March 26, 2009
Dear Colleague:
"Obama Apologizes for Quip About Disabled People" (New York Times, March 21, 2009). Chatting with the host, Jay Leno, on the "The Tonight Show," the president compares his modest bowling skills to those of athletes who have disabilities. He immediately recognized his error—his insensitivity—and sought to protect himself against the furor of an indignant public by eating humble pie.
Reading the presidential faux-pas reminds me that I should apologize too, for publishing the following item in my book Dear Colleague (University of Minnesota Press, 2002, p. 137).
During National Handicapped Week I witnessed a square dance performed by paraplegics in their wheelchairs outside the Social Sciences Building at the University of Minnesota. The master of ceremonies—a man of sound body—made a brief announcement to a thin gathering of curious noon-hour students. He turned on the music and the wheelchairs swirled energetically over the pavement, bumping into each other now and then. I do not recall ever seeing anything quite so unintentionally cruel. Victims of paralysis do not dance well. Their frenetic movements looked ridiculous alongside hale and loose-limbed youngsters who, by standing there watching, were a picture of grace.
If I were a paraplegic, would I want to participate in the dance? At the time I wrote the paragraph, my answer would clearly have been no. I wondered, then, why people wanted to deliberately fight against a barrier that they could not hope to triumph over. I now know. Not only that, I have come to realize that I have done that myself. Well, I am not a paraplegic of the limb. I am not limb-challenged—yet. But I am a paraplegic of the mind—the part of it that does math. Although, in 1958, I was well aware of my mathematical disability, I still applied for a post-doctoral fellowship in statistics at the University of Chicago. I got it, thanks to foolishly supportive letters of recommendation. At Chicago, I attended classes on statistics that were also attended by high-school students who, by virtue of their exceptional talent, received special permission to do so. I sweated at answers that teenagers plucked out of thin air. I was the awkward guy in a room full of nimble athletes.
Was my year at Chicago a mistake? I thought so at the time. Now I realize that it was not only NOT a mistake, but that it was the quintessentially correct—indeed, the human—thing to do. To be human is to go against nature—to be unnatural. The baby already knows this. The baby crawls beautifully. So why would it want to stand up on its wobbly legs and try to walk? Yet it does—even after repeated falls. And when it eventually manages a few steps, not even a proud parent would consider them graceful. But going against nature is the baby's instinct. It is instinct without which we can never hope to truly grow and excel. After all, we all start in life under certain handicaps. Some are physical, others are cultural and social. Every culture is replete with stultified ways and beliefs that prevent the individual from fulfilling his or her potential. Social handicaps are perhaps the most disabling. Think of bankers who nearly brought down the entire financial system by remaining chained to the prankishly ways of their tightly-knit social group.
President Obama is right to apologize, for he nearly missed the point that the Special Olympics, even more than the regular Olympics, articulates brilliantly, which is that humans are called to act against all barriers—nature's, culture's, and society's.
Best wishes,
Yi-Fu
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