How much truth can we get to?

Human beings are flawed. They make mistakes all the time. But I feel the most dangerous mistake we often make regards our judgement, not our actual knowledge about objective facts. In other words, I wouldn't have any problem with the world if decisions were mostly made by using the best methods available to mankind at a given point in time. What really bothers me is human capacity of condemning perfectly good methods of reaching objective knowledge just because conclusions they lead to go against human intuition itself. 

The universe is huge. We won't probably be able to get to know a significant share of it. Ever. But this doesn't have anything to do with how valid our methods to build knowledge are for explaining what they've aimed to explain. For example: it's illogical to think medicine effectiveness on fighting Polio has any direct correlation with its current ability to cure cancer. These two measures are completely independent, even if the method for getting to both has been exactly the same. It's possible and it happens all the time. You can establish two completely different effectiveness levels for currently curing two different diseases and at the same time be completely unable to deny the validity of the scientific method that has produced the two different treatment protocols.

Science is not perfect. It has its limitations and it is always evolving. But making intuitive claims about its method and call it critic view is just counterproductive. The main reason why science has allowed us to amplify our collective knowledge about the world so ridiculously in a very short period was the possibility to detach its conclusions from individual sensory experience. Which means that if a study was properly conducted (this is where critic view may actually  apply) and it got to a result that goes against your own experience and intuition, probably your experience and intuition are wrong. 

This is wonderful. Because it means that this piece of knowledge generated there doesn't depend on anyone's ability, personal opinions or perceptions to be valid. It's also the main reason why science is so powerful and so great. My take here is simple: discussing can be a healthy and productive exercise. As long as we focus on the right questions. Otherwise it's just like going back to dark ages again (even if you don't leave your cutting edge smartphone alone the entire time).

Disability and romance: tough combination

Dating sites offer a near magic experience for me. One of the things I've always hated about disability, even more so as a teenager and then as a young adult, was the apparent impossibility of getting some rest of it. Especially as a social interaction mediator. I really wanted to be seen, beyond any underrated external appearance or label. But this one would never go away.

Last time I've checked, over 60% of women claimed they will never be romantically involved with some guy with a disability. Even before having data, I've already come in too close contact with these statistics. This situation has always been very perceptible with several different degrees of clarity. Actually, this was the very first aspect of my life for which disability has shown to be a rather powerful excuse for exclusion, and frustration source. Best part is nobody needs to say a word about it. But it's there. It always is.

I could go (and went) for the psychological simplistic reading that I was pushing all these girls away, because I myself wouldn't accept who I really was. Again, accepting that would give me some sort of potential feeling of control over my own life and destiny, which I guess any developing person needs to grow up with a bit of self-security. Plus, despite the fact this pseudo therapy process would transfer a lot of my parents money to psychotherapists' pockets, there hasn't been much noticeable effect over my emotional well-being.

Apart from that, the more these romantic relationships would grow in importance and time spending among my friends as I'd grow up, the more alone I've gotten. Not only I wouldn't be able to interact with the girls at this level like they were, and make a sense of my own sexual identity, but I'd also become so different from my able-bodied friends, that I would soon become some sort of cast away right in the middle of regular school, the place I'd be occupying if it wasn't for being disabled (in fact, a place I had occupied not very long before since at that point it was up to me).

Most of my timid experiences in the romantic arena have started happening when I was around 19. And of course there was an additional price to be paid for initiating my life as male at that point. When I say these experiences have started then, I don't absolutely mean they've become a steady flow. Quite the opposite. Too many obstacles in life would provide extra difficulties for getting and maintaining these relationships. They'd feel much more like a fortunate accident, than something I could say I've had any control over. I've had too heavy luggage to carry. So either I'd be discriminated (no words of course) or would be deemed as exaggerated and neurotic.

This has been an ever present giant hole in my life. Scale would tilt to both sides and I'd never be positive about the ground I was stepping on.  Difference was later on, unlike in my teenage years, it wouldn't be the only one. Fact I was really clever all my life has brought me safe and sound only until University prep course at the age of 18. Everything I needed to study was well organized and accessible, which gave me the chance to become a top student, despite the never ending depression, exclusion, and loneliness.

But when I went to the University, things were all so different. Nothing was organized or accessible there. Classes would happen all over the giant campus. Books wouldn't be available, and even if they were, I'd have to spend very long looking for them at the huge libraries. I'd just get exhausted and learn very little. Fun was always related to activities I couldn't take part on. I was ashamed of all that. I thought it was somehow my fault and couldn't bond with my colleagues. Plus, it seemed I had become dumb all of a sudden. There was absolutely nowhere to anchor my self-esteem to. It took me more than 10 years to understand why university was a lousy experience for me, even as a student.

Today, besides the limitations currently imposed on me in leading my quasi-normal life experiment, I still face all these other demons from the past. Exclusion is something similar to heavy-metal poisoning. You get it a little at a time, and it accumulates all over your body and your life, generating some nasty effects as time goes by. It's always easier to blame that on someone's personality. It's better for the conception of world dominant people like to live with. Only issue is that's freaking unfair.

Very often, I feel like escaping all that. And a guy  like me, whose disability is only perceived by others as I move and speak, online relationship sites are extremely refreshing. As I've mentioned in previous essays, not because I'll trick girls to believe I'm something I'm really not. Before meeting them, I always go through the very unpleasant process of telling them about my disability, explaining it in the most detailed manner I possibly can. Some of them will just stop talking to me, as if I've done something wrong in having that in the first place. Others will say it's ok. Of course ok in theory is a whole lot different from ok in practice, and I get it, really, I do. Few will like me as a man, and treat me like they would do to any other guy. I realize these are very few, and meeting them takes lots of time, effort, and emotional energy. This is very frustrating at times, since I also have extra work to do at the other aspects of my life.

However, as nice as being in the game for finding a life partner maybe, I've realized the most value I actually extract from the whole online dating experience is not very correlated with the 3 or 4 dates I can have in a very long time and in which we both get attracted to each other (and that won't necessarily become anything else, because life's too complicated). The thrill I get from swiping and talking is actually bitter-sweet. I get to experiment a taste of the life I'd have if it wasn't for my disability. It's sweet because it gives me the certainty I'm a nice, even good looking, very lovable man. It reassures me about qualities I do have, but which are often offset by stigma or any other form of prejudice others usually have embedded in their eyes. But it's also very bitter when the real date shock makes me aware of how my life is poorer in pleasant and tender social experiences than it would be in a disability-free environment like the virtual one I've had the chance to flow in. No matter what happens, I've got to come back to this concrete reality eventually. And especially in comparison, it truly sucks.

Disability and fundamentalism

Today I finally felt like a suicide bomber. Of course I didn't explode myself or anyone else. Not literally anyways. But I've had the experience of protecting a principle with my life, because as for suicide bombers, what was being innocently minimized by others is exactly what has finally given me a direction and provided a compelling meaning for my life as is.

However, contrary to what usually happens to terrorists, enemy identity wasn't really obvious. As a matter of fact, the enemy was disguised in such a way that externally we'd have been considered as equals.

This was probably the most painful part for me. Because what has likely brought us together were terribly similar life circumstances. I'm sure although she had never mentioned that explicitly, the fact she has been temporarily disabled when she was a kid, must have opened her eyes to several issues I've faced myself.  Question is to what extent.

I've told her about my disability since the beginning. I thought that was the most honest thing to do. Also, I've realized this is always a much better approach than assuming the difference doesn't matter, and meet the other person unprepared.

What I wasn't expecting at all was that she herself had something that could be disguised in pictures, and that potentially could change radically her attractiveness judgement by these. At first, I just didn't feel attracted when I've faced her true self. This wasn't new at all. It was indeed the most frequent experience I've had in these semi-blind dates short career of mine. Something I didn't expect at all, by the way.

The other unexpected came later. All these unattractive layers of her just melt away right in front of me. And all of a sudden, I was able to see a person that was actually much more attractive than the idealized and carefully edited virtual version of her. Things could then flow well, at least for me. But on the day after, she has felt the after-shock of our collision. She was hurt by the fury with which I've argued for protecting my reason to live. And she never wanted to see me again.

The impossible

I came to believe there's no such a thing as impossible. But definitely not in the inspirational porn way people use to portrait disabled folks. Rather than that, I just draw on the fact at least as long as we live, there's always another day, whether you claim you can't stand it or not.

But there're certain mechanisms in living creatures that seem to act as a circuit breaker. If you like the idea of God, maybe you'd like to blame this on her/him. These switches seem to do nothing but to abbreviate terrible suffering with death. And they can be activated in animals, usually by inducing life threats the subject can't either escape or successfully beat.

Issue is, for some reasons probably related to human distancing from a standard animal model, these mechanisms often become the problem itself, turning into an acute or chronic mental illness. Under this light, disability has huge potential to produce that as a byproduct. Because analogous to survival in lower animals, development stage of someone in a given chronological time in life is very much correlated to this person'a ability to integrate socially, and support himself and possibly a family by doing so.

But for some reason, when partial integration is achieved, people around don't seem to get the weight of this deficit. Maybe it's just a matter of reference. Since these people don't identify completely with a disabled person, they can't see her as just another human being. Partial integration itself motivate able bodied people to expect less from the disabled, and therefore not get the gap dimension between the two body conditions.

On the contrary, able bodied folks seem to consider minor accomplishments as something disabled ones should nurture their souls with. This is probably the reason why it's so difficult to make things better, closer and more fair.