Kate Stringer (The Beacon)
By Kate Stringer, Staff Commentary
Ten percent of the world is feeling left out.
We're tired of ink permanently stained into our hands. We don't enjoy bruising our elbows every time we try and eat a meal with normal people. We're absolutely sick of sobbing over uncompromising can-openers made for our non-dominant hand. The southpaws are tired of being forgotten.
Existing as a left-handed individual is a true miracle and that's not just because we are products of a recessive gene. No, the real miracle is that we've managed to be wrong in a world that demands we be right.
The maltreatment starts in kindergarten. Lefties are never taught how to write. Walk into a kindergarten classroom and you'll see all the right-handed children being pampered by their teacher with right-handed-pencil-holding instructions. The lefties are staring with blank expressions because they have no idea what's going on. And people wonder why so many left-handers have bad handwriting. What's your excuse?
Pens are handed out in fourth grade and the ink poisoning begins. I don't know who made the decision that the world should write from the left to right side of the page but it was an incredibly selfish judgment. Did anyone think to consult a left-handed person to see how they would feel about dragging their hand across freshly inked paper? It's not exactly fun to come back from class and have to scrub my hand for hours in hopes of getting my skin color back.
If I thought the academic world couldn't get any more difficult for lefties, Franz Hall proved me wrong. The right-handed desks in Franz are nothing short of an instrument of torture for left-handed people. With no arm support we lefties are forced to strain our spines just to reach the desktop and remain in said position for between fifty-five minutes and three hours.
It's no wonder then that The New England Journal of Medicine estimates left-handers have a lifespan of nine years shorter than the rest of the world. Research indicates left-handers are more likely to die in accidents, especially when driving. Too bad these "accidents" arise from society's obvious favoritism of the right-handed gene.
Perhaps the insurmountable odds piled against the left-handed race have made us stronger. Or perhaps they have created psychological damage beyond repair. Either way it's time we show the southpaws of the world some respect. Keep your elbows off the table. Stop challenging us to right-handed thumb wars. And someone please bring left-handed desks to Franz 108.
Kate Stringer is a junior english and secondary education major. She can be reached at stringer14@up.edu
