For those expecting to read the latest on Naomi Campbell getting her dirty rocks off Liberian War Criminal (eh-hmm, I mean "Alleged" bally rotter))Charles Taylor, you might find this blog post a disappointment.
What follows is an account of an unsolicited encounter I had two Fridays ago in Bath City Centre. I am recounting this brief exchange, not because it is so extraordinary but for the reason that it is a depressingly recurrent papercut on my soul. I hope that, via the six-degrees-of-separation phenomenon, my documenting of this event will somehow reach those who need to address their attitudes and correct their behaviour. Well eya goes....
So, it's Friday afternoon and I'm off to my third gym session of the week. I'm walking up the high street past HMV, Ann Summers and Whittards. (I've lost count of the times the only things on my shopping-list have been: herbal tea, edible knickers and an Engelbert Humperdinck CD). Anyhoos, I'm psyching myself up for some gruelling supersets when some old geez steps in my path, breaks my gait and pulls me aside. "Fair dos" I assume, because maybe there was some big hole in the ground or bone-crushing machinery into which I was set to fall. This was not the case - the following dialog however was:
"Can you see at all"
"Um, I can see a tiny bit in one eye but that's about it - thanks anyway" -
"Hello, My name is John Taylor"
"Right. Hello John.... Well thanks" -
"Can you tell me, have you always been blind?"
".....ummm....Oh. no....I was ill as a child"
"Well many people who attend my church group have had their blindness cured"
"Right."
"Well Barbara – she attends the group – she doesn't need to wear glasses anymore"
"Hmmmmm...Right. I don't think - "
"Being part of the group has cured many members' blindness"
"No I don't think -"
"If you put faith in God, he will forgive your sins and cure your blindness"
"No. I know for a fact it doesn’t work like that.”
"No it is true. It works. If you would come to my group"
at which point I hurried off, not sure whether to explode with rage or burst into tears of exasperation.
"If your imaginary friend "God" is so omnipotent, how come he could (if begged) revive my optic nerves and brain but has yet to get round to correcting your splendiferous stammers, stutters and pronounced lisp?
^is what I wish I had said to Johnny-boy and that^ is pretty much what I wrote in that day's facebook status update. As it was, all I wanted to do at the time was get as far away from one of Jesus’s sunbeams as possible.
I've grown immured to the students and banana-townies (bent, yella and hang around in bunches) who shout whatever Little Britain or Ricky Gervais/Karl Pilockton has taught them to say this week. I don't like this whole "I'm so PC I can be more bigoted than Bernard Manning but I'm 'ironic'" bullshit but sadly it's here to stay. I let it slide when people mean well but get it so wrong. I routinely tolerate being patronised and regarded as a sub-human reject by the majority of my fellow man/woman - fuck 'em. I'm a quiet guy with a very thick skin and a high tolerance level to suffer fools kindly - So why did three sentences from this John Taylor character shake me up?
John upset me so profoundly, not because of what he said but rather because he honestly believed what he was saying and sincerely believed he was doing me a favour. I'm guessing Taylor was a member of some religious group because his own life hadn't panned out how it should. I’m guessing his life was running on empty and all he had left was hope…hope he wanted to share with me. What good would it have accomplished if I'd unleashed awesome wrathful indignation on a guy who had nothing better to do on a Friday afternoon than recruit me to his delusionist support group? That'd be like kicking somebody's (mental) crutches out from under them.
So there I was, being pitied by an utterly piteous wretch. It's like those couple of times when homless Big Issue sellers have offered me food and money (fe'reals, no foolies).
I always thought that the world’s main religions extolled humility, compassion and mutual respect above all else. What do "Christians" think gives them the right to routinely derail my train of thought, when I'm chilling in a cafe, to tell me that their imaginary friend loves me and that they shall pray for my soul? How is it that "Muslim" cab drivers presume it is acceptable to interrogate me, in great detail, about not only the medical details of my disability but also my benefits-claiming status. what is going through the minds of those Hindus/Jains who tell me, in casual passing, that my disability is the fruits of misdeeds in a previous life? What gives NHS employees the right to tell me and other blind people about some mumbo-jumbo faith healer? What gives anybody the right to invade the physical, emotional and spiritual space of society's most vulnerable in order to arrogantly presume that I need to be enlightened about their particular brand of millennia-old fairytales, hear say and imaginary friends?
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