Are you left handed?

[floo]

deleted

[Sriram]

Well...in India traditionally children would  be scolded if they touched their food with their left hand. (You know we usually eat with our fingers and not with forks and spoons).  This was because the left hand was reserved for washing... the posterior!

I wonder if left handed people washed their posterior with their right hand. I am not sure...I must find out.

These days we have various soaps and hand washes...so its not a problem either way.



 

[Aruntraveller]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias_against_left-handed_people

This is quite interesting Floo - it  goes into some detail about the origin of the various words in different languages that apply to left handedness. A significant number of these words have negative connotations. Whether that negativity still feeds through into society I am not sure.

I am left handed myself.

[Rhiannon]

One of my kids is left handed and there's no criticism or correction. Schools provide left handed equipment, although my daughter has learned to do most things using standard stuff. Still, it is alarming watching her cutting fruit - not sure if this is down to being left handed or just lack of practice.

[Gonnagle]

Dear Floo,

Didn't we have this discussion about a year ago, anyway it is one of my favourite subjects, I am left handed a sinistral, one of the devils own, sinistral from the latin sinister meaning left, all ATM's are Gods work, made only for his chosen right handed, can opener made for Gods chosen few, mobile bloody phones, kids watching the teacher writing on the blackboard ( can I say blackboard ) they are only partially taking in what is written, their wee brains are registering, something dodgy about that teacher, the teacher is doing something wrong, or is that just me, I watch right handed people using a pen and it looks wrong.

Gonnagle.

[jeremyp]

The reason I am bringing up the topic is that on another forum I couldn't believe my eyes when it was stated some crazy, extremist Christian nutters in the US, think people should regard being left handed as a 'sin' punishable by being sent to hell! YE GODS!

Did they actually supply a source for these extremist Christians or were they fictitious?

That attitude has prevailed in the past but I thought the people living in modern Western societies had got over it.

Has anyone here ever been criticised for being left handed?

Not me (I am left handed). The only pressure I get to do things right handed comes from the equipment. I hold scissors in my right hand because they don't work the other way, for example.

[Sebastian Toe]

No.

[Rhiannon]

It appears there's a spoof.

http://www.landoverbaptist.net/showthread.php?t=49703

[OH MY WORLD!]

That's going to be floo's favourite American site. So much she can rant to us about. Topics like,

Penis size worldwide
Why all Hungarian men are homosexual
NASA scientist discover hell by accident

Landover Baptist Church  Guaranteeing salvation since 1620

Can't wait for floo's  outrage at these crazy Americans.

[Humph Warden Bennett]

I am right handed.

[Harrowby Hall]

Well, well, well. Here is a thread which has risen from the dead. Perhaps Vlad will use this as strong evidence for resurrection.

Handedness was a topic for investigation by psychologists and neuroscientists - perhaps forty years ago. Studies of monozygotic and dizygotic twins and parent-child incidence came up with nothing particularly significant. The incidence of left-handedness was found to be little more than about 5% with slightly fewer girls than boys being affected.

Perhaps the most notable consequence of left-handedness is the problem it presents when writing Roman script languages - from left to right. However,  it would be interesting to learn if left-handers find writing Arabic or Hebrew script easier than right-handers.

Incidentally, King George VI was sinistral. It has been suggested that his speech defect was the result of him having been forced to use his right hand when a child.

[Dicky Underpants]

I am right handed.

I am left-handed with scissors and (when I last handled one) a cricket bat.

[Robbie]

I'm right handed.

Sririam earlier mentioned hygiene, that people ate with right hand and cleaned themselves with left, right hand being 'clean', left not.

You were right Sririam, I have it on good authority that left handed people did it the other way around. Common sense really.

It's a travesty that kids used to be forced to write with their right hand when left handed. Doesn't make sense!

I've not heard of left handed people being considered evil but there are some very strange people about. (I once met someone who believed owls were evil and so was the stone, jade!)

[Harrowby Hall]

I'm right handed.

I've not heard of left handed people being considered evil but there are some very strange people about.

Dexter is Latin for "right"

Sinister is Latin for "left"

Does that help?

[DaveM]

Has nobody heard of Ehud, the left handed man?

[ippy]

I had an aunt must have been born in about 1895, she was a lovely aunt to me, apparently they had tied her hand at her school to make her write with her right hand, I don't know about any other unkind treatment she may have suffered.

Her first name was Euphemia, how about that for an out of the ordinary name.

ippy

[Robbie]

Dexter is Latin for "right"

Sinister is Latin for "left"

Does that help?

No, I know that but "left" doesn't equal 'evil'.

[ekim]

Another word probably associated with left handedness is the French word for left ...gauche ... with a meaning of unsophisticated and socially awkward.

[Robbie]

Has nobody heard of Ehud, the left handed man?

Yes! A Biblical folk tale, in Judges I think. He wasn't considered evil at all, he was a hero but his lefthandedness is mentioned.

It is horrible that people have been vilified for using their left hands, just because more people use their right.

I agree. When you consider there are quite a lot of left handed people in the world and there always has been, it all seems a bit stupid- terrible that they were made to write with their right hand.