On Stigamtizing Left-Handed People: Another Case Where Science is Eliminating What Faith Produced

A friend of mine on Facebook asked why there are left-handed guitars when there aren't any left-handed pianos. He tries to teach his left-handed students to use right-handed guitars. As a right-handed guitarist myself, I could not play a left-handed guitar. So I wrote in response:
Let's just ask the right-handers, which I am one, to use left-handed guitars then! I see no reason to think anyone should use right-handed guitars! Let's have a revolution. Let's start strumming with left-handed guitars and do away with the right-handed ones! Usually the majorities rule while minorities suck. Screw that caste system. In the past, left-handed people were demonized by Christian folks. True story. So to correct this injustice let's make right handers conform from now on. Let's do it from compassion and love.
To see what produced the stigma and even demonization of left-handed people and what is eliminating it read below. Again, as Dawkins said, "science works, bitches." Faith does not! Get. Point. The.


Years ago many left handed people (kids) were forced to learn to write with their right hand. Some kids literally had the "undesirable" trait beaten out of them by their teachers armed with rulers or yardsticks.

Left-handedness has been seen by some cultures as wrong and defective and in most cultures as something that is different, little known, and therefore seen as curious and devalued to some extent. The Roman Empire tried to stamp out left-handedness by inventing and enforcing the right-handed salute and handshake.

The names alone for "right" and "left" say it all. Right = dexter (dexterous = skillful in physical movements; especially of the hands) and left = sinister (stemming from evil characteristics or forces; wicked or dishonorable). Other definitions for "left-handed" include:

Left-handed marriage ~ (of marriages) illicit or informal, "in Colonial America left-handed marriages between Frenchmen and Indians were frequent"

Ironically ambiguous; "a left-handed compliment."

Lacking physical movement skills, especially with the hands; "a left-handed mechanic" These aren't just definitions of distinction between left and right, they are judgmental of left-handedness.

The Bible shows preference for right over left. The parable of the sheep and goats in Matthew 25:31-46 has the preferred sheep on God's right side and the goats relegated to the left.
31 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats,33 and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 34 Then the king will say to those at his right hand, Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 41 Then he will say to those at his left hand, You that are accursed depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." (NRSV)
I don't take this scripture literally to say that God punishes left-handedness, but to show how in this Jewish-Christian-Roman context honor is given to the right and dishonor to the left.

This preference for the right is found in the Old Testament too. For example, in Genesis 48:
Genesis 48:13-18 (CEV)- 13 After Joseph got up, he brought his two sons over to Jacob again. He led his younger son Ephraim to the left side of Jacob and his older son Manasseh to the right. 14 But before Jacob gave them his blessing, he crossed his arms, putting his right hand on the head of Ephraim and his left hand on the head of Manasseh. 15 Then he gave Joseph his blessing and said:

My grandfather Abraham and my father Isaac worshiped the LORD God. He has been with me all my life, 16 and his angel has kept me safe. Now I pray that he will bless these boys and that my name and the names of Abraham and Isaac will live on because of them. I ask God to give them many children and many descendants as well.

17 Joseph did not like it when he saw his father place his right hand on the head of the younger son. So he tried to move his father's right hand from Ephraim's head and place it on Manasseh. 18 Joseph said, "Father, you have made a mistake. This is the older boy. Put your right hand on him."
"God," "honor," and "right hand" go together in the scriptures. Judgment, cast out, wrong, and left hand go together in the scriptures.

We find this has worked its way into worship. The Apostles' Creed proclaims that we believe in Jesus Christ who, after "he rose from the dead; he ascended into heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty."

Honor is automatically given to people born "normally," like the majority, like everybody's "supposed to be" - to the right-handed. Lefties still face dishonor, suspicion, and neglect just because they were born "different." LINK.
The term "leftist" is a pejorative term too, since the "right" represents conservatism, the norm in any society.

How is this stigma being eliminated? Science baby! It works:

...left-handed people are no longer discriminated as much as they were in the 18th and 19th century. Science has led the way in explaining the phenomenon and getting rid of the myths, superstitions and horror stories about why people use the left side of their body instead of the right.

Scientific advances are erasing the stigmatization of left-handed people. Recent studies at the universities of Durham in England and Texas in Dallas, explained that the determination of whether a person is right-handed or left-handed, is defined by the way the brain organizes and distributes workloads and not because they are “strange” people. LINK.

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