Chicken Soup For The Lefties Soul
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Hi, i'm feeling bored, so i'm doing a bit of a research work here, haha
Definition of Left
Of or pertaining to that side of the body in man on which the muscular action of the limbs is usually weaker than on the other side; -- opposed to right, when used in reference to a part of the body; as, the left hand, or arm; the left ear. Also said of the corresponding side of the lower animals.
That part of surrounding space toward which the left side of one's body is turned; as, the house is on the left when you face North.
Those members of a legislative assembly (as in France) who are in the opposition; the advanced republicans and extreme radicals. They have their seats at the left-hand side of the presiding officer. See Center, and Right.
Situated so that the left side of the body is toward it; as, the left side of a deliberative meeting is that to the left of the presiding officer; the left wing of an army is that to the left of the center to one facing an enemy. -
Far-Left
Far left is an extremely ill-defined term, used to refer to people or ideas falling into the general category of left wing which the speaker considers to be far into that spectrum.
The term must be understood as relative to either the speaker or the context in which they are speaking. So a US conservative may consider any member of a Communist party to be part of the 'far left', while in a communist state there may be 'moderate' communists and 'far left' communists.
In general, it is used to describe persons or groups who hold radical egalitarian views and who seek to achieve radical social and political change by taking over or overthrowing the existing order in society. Depending on a group's militancy and the given political circumstances, revolutionary change may be achieved through democratic or undemocratic, violent or nonviolent means.
Groups that advocate some form of revolution, but without being egalitarian, are generally not part of the far left.
Typically, far-left groups are communist or anarchist, and they strongly oppose capitalist governments and institutions. Sometimes the term "far left" is used pejoratively by those on the right wing to describe any view they perceive as hostile to capitalism. -
Rights for the left-handed?
In a society of growing awareness of discrimination, prejudice, and the resultant discovery of many more 'new' minorities, there is still a small group that has received no political or social recognition or relief for their plight. One of the last truly persecuted minorities have little hope for change. They are the people who were born left-handed. Left-handedness has been looked at as many things throughout recorded history: The mark of the devil, mental retardation, mental neurosis, rebellion, a nasty habit, a social inconvenience, homosexuality, and criminality to name a few. Left-handed people have been the positive minority since the early bronze age and there is more than circumstantial evidence that places left handers in the minority since the time of Australopithecus Afarensis(1) more than three million years ago. Left handed people have been discriminated against in nearly all aspects of their lives from religion to the languages we use and the tools we use to live our daily lives.
Discrimination based on a person's ethnicity or race is deplorable in today's 'enlightened' society. To round up all red headed men and women and deport them out of America is an absurd notion. To deny more than fifty percent of our countries population the right to vote simply because they were born female is another ridiculous idea. But by being the human beings that we are we have managed to create reasons to discriminate one group over another, to rationalize and justify outdated ideas to the world and to ourselves; and we have outdone ourselves against all the left-handed people. The technology and intelligence of our modern era has not improved the lives of the left-handed individual and has at best is quietly ignored them.
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The percentage of left-handed people in the world is highly debatable. In fact modern scientist are no closer to determining the reason for being left-handed than they were a thousand years ago. A popular answer for the problem is that being left-handed is hereditary and passed along in a person's genes. This theory seems to be supported in such examples as the famous Kerr Clan of Scotland who were predominately left-handed as well as several members of the Royal Family, King George II, King George VI, Queen Victoria, the Queen Mother Elizabeth, and Prince Charles all of which are left-handed as well. A recent study showed that two right-handed parents had a 9.5% chance of having a left-handed child. The chances rose to 19.5% if one parent if left-handed and rose to 26.1% of the children from two left-handed parents. The Geschwind and Galaburda's "Testosterone" theory argues that a larger that usual amount of testosterone in the amniotic fluid during pregnancy affects the handedness of the baby. This is not a completely accepted explanation yet and a wide array of other environmental theories abound. Bakan's "Birth Stress" theory states that during the birthing process great stress is placed on an infant's skull and in many cases damaged in the process, often leading to left-handedness. The "Primitive Combat" theory is that early warriors survived more battles when they carried their shield in their left hand as it better protected the heart. This natural selection weeded out the left handers. 5 The "Mother with Baby" theory says that women learned to be right handed by caring for infants because women predominately hold babies in the left hand. Some say that the baby is more comfortable on the left side of the body since it is closer to the heart. Others say that it frees up the mothers dominant hand for important tasks. But the net result of this is that women have learned to become right handed and passed it on to the world at large.
Regardless of the causes for becoming left-handed, science has problems just studying the phenomenon itself. If anything, our new science has only fragmented the problem into many smaller and in no way easier ones. The outdated cliché paradigm was that someone who was left handed also had a dominant left foot, eye, and operated dominantly in the right hemisphere of the brain. Yet this is easily debunked with the scientific study of psychopathology and lateralization of the brain. (Which is just amazingly bizarre scientific word games used to cover the fact that the scientist involved have no clue about handedness whatsoever.) Individuals can be left handed in one activity but right in another while being completely ambidextrous in others. There are left handed, left brained, right eyed, and right legged people and just about any combination thereof while only a small percentage of people are truly 'left handed' in the clinical sense.
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Yet how many of us are left handed? That depends on what is tested for in the studies of course. Manual tests versus neurological tests. The wording of test questions, the diversity of the test subjects, adequate sampling of nationality, ethnicity, and equal representation of historical and religious influences aside, the generally accepted number is about 11% of the worlds population. In a study performed by Gilbert and Wysocki (4) in 1992 of 1,177,507 people showed the following numbers:
"Men are more likely (12.6%) to be left-handed than women (9.9%)
Young people are more likely to be left-handed (14% for men, 12% for women) than are the elderly (near 6% for both sexes)
People of Asian (9.3%) or Hispanic (9.1%) lineage are slightly less likely to be left-handed than whites, blacks, or North American Indians."
All of this information and what does it tell us? In the long run it does not tell us a whole lot. Regardless of what science has to say about the subject does not change the fact that as a group left-handers suffer indignities, inconveniences, torments, and in some times of our history, death for a reason completely out of their control. In almost all religions in the world today there is an extremely strong bias towards the right hand and against the left. The full weight of the Old and New Testaments as well as the Koran, the Zohar, and the Talmud are in favor of the right hand. All blessings and just decisions are made from the right hand while deceit and damnation arise from the left. In The Bible, King James Version, Jonah 4:11 God tells Jonah that Nineveh contains people so sinful that they "cannot discern between their right hand and their left." The famous line, "Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth." Matthew 6:3, repeats the anti-left sentiment. In some modern concordances there are no less that one thousand six hundred different references against the left and the left handed. (6) From directional to emotional and superstitious the right hand is at first preferred and later exalted in religion and has left an indelible mark against the left-handed. During the Medieval period right up through the Renaissance the left hand was linked to Satan and those who used their left hand were thought to be possessed by devils, in league with Satan. One of the qualifications to be questioned, or tortured, in the infamous Spanish Inquisition was to be left-handed and often meant death. Left-handers were killed, tortured, exiled, and harassed throughout Europe more than any persecuted cultural minority for the simple fact that all religious or ethnic minorities always had a left-handed minority within itself. The persecuted among the persecuted.
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Even before the onset of popular Christianity anti 'left' sentiment existed. In Jamblichus' writings Life of Pythagoras, he describes rituals dealing with early Pythagoreans. They "enter holy places by the right, which is . . . divine, and leave them by the left, the symbol of . . . dissolution." And it was later confirmed by Aristotle that they "call good what is on the right, and bad what is on the left." (7) These early beliefs are thought to have arisen from primitive sun worshipping cults in Mesopotamia. At a time in human history where most of civilization was North of the equator the worshippers would face south to view the sun. Hence life and progress proceeded to the right and darkness and death from the left. A common theme echoed throughout Greek, Roman, and Norse mythology.
Even the long history of language promotes hatred and dissension towards the left-handed. The Oxford Dictionary defines 'Left' in the primary sense as, "weak, worthless" and defines the directional equivalent as the derived, or secondary, sense of the word. The Latin word for 'left' is 'sinistre' and has left us with 'sinistral' which is the scientific term for 'left-handed'. Incidentally enough the term for 'right-handed' is 'dextral' which also means 'just' as in justice in Latin. Many other words that translate into 'left' in English have secondary meanings as shown here:
Language: word: also translated as
French: gauche: awkward, clumsy
Danish: kejthandet: cat-handed
Italian: mancini: crooked, maimed
German: linkisch; awkward
Russian: na levo: sneaky
Portuguese: canhoto: weak, mischievous
Spanish: zurdo: malicious
Romanian: bongo: crooked, evil
There are also a great amount of words that have been used to describe with contempt left handed people. The British English 'cack-handed' meaning excrement handed. The Scottish 'gawk-handed' where a "gawk" is a foolish person. The Australian English molly-dooker where a "molly" is an effeminate man and "duke" is slang for hand. Cork-handed, Bang-handed, Gallock-handed, Wacky, Spuddy-handed, Kay-fisted, Kefty, Corrie-pawed, Back-handed, Clickey-handed, Coochy-handed, Cow-pawed, Gammy-handed, Kerr-handed, Kitty-wesy, Scrammy, Skiffle-handed, Skivvy-handed, and Watty-handed to name a few more. (
In contrast the words describing 'right' often mean such things as, straight, erect, just, correct, law, wholly entirely right, and upright.
The makeup of our language has spilt over into other areas of our lives. Oaths are never sworn in with the left hand, the evil eye is the left eye, hands are joined in marriage ceremonies by the right hand, people are born to their 'birthright', America entitles every one in the Bill of Rights, the political radicals are the leftists, et cetera ad nauseam
So we grow up in a world that has been taught from near infancy that being left handed is a bad and sometimes evil thing. It is passed on to the child from a very early age as the development and learning process begins. Many teachers still today will punish children for trying to write with their left hand. Among grade school teachers it still commonly believed that writing with right hand could be taught to a child given the correct teaching. Couple this with a sociological contempt of left-handers and you have a system that can traumatize many children who do not feel they are 'normal,' feel wrong or bad simply for writing as it feels naturally to them, with their left hand.
In the newsgroup alt.lefthanders many people have expressed their own personal experiences on the topic.
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"I started my schooling on Guam, where corporal punishment is still used. My earliest and most severe problem with being left-handed was not a desk, or the ever-popular scissors problem. I had a teacher who would smack my left hand with a yardstick every time she caught me writing with my left hand. To this day I never forgot this, and to this day I still heavily favor my left hand. I had to learn to adapt and make the best out of what comes my way, and by doing so I have become adept at using either hand in most situations. My primary role at work is computer support and believe me you will not find to anyone's mouse on the left side of their computer. I concluded long ago that societal norms in general are ruled by the majority, and we have to learn to play by their rules if we want to get anywhere. -anonymous, USA"
"In second grade I had a teacher who forced me to write with my hand turned so that I held a pencil the same way a right-handed student would. It was so unnatural for me and my handwriting was awful. I never understood why it made any difference whatsoever which way my hand was turned as long as I could shape the letters correctly. It was very upsetting to have this "differentness" pointed out in front of other children. -anonymous, USA"
"My fourth grade teacher, in an attempt to "cure" my left-handedness, would force me to use my right hand to perform all of my school work. If she caught me using my left hand, I was hit in the head with a dictionary. It turned out that she believed left handers were connected with Satan. Left-handed bias in the classroom has got to stop. In many ways left-handers should be more successful in the educational environment. It's the tools and paradigms that are their real handicap. -Michael Salazar, USA"
In addition to a teaching structure that has seriously frowned on left-handed children, most schools are also inadequately equipped to hold and properly instruct the left-handed. Pencil sharpeners, spiral notebooks, scissors, desks, rulers, and sports equipment such as gloves and hockey sticks are all designed for right-handed children. Writing over the spiral of a spiral notebook on a desk that does not support the left hand is difficult enough. Throw in the insistence of teachers of forcing left-handed children to write right handed slow down the ability to take notes and stay up with lectures in class. Left-handed children are often misdiagnosed as impaired or slow because of this. They are often accused of cheating during exams because of the way in which they must arrange the desks in order to write efficiently.
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Making it through childhood life suffering the taunts of all the right-handed children because a left-handed child couldn't conform to the right-handed world can last a lifetime. If the psychological obstacles that they face were not bad enough, a left-handed person must live in a world that was built from the ground up by right-handed people for right-handed people.
The following common tools all require left-to-right wrist turning movements more comfortable for right-handers: corkscrews, rotary dial phones, analog clock-setting & winding, screws, lightbulbs, door handles, and ice cream scoopers. The following are specifically designed to be used in a right-handed fashion: scissors, can openers, coffee makers, computer keyboards (numeric keypad on right), calculators and pushbutton phones (left-to-right array), golf clubs, wrenches, slot machines, gearshifts, playing cards, gravy boats, rulers, bowling balls, vegetable peelers, voting machines, phone booths, violins (and most other stringed instruments), saxophones, cars built in right-lane countries, and most hand-held power tools. Because of this there are jobs that are more difficult for the left-handed person to do as safely and as fast as the right-handed. Meat slicers, drill presses, band saws, textile machinery, production lines, and heavy equipment are set up for right hand use. Recent research in this subject has proven the greater threat of harm for left-handers in areas such as manufacturing and construction over the threat for the right handed workers. (9)
The obstacles are ever present in the life of the left-handed person. The left-handed comprise the silently discriminated minority that will always be a part of any society. The effects of anti-left ideology and the resultant difficulties can at best give one a mild identity crisis and a worse cause severe emotional and psychological distress that has caused stuttering, mental blocks, and depression that can keep otherwise normal men and women out of society. Our ideas and beliefs about the left hand and about those who are left handed are ingrained into us from generations upon generations ago. It is one of the only persistent and common dogmas found in nearly all societies the world over in the history of man.
Perhaps it is because of the nature of its intrinsic level of acceptance and integration with society that it draws such little attention today. Perhaps it is one of those simple ideas that is taken for granted simply because one is never faced with anything to the contrary. Yet the discrimination is real and it is not going away. Robert Hertz summed up the future for the left-handed in this phrase.
"The distinction of good and evil, which for long was [compatible] with the antithesis of right and left, will not vanish from our conscience the moment the left hand makes a more effective contributions to human labour and is able, on occasion, to take the place of the right. IF the constraint of a mystical ideal has for centuries been able to make man a unilateral being, physiologically mutilated, a liberated and foresighted community will strive to develop better the energies dormant in our left side . . . and to assure by an appropriate training a more harmonious development . . ."
End....
Offtopic : The above article is really worth a read -
Famous left handers
Left-Handed U.S. Presidents
James A. Garfield (1831-1881) 20th
Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) 31st
Harry S. Truman (1884-1972) 33rd
Gerald Ford (1913- ) 38th
Ronald Reagan (1911 - ) 40th
George H.W. Bush (1924- ) 41st
Bill Clinton (1946- ) 42nd
Left-Handed U.S. Politicos
Senator Bill Bradley, Rhodes scholar, basketball star
McGeorge Bundy, presidential advisor
Benjamin Franklin, statesman/publisher/scientist
Steve Forbes, businessman/publisher
Jean-Marc Froidevaux ?, Suiss politician
Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Supreme Court Justice
Senator Daniel Inouye
Anthony Kennedy, Supreme Court Justice
Brigadier Gen. Lee Hsien Loon, Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore
Robert S. McNamara, Secretary of Defense
Col. Oliver North, White House aid
H. Ross Perot, businessman
William Perry, Secretary of Defense
Nelson Rockefeller, Vice President
Senator Hugh Scott
Robert Wagner, New York mayor
Henry Wallace, Vice President
[Senator Bob Dole - switched to left due to injury]
Miscellaneous Left-Handers
Joan of Arc (?), French heroine
Lloque Yapanqui (?), Inca monarch
Ramses II (?), Egyptian pharaoh
Tiberius (?), Roman emperor
Alexander the Great
Charlemagne, Holy Roman emperor
Julius Caesar, Roman general
Napoléon Bonaparte (?), French emperor
Josephine de Beauharnais
King Louis XVI of France
Queen Victoria of England
King George II of England
King George VI of England
Prince Charles of England
Prince William of England
Fidel Castro, Cuban leader
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime-minister
Nicole d'Oresme, mathematician
Henry Ford, automobile manufacturer
David Rockefeller, banker
Dwight F. Davis, founder of the Davis Cup in tennis
Helen Keller, advocate for the blind
Dr. Albert Schweitzer, physician/missionary
August Piccard, inventor of stratosphere, bathosphere
Edwin Buzz Aldrin, astronaut
Wally Schirra, astronaut
Dr. Mark Silver, surgeon
Paul Prudhomme, chef
Cecil Beaton, photographer/costume designer
Lord Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts (ambidexterous)
Dave Barry, journalist
Edward R. Murrow, correspondent
Ted Koppel, journalist
Forrest Sawyer, journalist
Ray Suarez, journalist
John F. Kennedy, Jr., lawyer/publisher
Caroline Kennedy, lawyer/author
Ron Reagan, son of Ronald Reagan
Vin Scully, sports broadcaster
David Letterman (?), host
Jay Leno, host
Lenny Bruce, comedian
Allen Ludden, host
Joel Hodgson, host of Mystery Science Theater 3000
Wink Martindale, game show host
Uri Geller, psychokinetic performer
Richard Simmons, exercise guru
Euell Gibbons, naturalist
Marie Dionne, one of the Dionne quintuplets
General H. Norman Schwarzkopf
Clarence Darrow, lawyer
F. Lee Bailey, lawyer
Melvin Belli, lawyer
Marcia Clark, lawyer
Alan Funt, television producer
Milt Caniff, cartoonist
Bill Mauldin, cartoonist
Cathy Guisevite, cartoonist
Matt Groening, cartoonist
Jean Plantureux (Plantu), political cartoonist
Pat Oliphand, political cartoonist Ronald Searle, cartoonist
Pat Robertson, evangelist/politician
N.B. Forrest, Confederate general
John Dillinger, criminal/bank robber
Boston Strangler (Albert Henry DeSalvo), serial killer
Jack-the-Ripper, serial killer
John Wesley Hardin, Western gunslinger
Bart Simpson, cartoon character
[King Edward III of England, due to stroke] -
Left-Handed Authors
James Baldwin, novelist
Bet Bowen, horror novelist
Peter Benchley, novelist
Lewis Carroll
Richard Condon, novelist
Jean Genet
Marshall McLuhan
Diane Paul
Helen Hooven Santmyer, novelist
Viktoria Stefanov
Mark Twain, novelist
Samuel C. Warner (?), poet
H.G. Wells
Jessamyn West
Eudora Welty, see One Writer's Beginnings (1983:27)
[Thomas Carlyle - switched to left due to injury]
Left-Handed Musicians
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, composer
David Byrne (Talking Heads)
Glen Campbell
Vicki Carr
Natale Cole
Kurt Cobain (Nirvana)
Phil Collins (Genesis)
Billy Corgan (Smashing Pumpkins)
Dick Dale (guitarist)
Don Everly (The Everly Brothers)
Phil Everly (The Everly Brothers)
Bela Fleck, jazz musician
Glenn Frey (the Eagles)
Eric Gale, guitarist
Noel Gallagher (Oasis) (?)
Errol Garner, jazz pianist
Judy Garland
Crysal Gayle
Kevin Griffin, guitarist & lead singer (Better than Ezra)
Thomas Hedley, vocalist/musician
Jimi Hendrix
Isaac Hayes
Tony Iommi, guitarist (Black Sabbath)
Albert King, guitarist
Melissa Manchester
Chuck Mangione, trumpet
Martina McBride ?, country music singer
Paul McCartney (the Beatles; Wings)
Christie Marie Melonson (opera)
George Michael (Wham!)
Peter Nero, conductor
Joe Perry ? (Aerosmith)
Robert Plant (Led Zepplin)
Cole Porter, song-writer
Sergei Rachmaninoff ?, composer
Maurice Ravel ?, composer
Lou Rawls
John Lydon a.k.a. Johnny Rotten (Sex Pistols / Public Image Ltd.)
Rich Szabo, trumpeter
Seal
Ringo Starr (?) (the Beatles)
Paul Simon (Simon & Garfunkel)
Tiny Tim
Rudy Valee
Lenny White, drummer
Paul Williams, song-writer
Left-Handed Artists
Albrecht Dürer
M.C. Escher
Hans Holbein
Paul Klee
Michelangelo
LeRoy Neiman
Raphael
Leonardo da Vinci (RH paralyzed?)
Left-Handed Actors
Don Adams
Dan Aykroyd
Eddie Albert
Tim Allen
June Allyson
Harry Anderson
Amitabh Bachchan, Indian actor
Herschel Bernardi
Robert Blake
Matthew Broderick
Bruce Boxleitner
Carol Burnett
George Burns, comedian
Ruth Buzzi, comedienne
Sid Caesar, comedian
Keith Carradine
Khaled Chahrour, Egyptian actor
Charlie Chaplin
George Gobel, comedian
Chuck Conners
Hans Conreid
James Cromwell
Tom Cruise
Quinn Cummings
Daniel Davis
Bruce Davison
Matt Dillon
Marty Engles, comedian
Olivia de Havilland
Robert DeNiro
Michael Dorn
Fran Drescher, comedian
Richard Dreyfuss
W.C. Fields
Larry Fine ? (of the Three Stooges)
Peter Fonda
Greta Garbo
Terri Garr
Paul Michael Glaser
Whoopie Goldberg
Betty Grable
Cary Grant
Peter Graves
Mark Hamill
Rex Harrison
Goldie Hawn
Joey Heatherton
Tippi Hedren
Jim Henson, puppetteer
Kermit the Frog
Rock Hudson
Angelina Jolie
Shirley Jones ?
Gabe Kaplan
Danny Kaye
Diane Keaton
George Kennedy
Nicole Kidman
Lisa Kudrow
Michael Landon
Hope Lange
Joey Lawrence
Peter Lawford
Cloris Leachman
Hal Linden
Cleavon Little
Shirley MacLaine
Andrew McCarthy
Kristy McNichol
Steve McQueen
Howie Mandel, comedian
Marcel Marceau, mime
Harpo Marx
Marsha Mason
Mary Stuart Masterson
Anne Meara, comedian
Sasha Mitchell
Marilyn Monroe
Robert Morse
Anthony Newley
Kim Novak
Ryan O'Neal
Sarah Jessica Parker
Estelle Parsons
Anthony Perkins
Ron Perlman
Luke Perry
Bronson Pinchot
Joe Piscopo, comedian
Robert Preston
Michael J. Pollard
Richard Pryor, comedian
Robert Redford
Keanu Reeves
Don Rickles, comedian
Julia Roberts
Mickey Rourke
Eva Marie Saint
Telly Savalas
Jean Seberg
Jerry Seinfeld, comedian
Christian Slater
Dick Smothers, comedian
Brent Spiner
Slyvester Stallone ?
Terence Stamp
Jessica Steen
Rod Steiger
Alan Thicke
Terry Thomas, comedian
Emma Thompson
Rip Torn
Peter Ustinov
Brenda Vaccaro
Karen Valentine
Rudy Vallee
Dick Van Dyke
Graham Walker a.k.a. Grumbleweeds, English comedian
Wil Wheaton
James Whitmore
Treat Williams
Bruce Willis
William Windom
Oprah Winfrey
Mare Winningham
Joanne Woodward
Keenan Wynn
Stephanie Zimbalist -
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LEFTY BRAIN-TEASERS
Because their brains are organised differently, left-handers see and think differently and can get some very different results from various "brain tests", usually doing very well on tests that involve creative thinking or unravelling complex images and manipulating 3D images. Here's a famous test of creativity - have a look at the image below:
A non-creative right handed brain sees only a hodgepodge of disconnected shapes, but the left-handed brain can go beyond logic and find the connecting concept that makes sense of the shapes. If you can't "see" beyond the shapes, it's because your right-handed brain is trying to solve the problem and won't let your left-handed brain have a go. If you still can't see the picture, page down for the answer*.
* The picture is of a dog drinking from a stream, with its head in the middle of the picture facing down to the water and its tail off to the right. -
FASCINATING LEFT-HANDED FACTS
Most left-handers draw figures facing to the right
There is a high tendency in twins for one to be left-handed
Stuttering and dyslexia occur more often in left-handers (particularly if they are forced to change their writing hand as a child, like King of England George VI).
Left-handers adjust more readily to seeing underwater.
Left-handers excel particularly in tennis, baseball, swimming and fencing
Left-handers usually reach puberty 4 to 5 months after right-handers
4 of the 5 original designers of the Macintosh computer were left-handed
1 in 4 Apollo astronauts were left-handed - 250% more than the normal level. -
Lefties DonÂ’t Die Any Earlier
LONDON, ENGLAND -- May 29, 1998 -- Do left-handed people die early? Some studies have indicated that premature mortality is more common in left-handers compared with right-handed people. In this week's issue of The Lancet, Dr. Simon Ellis, department of neurology, North Staffordshire Royal Infirmary, Keele University, and colleagues from Stoke-on-Trent, present evidence to suggest that left-handers are at no greater risk of dying earlier than right-handers.
The investigators sent a questionnaire inquiring about handedness to people aged between 15 and 70 years. They received 6,097 correctly-completed questionnaires; nine years later, they attempted to trace the respondents. They found that 48 could not be traced, 387 had died and the remaining 5,662 were known to be alive. Further analysis indicated that handedness was not related to longevity.
Because left-handed people were a minority compared with right-handers, the researchers were concerned that they may have missed significant premature mortality in the left-handed population. They did further analyses and also accounted for the effect of age, since their left-handed group was younger than their right-handed group. However, all these analyses confirmed that left-handers did not die earlier.
"Handedness did not make a significant contribution to the outcome of death," they write -
Lefty Jokes
Conversation over dinner:
A husband asks his wife, "Honey, if I died, would you remarry?"
"After a considerable period of grieving, I guess I would. We all need companionship."
"If I died and you remarried," the husband asks, "would he live in this house?"
"We've spent a lot of money getting this house just the way we want it. I'm not going to get rid of my house. I guess he would."
"If I died and you remarried, and he lived in this house," the husband asks, "would he sleep in our bed?"
"Well, the bed is brand new, and it cost us $2000. It's going to last a long time, so I guess he would."
"If I died and you remarried, and he lived in this house and slept in our bed, would he use my golf clubs?"
"Oh, no!" the wife replies. "He's left-handed!"
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Little Bobby was spending the weekend with his grandmother after a particularly trying week in kindergarten. His grandmother decided to take him to the park on Saturday morning. It had been snowing all night and everything was beautiful. His grandmother remarked...
"doesn't it look like an artist painted this scenery? Did you know God painted this just for you?"
Bobby said, "Yes, God did it and he did it left handed."
This confused his grandmother a bit, and she asked him,
"What makes you say God did this with his left hand?".
"Well," said Bobby, "we learned at Sunday School last week that Jesus sits on God's right hand!"
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Knock-knock.
Who's there?
Blind Tom of the Wild Left-Handed Monkey Boys.
Blind Tom of the Wild Left-Handed Monkey Boys, who?
What, how many Blind Tom of the Wild Left-Handed Monkey Boys do you know?
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A guy invented a left-handed hammer. Didn't Sell. No left-handed nails
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It was during the days of Indo-Soviet friendship, and travel from one country to the other was regular. Pande, a Government bureacrat, was promoted for being a Brahmin close to Nehru, and was flying from Moscow to Delhi after completing some Government work in Moscow. To his surprise, sitting right beside him was Gary Kasporov, the world Chess Champion. Pande had always been in awe of Chess players, and immediately started a conversation with Gary.
Kasparov: "How would you like to play me for 500 Rs. ?"
Pande: "But you are too good - you will beat me and I will lose my money!".
Gary: "How about if I play left-handed"?
"Then I might have a chance," thought Pande and he accepted the offer.
Kasparov checkmated our Panditji in 4 moves.
Pande was still scratching his head as he left the airplane. Upon reaching Mathura, Pande told Panda about the game he had with Kasparov.
Panda: "*Tu bhi pura buddhu hai, Pande*". (You're an absolute fool, Pande)
Pande: "*Kyon*" (Why)?
Panda: "*Are Chootiya! Gary Kasparov Left-handed hai!*". (You Stupid! Gary Kasparov IS a lefty, no wonder he beat you left handed!).
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The Left-Handed Whopper:
Burger King published a full page advertisement in USA Today announcing the introduction of a new item to their menu: a "Left-Handed Whopper" specially designed for the 32 million left-handed Americans. According to the advertisement, the new whopper included the same ingredients as the original Whopper (lettuce, tomato, hamburger patty, etc.). However, the left-handed whopper had "all condiments rotated 180 degrees, thereby redistributing the weight of the sandwich so that the bulk of the condiments will skew to the left, thereby reducing the amount of lettuce and other toppings from spilling out the right side of the burger."
Jim Watkins, senior vice president for marketing at Burger King, was quoted as saying that the new sandwich was the "ultimate 'HAVE IT YOUR WAY' for our left-handed customers." The advertisement then noted that the left-handed Whopper would initially only be available in the United States, but that the company was "considering plans to roll it out to other countries with large left-handed populations." The following day Burger King issued a follow-up release revealing that although the Left-Handed Whopper was a hoax, thousands of customers had gone into restaurants to request the new sandwich. Simultaneously, according to the press release, "many others requested their own 'right handed' version." -
wtf, this is not chicken soup
this is Time Magazine Journals for Lefties
arghhh
*brain burst* -
haha, I guess I do overdid some parts of itOriginally posted by laurence82:wtf, this is not chicken soup
this is Time Magazine Journals for Lefties
arghhh
*brain burst*
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im left hander too
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some parts?Originally posted by Oyster Omelette:haha, I guess I do overdid some parts of it
*me take out hammer and kok kok ah oyster head* -
Haha, ah lau now stress by all the contents written hereOriginally posted by laurence82:some parts?
*me take out hammer and kok kok ah oyster head* -
......
Only Leftie Has the Answer
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oh my im having a headache -
ladies...Originally posted by BabyLover:
oh my im having a headache 
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Originally posted by laurence82:some parts?
*me take out hammer and kok kok ah oyster head*
Oyster...anyone?
