FIGHTING IGNORANCE
I have known adults who could not read or write.
I have had mixed feeling about most of them; partly feeling sorry for them for being in such a miserable plight in the modern world, and , more often, being piqued with them – on the very edge of disgust and chagrin with their seeming refusal to conform to standard operational procedure of society today. Some few, I admit, may well have had medical, psychological or physicalconditions which would forbid their learning to read and write but they would be few, indeed. I found that, more often than not, it was the result of sheer laziness, either on their own part. or that of unloving parents or guardians.
You probably know someone who is on the fringe of being functionally illiterate. They are often expert in cover-up techniques and you may known them by the veneer they wear and not realize they are unable to read and write. Having the ability to scratch out a name as a symbol of who you are supposed to be is not “writing” nor is having memorized street signs and traffic signals and TV chatter and patter, is not “reading.” Think twice about the person who drives your our car pool group to work some mornings - that man or woman who brags laughingly about “never having read a book since I got outta high school.” That's an all too common admission of such basic ignorance that is quite often voiced by people who are ashamed of their “handicap” but not ready to admit they are “at fault” in any way, shape or form.
Another trait to be aware of is that such a person has developed a remarkable knack of getting others to do things for them. An older man will elicit the help of a school kid to solve problems; the man or woman in business hires secretaries, clerks or others who constantly make him or her “look good” in the eye of those he courts, respects, hates, envies, fears or loves. A father, aware of the simple fact that his children comprehend more of what the present-day world is all about than he ever will, tends to shower them with gifts and rewards others find to be questionable or to joint them in sports and outdoor activities. What family member is going to refuse to balance a check book for a person who has “arthritis so bad in his or her fingers and hands they can't steady a pen or pencil” and they can't tap keys with pain. Such individuals shun “self-service”facilities of all kinds arguing that they like “the personal, real-people touch. The personal computer has been a godsend such intellectually handicapped people, because it enables one to return again and again to a set story or theme until,.it is structured into ones memory..
It may well be, you see, that we have discovered to a tricky way to get at such non-learners. I think the computer is educating more and more people all the time and in basic reading and writing skills in particular.
I have known people who could not read or write, as I said earlier, and I have also known people who, with a few pushes here and there, became people who read and write much more- much better - than they did not too long ago.
You part is to realize there are such persons among us today. Then, and only then, can anything be done about it.
A.L.M. August 13, 2004 [c593wds]
