I started grade school in 1970. My first-grade teacher was in her last year before retirement. She was old school, figuratively and literally. Relevance, please, Leslie?
It was commonplace decades ago to discourage lefthandedness. I like to think that it was a dying trend when I entered the school system, but my elderly teacher got me caught up in it. She was very uncomfortable allowing me to write with my left hand. I have some ambidexterous leanings and she righteously pushed me toward rightness. She had me sit at a right-handed desk and actively discouraged me from using my left hand. Fortunately for me, both of my parents favor their left hands, and they pushed back, insisting that I be allowed to sit at a desk more welcoming to being left-handed. They told her to stop fighting my nature, that there's nothing inherently wrong with being left-handed. As a result, I write with my left hand.
As it turned out, I was bucking tradition in another area. My struggles with my gender of birth have yet to be sorted out, but I have people in my life who are actively pushing me to conform to the majority. She will go unnamed here. *wink* That's a little unfair, actually. At the moment, we are having a pleasantly quiet period, talking easily and freely about things that had us both bottled up not long ago. The point I'm making is that my true nature in this regard is receiving undue influence from places outside my own head, much as my first grade teacher imposed her beliefs on me all those years ago. It can't be helped, as we don't live in a vacuum. There is little that we do that isn't influenced by outside forces.
I have worked for many years in a small industry, doing a job that is quite specialized and novel. I don't discuss it here, as it would make me much more identifiable. I have noted over the years a disproportionate number of left-handers doing jobs in my field. I recently noticed the same among some of my TG friends. This left me wondering if there is also disproportionate lefthandedness among the transgendered. Our brains are wired very differently than most, and it occurred to me that this might be reflected in the hand that is dominant.
I am pretty certain that anyone visiting this blog is likely to feel that they exist outside some norm of society. I'd like all of you to take a moment to respond to a simple poll to see if there is more than the standard 10% lefthandedness in our quirky little demographic. It's over there in the right-hand margin. I'll discuss the results in a week.
Why Nights Aren’t Ours
21 hours ago
I typically can't fill in your questionnaire! Being the first would skew the results from the first moment!
ReplyDeleteI should vote right but the question does not ask by how much. if I am doing a job which takes along time and the right gets tired sometimes the left takes over without my knowing. A hammer or an axe works in either hand, swirling a glass of wine strangely does not but I may be trying too hard. Give me an orange to peel and if the thumbnail is broken on my left hand it will take me an age to figure out how to peel it with my right hand! Painting my nails is as easy with either hand. Based on this can you vote for me please.
Caroline xxx
I'm a right-hander, but since my dad's a left-hander I have the odd feature of using power tools left handed that's stuck with me.
ReplyDeleteCaroline, I, like you, use my other hand quite a lot. I guess the truest indicator is which hand you write with. There are things that I do better right-handed, like batting or golfing. In fact, I'm clueless how to do those left-handed. So if you write with your right hand, then vote that way. My Dad writes with both, so he'd go in the third category.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I can vote more than once, so you need to vote for yourself.
I remember being fascinated with left handed kids, when I was in elementary school. Being right handed, I always wrote from underneath, in order to slant the letters to the right, but I noticed the south paws hooking their writing hand over top of the letters to get same prescribed right hand slant. Occasionally just be incorrigible, I would copy their style, only hooking my right hand over top of the letters, giving them a leftward slant. Then I read that many sociopaths, including Adolf Hitler slanted their letters to the left, and figured it would be best not to do that anymore, lest people think I was a kindred spirit.
ReplyDeleteMelissa XX
Melissa, I am a hooker, as you call it. Ooo, let me try that again. I write from above the line, which in my pencil days meant that I always had graphite all over the edge of my left hand. It is a right hander's world!
ReplyDeleteHmm.. Both for me - in a way
ReplyDeleteIn day to day life I am right handed. But I eat left handed. I cannot write left handed, and I cannot eat right handed (food flies off the plate as I try to cut things with a fork :) )
Oddly enough, my brother, who is left handed eats right handed.
I am right handed but left footed. Gads, I wonder where that puts me? It just goes to show that maybe there is no such thing as normal. Christine Elaine
ReplyDeleteI wrote a blog on lefthandedness several years ago. Past research indicates lefthandedness at approx. 40% in the trans-population. In 2005 I had a Christmas dinner party at a local restaurant for 11 transwomen. Prior to a toast I asked for a show of hands for all those who are lefthanded. 10 of the girls raised their hands.
ReplyDeleteI have been a lefty since I can remember and have never been encouraged to use my right hand over the left. As for eating, why do you think that the table is set with the fork on the left and the knife on the right? Eat as most Europeans do with fork in the left and knife in the right hand.
ReplyDeleteEleanor
I'm so weird when it comes to the subject of dominant hand stuff. I have a vague recollection of a teachers aid standing over me, saying that the way I write looks strange, and the teacher saying that left handed people are that way. Apparently at some point I wrote left handed, but now, write right handed. There was a point in 4th grade.... this is where it gets very strange...
ReplyDeleteIn 4th grade, I had a writing assignment, picked up a pen, and it felt different. When I wrote some letters it felt odd, like "hmm, is that a b, or a d?"
I turned in the paper and thought nothing of it. The teacher gave it to mom, afraid I was dyslexic. Why? Because the paper was an exact mirror image of what it should have been. Written from right to left, every character perfectly reversed.
I had picked up the pen with my left hand, and mirrored the motions I learned with my right hand.
Also, if I hold a fork or spoon in my right hand, it feels absolutely bizarre. I can only eat left handed.
My feeling is that some early teacher converted me from left to right hand or something. Either that, or I had a lot of trouble making up my own mind which hand I should write with. Who knows!
I don't know what else it means, but I'm sure it explains why all my art sucks. LOL!
I've read in more than one place that left handers are a higher percentage of Trans folks. However, my brother is str8 non-trans and is left handed. I am trans and right handed. Go figure. Actually, it's the only "normal" thing I do and gets me that little nod of approval from society. Ya know?
ReplyDeleteWell, gotta go vote. I'm clicking right handed, but using my left hand. Ah huh, that'll keep 'em guessing. :P
Peace,
Tina
Nope I'm right-handed. Can't write with my left hand for the life of me haha.
ReplyDeleteBut I did want to say I still find the thought of teachers making you write with your right hand...horrendous! Can't believe they actually did things like that.
Primarily left-handed, but can write reasonably well with either hand.
ReplyDeleteOh Yes!!1, Catholic elementary school, Nuns forced me to change to my right hand. Fortunately for me my mother stood up for me, so there was a short time in my life I tried to write right-handed. Now days, there are a few things I do right handed; bowl, catch w/left, throw w/right, bat right-handed; tools either hand. I eat and write left-handed. Am a very confusing person to say the least.
ReplyDeleteOh, am MtF woman.
The answer to your question is yes.
ReplyDeleteOur three famous doctors (sic), Blanchard, Zucker and Lalumière did a study and reported that...
The study, published in the July issue of Psychological Bulletin, combined the results from 23,410 heterosexual and homosexual men and women. The results for both sexes were statistically significant; however, the tendency toward increased levels of left-handedness was markedly greater for lesbian women than for gay men.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/07/000710071931.htm
Although I use my right hand for many simple, fine motor actions, I rely on my left for power. My dad noticed my accurate, left handed throwing prowess at a very young age...like 4 yrs old. When I showed no interest in football, he started working with me to become a pitcher. I pitched my first no-hitter at 8 yrs old. I didn't even know what a no-hitter was at the time...lol.
ReplyDeleteIn my family, there seems to be no genetic tendency towards either hand. My parents, brother, and sister are all right handed...me, left. My wife and I are both left-handed...our son, right. My wife's parents were both right handed and had three left-handed children...go figure.