Nervous as Hell. Social security is reviewing the obvious.

Dear Readers,

While I was going through the mail, I came across a letter that said we (both myself and my fiance Trenton) had to do a work and health review about our disability. Well? Let’s look at a few figures.

1. Blind people are 75% or higher in the disproportionate unemployment rate in the nation. About 80% of employers are uneducated about blind people and their abilities. An ability based resume doesn’t seem to work for a lot of my friends, including my friends Blake, Josh, Jason, Clayton, and so many others. Four males who have spent their lives unemployed could tell you, especially Clayton, that job hunting is especially hard. Imagine 30 job applications a day, and do the math times the number of days in a year. Times that by 365 and you get a very high number, over a thousand. Compound the applications themselves with print only and access barriers you get lots of unemployed blind people.
2. Compounding this with being female, most blind females are seen as valueless, naive sexually, a target on their backs for executives to take advantage of them. Rape culture is written into school and work handbooks, their dress codes, and worse, their corporate manners. IF I try to do manners like I have seen in an etiquette book, I might have a man pull out his junior executive and expect me to suck it, which I won’t. The blind men and women with jobs are lucky, lucky as ever, and most of those blind people with jobs are Braille readers, but women who are blind are also subject to the gender based pay gap. I would earn 50 to 75 cents out of every 1 dollar, whole dollar, that my fiance would earn. I won’t have this happen to me, and even if I ask for a raise, I would probably have to sleep with males who aren’t my husband. THis could hurt our marriage and relationship down the road.\
3. What are the consequences of today’s corporate rape culture? For the men, it should be the high profile headlines like Charlie Rose, Harvey Weinstein, and others being thrown out. Matt Lauer was a Today show host, but because he sexually harassed colleagues at work, he was thrown out. But there are many more Matt Lauers and Harvey Weinsteins out there who expect, not respect, sex with women at work. Though Matt’s and Harvey’s stories brought it to the forefront, I wish this had been addressed earlier. Not only that, but I wish they’d address blind females at job sites being harassed because of blindness. Blind females have a huge consequence that I can’t bear to think of. Pregnancy at work. Can you imagine yourself in my shoes? Blind and pregnant? Because of a boss? I didn’t think so.
4. Most of the SSI and SSDI rules make marriage impossible, but with Trenton’s affiliation with two Native tribes, we could get better resources, we could possibly together work to build a better future. Not on a reservation, however. The unemployment of reservation residents, especially at Pineridge in South Dakota, according to some church data I collected, is staggering. Try being blind, female, and black (person of color) or a minority racial group, religious group, etc. A Jewish blind female could suffer the same consequence as any other if harassed or forced to have intercourse with bosses who don’t think that their playing around, their sweaty fumbling as one guy in SVU once said, could lead to eighteen long and hard years of responsibility. I would never want my boss to be the father of children that I, Beth, would be forced to carry, raise, and or adopt out because if Trenton finds out a colleague in the upper office rank slept with me, the consequences would be damning.
5. For females who are harassed in any way whether it be school or work, when the assault is done, the damage is done. I have been called slut before, and it hurts. Imagine if a boss violated me and nobody believed me and instead called me names, wanted nothing to do with me, and took things from me like friendship, relationships, and so on. This is unacceptable, and my body is as valuable as anyone else’s, and is not a vessel for someone to throw their broadsword into. That’s what my friend Tim calls the man’s body member. A woman’s body should be respected, and when I say no, I mean those two letters, n, o. Nothing more nothing less. I mean, leave me alone, don’t touch me, don’t advance on me, do not sleep with me, do not get me pregnant. Don’t upset my relationship with Trenton. No means no, and all those other things are important.

I have many profiles of persons both male and female on Facebook who work and are blind, but they come across access barriers at work. There are some who are expected to log visual information, use a visual software that can’t be rendered by a screen reader, and sometimes these ladies have no way to do proper clerical work. Clerical work requires you to read emails, collect data, etc. Oh well.

I have seen blind men at work. All but one of these blind men at work have shown their true colors. Maybe even two. I’ve got a few blind friends who work, but most of them work in sheltered places. Some of these guys are entitled, others have committed predatory acts in the past. See a medium post I wrote, and I was going to reprint the blind sex offender post, but I want to make a reference to that post.

Now, what is the punishment for sexually violating blind girls? The answer should be, jailtime, not just probation. One man raped a thirteen-year-old girl in Oklahoma, but used his disability to get off easy. This should not be happening.

There are probably many among us who would decry the presence of all sex offenders, but those who’ve committed sick sexual offenses against blind disabled females, or otherwise known as females with any type of disability, they should be in jail for a few if not ten years. They should have probation, a restraining order that prevents them from contacting their victims, or finding more potential victims, and this goes for all male sex offenders. The sexual offense battlefield is 90% male, 10% female. I for one am not one to assault a child, and I would never touch a child because sex between an adult and a child is considered abuse, and yes, it is abuse. I wouldn’t dare.

As for males who think it okay to say that there are no sexually aggressive females, there are. Sexually aggressive females are rising up, not in response to man, but in response to their inner wiring. Same thing with guys, they feel they can do deviant acts because of a choice they make based on wiring.

One such lives in Arizona, I’m redacting her name for those guys who think they can say she’s a dream. She’s not.

I’ve seen what she’s capable of, the things she says about the LGBTQIA community, and the worst thing she ever said was something to try and get someone she stalked to have her for breakfast. She might have had a brain tumor at twelve that took away her sight, but the brain tumor is not an excuse for her behavior. She must receive one on one and family therapy, treatments to prevent deviant sex acts, and stay away from guys.

And she certainly can’t go to work, not even with her loads and piles of money.

But what I’m nervous about is Social Security Administration taking away Trenton’s and my payments, and we have an audit to do on Tuesday, and they want to review whether I’m healthy enough for work. It’s not a question of health, rather it is a question of social status as to whether I can work or not. I won’t be able to do job training, work related programs, etc., and Trenton certainly will have to do something in order to get us a home. A house, a town home, a whatever, is the only way we can have the future we deserve. But SSI rules prevent us from getting legally married, so we won’t be doing it legally. Tim understands this, though he works. He and my friend Jessie are probably the best two blind guys who work, have good standing in the world, and do crazy stuff that makes all of us happy.

How many females work along with their male colleagues?

Not many. I hope the SSA does not take away mine and Trenton’s paycheck because we won’t be able to get a paycheck or food or anything if we don’t have payments.

Beth

P.S. For those who are pro guardianship, refrain from commenting. If we lose our SSI payments, I and he won’t be able to live on our own. Meaning, Trenton and myself, that is.