“Give me a smart idiot over a stupid genius any day.”~ Samuel Goldwyn
This t-shirt image was given to me last night by a great friend of mine. This t-shirt is on eBay for sale.
I love it! I think its wild and I think its funny!! But this image would eventually bring out the worst in me, due to a small collective group of people who are totally and completely ignorant.
The image is obviously of a two people making love while one of them is sitting in a wheelchair. Gender cannot be determined. But gender isn’t the point. The point is the funny visual of making love while sitting in a wheelchair.
I was delighted to see it, so I shared it across the Internet. A lot of people enjoyed it, thinking it was funny as well. But there were that small group of people that just took the image and discussed it at length to the point where they were absolutely out of line and their comments were uncalled for.
These ignorant morons literally to this image to the extreme and came up with the general idea that this could never happen in reality. Furthermore, their opinions went as far as to say that ALL people who need the use of the wheelchair cannot make love, because they are in a wheelchair.
If there ever was a time for my mouth to let fly a series of F-bombs, this would be one of those times.
I could not believe the stones that they had, to say something like that. To me, to others, and actually believe that what they were saying, was totally true and right. And of course, they were closed-minded to any debate. In their minds: HANDICAPPED PEOPLE OR PEOPLE WITH PHYSICAL DISABILITIES CANNOT HAVE INTIMATE RELATIONS.
I asked them all, if they had sex. Then I asked if any of them who have had sex before ever done so other than the bedroom. Whether it be the couch, a chair, the backseat of a car, whatever. Some still said yes. But they still were not grasping the concept that they were in the exact same position as the people in the image when they were engaging in sexual relations with a partner.
For them to say into my face that it was impossible, was more than just an insult. It was absolutely discriminating. My final words to them were, “When you find yourself in a wheelchair for something stupid that you did, which caused you to be in a wheelchair, you tell me whether or not if YOU can have relations with another person. Don’t sit there and tell me what I can and cannot do, because you do not even know who I am. You’ve never met me, you do not know what my own limitations are. And neither do any of you know of the relationships I have had in the past with women, and what I have or have not done with them. Open your mind because there is no way that you can say for sure what I (or others who are also in wheelchairs) can or cannot do. Why? Because you don’t have the lives that we do and will never know what we have to endure to get by every day. So either think before you speak, or shut the fuck up!”.
I was infuriated and very pissed off. It didn’t calm the debate down by a long shot, but I got out what I needed and wanted to say.
I realize that a lot of people don’t fully understand what I have to go through in life. I also realize that when I tell them, that it might be difficult for them to visualize. And that’s because they don’t have to go through it themselves. Doesn’t make them stupid, it makes them without knowledge and unaware.
The same thing happens when I tell people that I play sledge hockey. Automatically, their minds have this visual of people in wheelchairs on ice. But that’s not what the sport is about. And I have to walk them through it and explain it to them so that they have a better understanding.
I do not know what it is like to drive, jump rope, or go rock climbing. Doesn’t mean I should bash on those who do. And that’s exactly what these people were doing! Their assumptions that physically handicapped people and their limitations go so far. And in their minds, it wasn’t far at all.
Everyone has their own opinion. But at some point, there comes a time where sometimes that opinion should be quietly withheld. And that statement is MY OPINION.
If this group of people would have either just agreed or disagreed that the t-shirt image was funny and dropped it, this explosion of anger wouldn’t have happened. I was not the only ones involved in the conversation that were angry either. But for those who were, I couldn’t really get a word in, except for the above stated quote.
As far as the t-shirt goes, I’m glad that it was brought to my attention. And most likely I WILL purchase it from eBay. Why? Because to me- its funny.
Dambreaker 