Tolerance, or, We Buried My Uncle Today

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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One of my uncles died on Sunday. His name was Patrick, and he had Prader-Willi syndrome. He was 37.

Patrick and I were very close in age (I’m 35), so he was more of a playmate than an uncle. But, the Prader-Willi syndrome made it obvious that he was different than me. I always knew that he was “mentally retarded,” or something like that, but in my family, it was never an issue. We were never told that he was “special” or “different.”

Growing up with him in my family taught me a lot about tolerance. Well, I don’t know that it “taught” me tolerance per se, but it did teach me that in tolerance sucks.

I just read the gaybashing thread (which was started while I was offline for about a month, and I totally missed it the first time). Patrick was’t gay, but as a kid, he had to deal wih a lot of stupid crap because of his syndrome. He had a low IQ, a speech impediment, a learning disability, and he was overweight (all symptoms of Prader-Willi syndrome). His brothers and sisters and parents all defended him, of course, because that’s just the way my family is.

But I just don’t get intolerance, or bigotry, or racism, or sexism, or prejudice like that in any form. How can people think like that? How can people think that different=wrong, and must be destroyed?

I simply can’t get my head around it. Why should I think that because someone has a different skin color, or a different sexual orientation, or a physical challenge, or a different religious belief than me, that that person is bad?

I don’t get it. And I hope to Deity that I never do.

Thank you, uncle Patrick, for being part of my family. You’ll be sorely missed.

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Bye, Patrick. :frowning:
{{{ Persephone }}}

http://www.pwsausa.org/faq.htm

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I’m very sorry for your loss Persephone. My thoughts to you and your family.

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My WAG is it’s some kind of primitive herd instinct. The advantage of being human is that we can grow out of that, but some people choose not to.

{{{Cristi}}}

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Thank you for being a light to shine against the gloom of prejudice and intolerance, my friend.

((((Cristi))))

You are greatly loved.

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Fear begets prejudice, Persephone. In a couple of ways. The fear of what is different is what causes some children/people to mistreat others. And fear of going against the crowd is what keeps those who know better from sticking up for those. It’s sad but unfortunately often true.

I recall getting into more than one fight as a child sticking up for kids when I was in elementary school (I think I watched to many Batman-type shows and thought it was also my job to fight injustice). This tapered off for me in High School where the herd got stronger and the risk of serious injury became more real. But also my High School was mainstreamed and mostly commuter, so there was not a lot of direct intolerance there anyway, although there was some thoughtless teasing still.

One beautiful thing about people with disabilities similar to your Uncle is that they often maintain a capacity for selfless love that many of us grow out of sometime in childhood. This is a true gift to those who are open to accept it and something that we should take the time to learn from them.

I’m terribly sorry for your loss. Thank you for using his death as a reminder to us all on the importance of tolerance.

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Persephone, I’m sorry for the loss of your Uncle/friend. Its very sad when someone is taken so young. It is even more sad when they have to live a life that isn’t fair. Intolerance is ridiculous in my opinion. I’m sending you good thoughts and prayers and best wishes. Always remember the good times that you and Patrick shared. And remember to hug another today.

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:frowning:

I’m sorry for your loss {{{Christi}}}

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Thank you for your kind words, everyone. I really appreciate it.

But, Shibb? Funny you should mention this…

My uncle was an avid superhero comic collector, and Batman was one of his favorites. They even placed a few of his most prized comics in his coffin with him.

And in my humble opinion, fighting injustice is our job.

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Fear is certainly an element of prejudice, but I think the source is deeper and more primitive. I think people tend to create and place themselves in pecking orders, just like other pack animals.

I’ve heard it said that prejudices are learned, not born. But maybe this is wrong. Even small children notice differences between themselves and others. And they ask questions. “Why is his skin a different color? Why does he talk slower?”, etc. By the time kids are in school, they’re are on track to conformity, or being an outcast, or an outlaw.

Maybe it’s tolerance that is learned, not born.

I hope I’m wrong, and it’s just a WAG. I’m unable to defend it in a debate, because I simply don’t have the background to do so.

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I dig what you’re saying and I’m so sorry for your loss…Big hugs for you!

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So sorry for your loss and your having to put up with a childhood of listening to others peck at him. DuckDuckGoose and I used to care for handicapped adults in an adult foster care home.

I hope this is not impolite to hijack your thread to recall my favorite resident.

Francis Hall was the world’s greatest lover. I knew Francis when he was about 45, in 1977-79. He was a resident in my family’s adult foster care home where we took care of mentally retarded, mentally disturbed, and aged people.
His head came to a bald point. His nose came to an odd point. His narrow shoulders and broad hips (typical of Kleinfelter’s) made his whole upper body come to an odd point. He had no teeth so his checks puckered way in and way out as he ate. His voice was faint and high as if he had constant laryngitis.

Francis had Klinefelter’s syndrome. That is, he had two X(female) chromosomes and one X (male) chromosome. He was a gentle, wonderful person. In three years, I practically never heard him loose his temper or express an unkind word. His greatest intellectual accomplishment was being able to print in big block letters. His favorite words were HERSEY’S CHOCOLATE copied right off the label. I can still see the strained concentration that cause his toungue to fall out of his mouth and contort as he tried to form the letters with his big kindergarteners pencil.
He loved to help in the kitchen and he loved company–anyone’s company. Whenever someone came in the door Francis would wait patiently nearby until just the right moment. Then he would swoop in from the side and lay a big smack on their cheek. When someone he especially knew and liked came in his oddly formed eyes would just squint in unashamed delight.

He loved to dance when The Michigan Polka Party show came on the local TV station on Sunday afternoon. He loved going to the beach to swim and when he wet himself (as he invariably did when entering the lake) he made the oddest “oops” sound, but otherwise he never blushed or needed to.

Love

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Don’t apologize for the hijack, Boxer! Your story brought back another memory for me.

Patrick attended a specialized school as an adult, and at one point, he was taking classes in sign language. One day, he was walking through the hall at school, and got a bit confused, and walked in to the wrong classroom, disrupting the class a bit. The class, however, happened to be a class for the deaf. The teacher didn’t know Patrick, though, nor did he know her, but he pretty quickly realized that the class was full of deaf students. As he backed out of the room, he began to apologize…in sign language. “Sorry. Friend,” was all he could do, but…the teacher remembered the incident, and a few days later, when our local newspaper did a story on the deaf community here in Flint (we have a school for the deaf and blind here), she recalled it to the reporter, and the whole story was in our local paper. :slight_smile: