker members, thereby assuring the survival of the whole.
Yep, people are that cruel. No need to rely on medical issues when assholishness or stupidity covers most scenarios.
My Dad is an amputee (leg). I had extensive facial scarring from a childhood accident (four operations later, it’s much improved). The things I’ve heard people say to myself, my father or in earshot of either of us is astounding. Or was. I am no longer surprised by people’s unthinking cruelty. Apalled, but not surprised.
You know, I wonder if there is something about museums that attracts the assholes. I’ve been at my museum for over eight years and I’ve never seen the public behave as badly as they do there. I’ve been pinched and cursed. A co-worker got slapped in the face with a book. I’ve known of people who show up day after day just to scream abuse at a worker, until security chases them down. The list of bad behavior is endless.
I am so sorry your boss had to endure that kind of treatment. Unfortunately, I am no longer surprised at people’s ability to inflict cruelty for fun.
I’ve heard about a lot of bad behavior at museums, too.
That being said, :eek: I hate rudeness. I remember my old boss had something wrong with his fingers. The only reason I even noticed is he would always try to hide them, if he saw you looking he’d tuck them away. One was a little stunted, or something.
I never asked…it wasn’t my business. The rude, insensitive girl who sat with us asked him to his face one day. I jumped right in there and made a silly little joke about nosiness, and he was able to drop it.
I can’t understand where these people were raised…somewhere **worse ** than a barn.
OK, I don’t know the situation, but as a general principle, sometimes asking matter of factly and making it clear that it’s not a big deal can do a lot to get rid of the stigma on these sorts of things. Whether the person was rude or whether you just think she was rude because she asked I don’t know, but I think people can ask without being rude.
Elenia28, that’s interesting. See, throughout my upbringing, I was always taught that it is okay to ask someone about a disability. Obviously you need to be polite and respectful about it, but that there is no harm in inquiring.
Essured, if I may ask a bit of a hijack question: a year or so ago, when my son was about 4 or 5 years old, he noticed a man that had the lower part of his leg amputated. He had been fitted with a very high-tech looking apparatus and was apparently able to walk about just fine with it. My son grabbed my arm and pulled me over so he could whisper, “Look dad, that guy has a robot leg! Cool!!” I don’t know whether or not the guy heard us, it was in a bit of a crowd and my son is usually quiet even in his normal speaking voice. But he thought it was just the coolest thing he’d ever seen in real life. My assumption is that it would have been rude to bring it up to the guy, but he was wearing shorts and didn’t seem obviously bothered by his “handicap”. In some way it might be better if more kids were exposed to people who have had amputations so that they’re very aware that it doesn’t make the person any less human (or probably any more “cool”). What would be, in your father’s experience, the best way to handle childhood curiosity about this kind of stuff? Just do as I did, and wait until we’re someplace private to discuss a little more with him, or maybe say hello and ask about his cool engineering?
ShibbOleth, I know you didn’t ask me, but I’d like to butt in anyway.
I haven’t had an amputation, but I use a manual wheelchair & have gotten many questions about it & about my disability in general from more people than I could ever hope to count.
I’ve always felt that allowing children to ask politely-phrased questions of people with disabilities is a good thing - provided, of course, that the person with the disability isn’t otherwise engaged with an activity. IMO, a child who is encouraged to ask appropriately timed & phrased questions may come to interact more easily with those who are “different” than a child who is continually told not to ask about such things.
I cannot imagine this - is this something cultural or regional, seeing as how you are in Canada? To me it doesn’t matter how polite someone phrases it: to go up to a stranger and ask how they happened to have no legs or why they are in a wheelchair is shockingly, unbelievably rude. Can you elaborate on how you were taught this is acceptable? I am genuinely curious; not trying to slam you.
Perhaps these old guys were veterens who had seen more death, destruction and maiming than can be discribed and simply have no concept how a simple question/comment about how a finger went missing could possibly upset so many soft, sensitive creatures? Combat, like a lot of guys who are now in thier 60s/70s saw, tends to change thier perception and the way they address things like physical ailement and injury.
Tell a sob story about your burst appendix to a surviver of the Baatan death march and see what his reaction would be. My wife has one of these in the family. The enemy castrated him, apparently for sport, and left him for dead. He had the bad taste to survive to the end of the war.
I’m not saying what the geezers did was necessarily in the best of taste, but I don’t see how it is anything to get worked up about. I’d be willing to bet they didn’t intentionally mean to hurt this woman’s feelings.
Maybe its just me, but when I read the OP, I pictured a couple of old dude wearing those stupid hats and plaid pants that I alway see old dudes wearing. You know, the pants with the waist just under the nipples and the hats chock full of campaign ribbons and ship names. I met a guy that fit that description and found out he was a fighter pilot with many “kills”, was shot down in the pacific and fought behind the lines to get back to safety, only to have the ship that picked him up get sunk out from under him! A real tough SOB in his day.
Or maybe they were just a couple of jerks. Plenty of them around, too.
For me, it depends on whether it’s a kid or an adult. I can deal with kids asking questions because they’re kids, and frankly a 4’2" adult is pretty damn rare. I can’t blame them! It’s a whole new idea to them that a grown-up can be no taller than they are.
If you’re an adult, do please get to know me before asking questions. There’s nothing I hate more than going about my business and some stranger asking me out of nowhere, “How tall are you?” or “How old are you?” Contain your curiosity, please, people. I’m trying to buy groceries or something, not climb a damn mountain where my height would make things more difficult, ahd therefore a potential topic of discussion.
This is IMO, of course.
I think a robotic-looking prosthetic leg would be pretty cool, though I wouldn’t say anything about it to a stranger.
Can anyone explain this question to me? “Skinning a chicken”? What the heck does that mean? Of all the ways to lose a finger, this one would not immediately leap to the forefront of my mind.
I never think quickly enough on my feet to respond to people this rude, but sitting here reading this, I’ve formed an answer to the question. My response (in my perfect little world) would have been "No, sir, some rude old bastard insulted me so I punched him in the mouth. I got an infection from his rotten self and had to have my finger amputated.
I personally view kids as untrained (and somewhat annoying) adults, as does my father. I think it is the parent’s job to train the child in an acceptable way to deal with the issue. So, would you walk up to a complete stranger and say “what happened to your leg?” No, of course not, so don’t let your kid. But explain to the kid (in an age-appropriate way) that accidents can happen, and some people are lucky enough to survive and live normally, but with additional help (like a fake leg). There’s no need to make the issue a big deal, or secretive, but there’s also no need to involve the person in the training of your child, as it isn’t their job. That said, it isn’t the end of the world if a kid wanders up to an amputee and asks a niave question, but really, nobody should be letting their kids wander off and talk to strangers anyway.
The cruelty side of things usually comes with a group of people. People are much nicer (or too cowardly) to do the nasty stuff when they are alone. A child who doesn’t know better, standing wide-eyed, or blurting out a comment just doesn’t compare to a mob of people encircling you at the beach, pointing at your leg and whispering or a bunch of older teens hooting, laughing and pointing, saying “Look at the fucking scarred-up bitch” to a 13 year old girl.
On the topic of strangers asking questions… Yes, it’s just curiosity. Yes, it can be done politely. No, it isn’t traumatic, like cruel groups of people can be. But it is still rude, IMO. If I’m just going about my day, and someone stops me to ask me a personal question to satisfy their curiosity, well, the answer they’ll get will depend on my mood, but at times, it won’t be pretty. I just want to go about my business as a normal human being, without having to cater to every Tom, Dick and Nosy’s questioning. If we’re more than strangers, sure bring it up and ask if you’re curious. I don’t mind co-workers, friends, relative, etc asking at all, in fact, I’d rather they ask, instead of not fully listening to me, because they’re spending all their synapses wondering what the hell happened to me. But complete strangers - well, they should learn to mind their own business and curb the “I was just curious” impulse.
You know, we talked about this at work today. None of us quite figured it out, either. The best explanation we were able to come up with for it is that maybe he meant to say something like killing a chicken–chopping its head off, or quartering a chicken and it just came out wrong. Either way, it’s a really stupid comment, but this guy seemed to think he was a comedian on par with Bob Hope. whiterabbit, I used to have a boss complain about the same question: “How tall are you?” In his case, it was because he was 6’7’’, and skinny, which makes some people look even taller. I saw it at work all the time. Total strangers would approach him with that question as if they had a bet riding on the answer. He never gave any of the smart-ass answers that we jokingly suggested, but I could tell it irritated him to be treated as a freak of nature.
First, the guys in the OP were pricks. There is no excuse for that behavior.
But there is a silver lining, Lissa. Your boss has to look at it like this.
She has an amputated finger. It can’t be hidden and will always be noticed. Most people will notice and avoid the subject. Some will make an innocent query, not knowing it may be uncomfortable to talk about. And a small percent will make insensitive remarks either because they they don’t know how to handle the situation, or are complete assholes.
This situation was a trial by fire, of sorts. She’s seen the worst that may happen, and got it out of the way. Hopefully she’ll take this as a fact of her new life and learn to compartmentalize such encounters. What some dick says about her missing finger should be easier to handle in the future than actually losing the finger. If you want, tell her some random guy in North Dakota said “Hi”.
(FWIW, I had a friend in school who’s dad had his middle finger ripped off in an industrial accident. For 15 years I always looked at it. It was strangely fascinating, and I always felt guilty knowing he knew I was looking. He never seemed to have a problem with it, though. He knew why I couldn’t help looking.)
Whenever I walk through the museum I work at, and I see some cave-dwelling rube poking and rubbing its grubby claws on one of the paintings, I’ll very often wish that amputation was a viable option.
May I suggest a stock, cavalier response for the future - somewhere along the lines of, “THIS is what we will do to you if you touch any of our goddamn art - any questions?”
