Check out my VIDEO...post a comment...share my video. Let's see what "People Have to Say". ;o)
Peace out!
Friday, June 1, 2012
My Social Experiment Video Flog!
I started this blog a few years ago to feel better about the book that i had started writing years prior. Yeah, yeah...the book I started writing...how many times have you heard people say that? Probably a lot in your life, if you think about it. Writing a book is a huge undertaking...no matter the type. (mind you...a Harlequin romance novel couldn't take THAT long. As long as you have a healthy, insatiable sexual appetite! hee hee) My book was to be somewhat of a memoir...not that I am an old lady with tons of experience having so much to write about my life and the wisdom I have gained. ha ha not quite. But, my life sure has been incredibly eventful being the one armed child, girl and woman that I am. Anyhow, I got about 22 pages of a book written and then I just stopped. I felt overwhelmed by the process...and didn't feel as though my writing could stand up to other published writers. (I write very much with my emotion...just like talking to me.) I am starting a whole other project now. And the very beginnings of this project is a little video I made to put on You Tube..."My Social Experiment" video. As I have written previously in my blog...I get a ton of different reaction when I walk in a room or walk by a crowd of people...stopped cars at a red light...people at the beach...wherever I go, I am the one who sticks out like a sore thumb. (for the most part) But all I get is the look on someone's face...not knowing them personally, I really have NO idea what that look even means. Maybe sometimes I judge them thinking they are judging me...but that is not the case. Who knows right? Well...with my little video, people can post what they think when they first see me. I want honesty...even though some of it may hurt my feelings. It is incredibly interesting to me...to say the least.
Check out my VIDEO...post a comment...share my video. Let's see what "People Have to Say". ;o)
Peace out!
Check out my VIDEO...post a comment...share my video. Let's see what "People Have to Say". ;o)
Peace out!
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We all have basic expectations about what certain things are supposed to look like. I think we have to have those expectations just to make sense of the world - we need to have categories that are defined by readily recognized characteristics. The "generic" car has a hood in the front, and a trunk in the back, and four wheels. When the old Corvair came out with the engine in the back and trunk in the front, its very appearance people to rethink what a "car" is supposed to look like. Same thing with those three-wheel cars one sees in European cities.
ReplyDeleteWhen I saw your video, your appearance similarly challenges my very expectation of what an "average" person is supposed to look like - two legs and two arms. That challenge comes in the form of a brief shock to the stomach, and perhaps a double take to make sure I'm seeing what I think I'm seeing. The reaction to a different person is probably more exaggerated because, unlike a car or some inanimate object, I recognize you have to live with that difference - including putting up with people who don't know how to react to it.
The initial reaction of shock disappears after a few seconds. My next reaction is just to take in that difference - it's not every day you get to see a person with an asymmetrical appearance. Then I find myself wanting to get past appearances. What does your difference really mean to you and what should it mean to my preconceptions? Is it a true "handicap," or just a "difference" - like red hair or green eyes - that gets exaggerated in my mind by its uniqueness? To find out, I observe your body motion and look to see how you physically compensate for it and whether you are at peace with it. I think that's why most people stare. They just want to know, and they realize they have perhaps one fleeting opportunity to find out.
I would argue that most people who stare are simply curious, and not pitying you. I can tell you that's my reaction. By the end of the video, I see you as a likeable person with normal interests and reactions. The fact that you have one arm makes you "exotic" and, admittedly, endlessly fascinating to look at - but that's in the context of you coming across as a normal, cool, "exotic" person. Who apparently lives in a very beautiful part of the world.
Peace.
Thank you for your comment. You have a very intelligent way of looking at the world.
ReplyDeleteThe experiment is to get whatever reaction is the first...to find out what that is. When someone looks at me with jaw dropped to floor and hand over mouth, for instance....i really got to wonder what is going on in that mind of theirs. (It is amazing what some people do...how they react)
So...thank you for taking the time to watch the video and then to respond. I appreciate your honesty. :o)
Peace.
great video pam....good job getting started on this project...i have to say, for me, when i 1st saw you several years ago, dancing at silva bay, my 1st reaction was to do a double take.....cause i was taught that it is impolite to stare, and also because i do not want to freak you out...i saw you, then looked away, then looked back to see what i was really seeing...i must say, it is really hard not to want to stare that when i see something that i'm not sure my eyes got right....ya know, double checking.....after the initial "shocK'.....and it is shocking at 1st.....and i could see the whole picture.....i could see that you are a beautiful woman and a beautiful dancer......so then i became interested in watching you dance, to see how this affects you body movements....what i saw? wow, i saw someone with grace and natural body movement .....and i can say from knowing you better that i forget about this one arm thing cause you move so naturally in the world, you know, like how they say that someone very skilled at ballet makes it look easy, but really it is difficult? this is what i imagine it can be like for you sometimes....xoxoxox
ReplyDeleteOh wow Tammy...thank you so much for sharing this. I love you!!! xox
ReplyDeleteI’m totally agree with two comments above. I’ll just add a few aspects, according to my special point of view.
ReplyDeleteI’m afraid, I have to explain something before I’d start to discuss the topic. To tell the truth – I was asked to be honest – I’m a devo. No, not of that type, who posts photos and comments of “sexy stumps”, who treats women as objects. On the other hand, I’m a man. But not of that type, who posts photos and comments of blowjobs, and … (sorry, I don’t know the exact slang phrases of genitals) , who treats women as objects. There are men, who are of this kind, (and there are sites for them), but not MEN in general! Similarly, there are devos of that kind, you wrote about formerly, but not DEVOS in general are such kind. Please, open your mind – as you asked the devos – and read a few thoughts from a devo, who also considers those guys sickening, who post about either sexy stumps, or genitals, fucking and blowjob. They’re miserable since don’t understand, what is amazing in sex: to reach an other human’s mind through satisfying her (his) body. And that it can only work between equal participants.
So! As I mentioned above, I’m a devo. A soft devo. Soft, because disability is not NECESSARY, and not ENOUGH for me to spin up. Just a special – but more characteristic - spice, like cute teeny breasts (or huge ones for some others), a characteristic nose, or mouth, (a baby-face for someone else), or being left-handed. (As you can see, you are cumulatively exciting for me :-) ). Of course, the essence is the mind and spirit inside: no breasts and bottoms (thighs, calves, toes, etc… all just meat and skin), and no disabilities can arouse me. The only thing what can do this, is a WOMAN herself with her magic spirit and glamour. And yes, with her body, (and it’s smell, and touch). But while body is visible, mind is not. Mind can only be concluded on the basis of body, and ‘aura’.
Another important thing is imperfection itself. Perfection is great, it should be admired and adored, but not loved. Nothing to do with it, it don’t need us, as we’re imperfect. And the most amazing: to be complete in an imperfect way. Where disadvantages and disabilities become just neutral properties. Of course, the essence is still inside, your REAL disability must not be your missing arm, it’s (they’re) in your mind. (Of course, no one but you and your closest friends should know, what they are), but you can likely treat it in that way, you treat your ‘armless-ness’. Mind and soul, and their properties are embodied in a body, and it’s working manner. (Gestures, movements, facial expressions, etc). Therefore I love one’s body: whose mind I also in love with. (Or when I first meet her: that one’s body excites me, whose soul is assumed to be lovable for me. But this assumed lovability is effected by some aspects of body, and vice versa). No one is perfect, therefore everyone is special in a special, individual way. But not everyone’s specialness (way-to-be-special) is for me. But your one – the strength which overcome any physical disabilities – impresses me.
to be continued...
Part 2.
ReplyDeleteWhat I feel, or think, when I see you (or a woman like you in my country in Central Europe)? Or a man?
As I mentioned above, this kind of specialness always makes me curious. There are things, making me curious. I catch sight of them, like the eagle does of mouse from the sky. Let there be one person in an auditory, who writes with left hand! I set focus on him / her. And if there is a man, or a woman, who is not interesting for me in general, I get over. But a girl with an exciting aura (even if writes with her right :-) ) catches me, and I can not look elsewhere. Like Tammy wrote it. I don’t stare anybody just because of some disability. I have a one-handed uncle. That sight doesn’t shock me. (Yes, I can imagine some kinds of shocking injuries or disabilities, mainly if the face is effected, but an armless woman is not of that kind.)
I think, if I met you, I would behave like Tammy wrote. I would be quite embarrassed. You have the chance to make me feel such way, if you would have two arms, as you seem to be tempered of three girls I formerly wanted to go with. However, maybe it wouldn’t turn out at the supermarket or bus stop. But surely would immediately, as you have one.
All best
Ivan
p.s. Sorry, if my poor English can be hardly understood