I spent the last school year in Israel, a country that is constantly forced into war to protect itself; almost every single person over the age of 18 is a veteran. Most people in Israeli society are perfectly functional human beings, however it’s not so unrealistic to see someone disabled by war.
The picture is one that I took while hanging out at a falafel stand with one of my friends. I usually catch myself when I’m staring at people, but this one was definitely an exception. The men were just cruising along when they saw each other and struck up a conversation, talked for a few minutes, and then continued on their way. Now I have no idea whether they knew each other or not, but I imagine that their conversation went something along the lines of…
“You don’t have any legs? Me either!” “No way, what happened to you?”
At the time, my friend and I were definitely kind of shocked. Seeing a man without legs is certainly out of the ordinary, and encountering two disabled people in one day was a little disconcerting. Since I had my camera with me we did a pretend to take a picture of someone and actually take a picture of the thing behind them.
Staring is a natural response, and humans have the tendency to move away from nature, thinking that our newer approaches are better. This can be seen in a number of situations, but when it comes to staring it makes us less able to understand each other. Garland Thomas talks about anthropologist Robert Murphy and how his experience from both ends of the spectrum shape his views about staring at people with disabilities. “People refuse to look at Murphy, he concludes, partly because they know that they are not supposed to stare at him and have no easy way to relate to him” (83). Relatability is a big problem. It’s difficult to put yourself into someone else’s shoes in general, but especially in a situation that you have never experienced like being disabled. People don’t know how to react without either patronizing or ignoring the person all together.
In the quote, Murphy also mentions people refusing to look at him because they know they’re not supposed to stare. But if we felt comfortable with staring at people wouldn’t we ultimately be able to better relate to them? And since we need to be taught not to stare, does that mean that when we are young staring doesn’t make us uncomfortable? And since staring is a quest for mutual understanding, then maybe if we were never told as children not to stare we would be able to understand each other more and on a deeper level.
Looking back on that day, I don’t think that I reacted the right way. There is nothing wrong with staring, but taking a furtive picture of two disabled men fits more into the category of rude than of curiosity. Staring is a perfectly normal and natural reaction, but maybe next time I will just said hello.
I'm trying to decide if the fact that covertly took this picture constitutes as rude. Yes, you didn't ask their permission. Yes, you saw something jarring and wanted to be able to peruse the image at your leisure, therefore taking staring to new extremes. But also yes, you have used this image as a way of exploring the normalities of people who are societally categorized as disabled, as deformed. This picture is a delightful expression of the power of communication, the bonds of commonality, and the fact that what makes us human is not a few characteristics but a whole host of them!
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with Ava, I think that originally you taking the picture may have been slightly rude. But the fact that you have used it in this blog to discuss how normal it is in Israel to see something like this and that it can even be considered a bond between the men you have fought, is enlightening and should be commended.
ReplyDeleteAs you said, staring is a natural reaction to something we do not always see and we as the human species need to stare and figure it out. However, the way that you have approached this and discussed how your picture may have been rude, shows that Rosemarie Garland-Thomson's book is really speaking to you and making you think about what is an appropriate stare and what is not.
In my blog I've included a similar image thats actually in Garland's book, and its intersting to me how conversations of staring leads to discussion about able and disabled bodies. I think this really says something about our tendencies as a culture to always name and catergorize things as being normal or rather abnormal, which is why poeple can stare when seeing someone on the street without perhaps a limb. We have been mentally conditoned, I believe, to imagine what normal and abnormal mean, and seeing someone without a limb strikes us so because its to us its not normal, or has been implicitly conjugated as something other than our expectation.In order to get rid of this type of stare, I think it is first necessary to admit that the reason that we stare is because what we see isnt normal to us. Until we admit that, I dont believe our reactions to such images like the one which you have provided, can be changed.
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