# Is being left-handed a "choice"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 17, 2001, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315 "2001-04-17T20:44:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/101 "2001-07-01T00:06:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Persephone \* > **when giving things to your child (like toys, eating utensils, etc), place them _in front_ of the child, not in a particular hand. The child will reach for it with whichever hand works best for them.** So you let your kids make their own choices. Does this make you pro-choice? ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/102 "2001-07-01T00:07:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Persephone \* > > The only real discrimination I’ve encountered against left-handed children is by the manufacturers of MagnaDoodles. Those things are BLATANTLY right-handed. My daughter LOVES hers, but the darn string that holds the magnetic pen to the board is always getting in her way. But she’s just too young for me to even begin explaining “toymaker conspiracy” to her. She’d never understand, and I just don’t want to break her little heart. \*\* Unfortunately, it will get worse as she gets older. Maybe the people who make the magnadoodle are the same manufacturers of the debit car machines that require you to use a “wand” to punch in your code, because they’re rooted on the right, too. It’s awkward to use with the left hand. Can openers, power tools, doors, scissors and hundreds of every day objects were designed with righties in mind. She’ll adapt to all of them, but it won’t be easy. Perhaps the biggest injustice will come when she’s a student, from middle/high school through college, when there will probably be very few desks designed for lefties. Freshman year of high school was the first time we had the little desktops, with the surface being on the right. I saw a chiropractor that year because I got such bad back pain trying to learn to adjust to writing twisted to that angle…but I bet she’ll be a creative person, and every good thing requires a price. Hey, the adaptations work for the most part, though, at least I learned how to draw with a mouse better than a lot of righties I know 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![south333](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5f9b8f/32.png) [@south333](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/south333)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2001, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/103 "2001-07-01T02:19:50Z")
Hey Persephone tell her to turn the magnadoodle upside-down. That helps a little bit, except that the eraser is at the top, but oh well. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Persephone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecc23a/32.png) [@Persephone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Persephone)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2001, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/104 "2001-07-02T22:53:58Z")
> [@](#): > > So you let your kids make their own choices. Does this make you pro-choice? There’s gotta be another thread for this statement around here somewhere, isn’t there? ---
**Author:** ![kenny777](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@kenny777](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenny777)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2001, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/105 "2001-07-03T07:13:40Z")
The newbie strikes again. I am left-handed and I am proud to say that. I am different and I have survived in a right-handed world. I use right-handed tools all of the time. The only to solve this stupid debate is too make the world “ambidextrous”. Make tools with handles that suit both hands. Duh!!! I think this debate has gotten out of hand! Stop now and forever hold your peace. If being left-handed is a choice, then I chose to be. If it isn’t, then I was given a genetic trait. Who really cares if it is a choice or not? I don’t. Let’s just stop this debate because nobody is really winning. 🙂 “Left-handed people tend to be more creative, more imaginitive than right-handed people.” -Dr. Bryng Bryngelson, University of Minnesota ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2001, 9:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/106 "2001-07-03T09:15:31Z")
I’m winning!! Lets keep going. ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2001, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/107 "2001-07-03T18:27:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by kenny777 \* > **Stop now and forever hold your peace.** With our left hands or our right or with both? (If you can hold your “piece” with both hands…) ---
**Author:** ![kenny777](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@kenny777](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenny777)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2001, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/108 "2001-07-04T20:23:00Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jab1 \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > With our left hands or our right or with both? (If you can hold your “piece” with both hands…) \*\* Does it really matter? Just end this stupid debate. Man, can’t we fight about something else? Seriously! 😑 ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2001, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/109 "2001-07-05T18:40:57Z")
You DO realize that most of this “debate” was all in fun, don’t you? ---
**Author:** ![BillabongBoiBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@BillabongBoiBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BillabongBoiBG)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2001, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/110 "2001-07-07T00:43:41Z")
IM LEFT HANDED AND PROUD OF IT! But I am not one of the people who complain about how unfair everything is, I hate left-handed desks, and I feel more control with right-handed scissors. I bat as if I’m right handed. I do everything as if I am right handed except for eating, writing, and sometin else! LOL. So Im a good left-hander, the only problem with it is I smear what I write, so I have learned to keep my hand off the paper, so I have no problems with it, with practice, I could be both left and right handed. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2001, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/111 "2001-07-07T02:01:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by BillabongBoiBG \* > \*\* I do everything as if I am right handed except for eating, writing, and sometin else! LOL. > \*\* Yeah, but…most righties use their left hands to do “something else” too, so that’s **not** a trait that gives you more in common with lefties. People like you and my dad though, doing almost everything but writing with your right hands, you’re traitors. You realize that, don’t you? You’re trying to be like _them_ and blend in, yet you claim to be proud of being a leftie. It’s people like you who are afraid to show the world who they really are, what with only being a “private” leftie and being a rightie in public, that are holding the rest of us back. Rightie-wannabes, you make me sick. ---
**Author:** ![BillabongBoiBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@BillabongBoiBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BillabongBoiBG)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2001, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/112 "2001-07-07T06:50:14Z")
Well, I do go back and forth for somethin else. Though I don’t try to blend in as a righty, because I like to be unique, not many people are lefty. I find it more comfortable to do sports and such with my right hand, though occasionally I try to do things with my left, I don’t succeed. I rather be left handed though, just because it’s different. ---
**Author:** ![Twinge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d78d45/32.png) [@Twinge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Twinge)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2001, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/113 "2001-08-17T00:36:30Z")
So, does that make you a gay, black, left-handed vegan? ---
**Author:** ![SFCanadian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@SFCanadian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SFCanadian)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2001, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/114 "2001-08-17T08:48:28Z")
OK, I’m not anti-left handed… Some of my best friends are left handed, but… I’m amazed in this whole debate not ONE person has brought up the fact that San Francisco is willing to pay for TransManuals to change their handedness… I think it is SO sick to force us normal people to have to share utensils with people who are changing their handedness… If I found out I was working with one, I wouldn’t know what to say or do… I don’t think it’s right… It’s “left and right” not “left then right”… I remember one time picking up this person at a bar who I was SURE was right handed, but it turns out they were left handed and FOOLED me… As soon as I found out I did what any other red blooded right handed guy would do and told them that they were lucky I wasn’t gonna get them arrested or something… I mean, how could they do that to me? Do I look like someone who is left handed or something? I just think it’s not right for them to come into MY bar… Next thing you know, it’ll be filled with lefties and none of us normal right handed people will want to go there any more… I mean, I once saw a coffee mug they use, and it had the handle on the WRONG side… SFCanadian ---
**Author:** ![Dignan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f07891/32.png) [@Dignan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dignan)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2001, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315/115 "2001-08-17T23:45:47Z")
> [@](#): > > I think it is SO sick to force us normal people to have to share utensils with people who are changing their handedness… If I found out I was working with one, I wouldn’t know what to say or do… I don’t think it’s right… I’ll tell you what I’d do to that confused psycho, I’d smash their left hand into a bloody mess with any blunt object I could find. That’d teach them to flaunt their left-handedness in front of me, hopefully it’d send a message to other lefties, then again lefties are stupid so I doubt they’d figure it out. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-being-left-handed-a-choice/62315.md?page=5)