essay about blind man

Friday essay: blind people are often exhausted by daily prejudice – but being blind is ‘inherently creative’

Adjunct Research Fellow, Western Sydney University

Disclosure statement

Amanda Tink does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Western Sydney University provides funding as a member of The Conversation AU.

View all partners

Andrew Leland was in his thirties when he had to stop driving at night – and then stop driving at all. Next, he had to start using a cane in public. As the cycle of decreasing vision became familiar, each absent sliver of vision required more adjustment to how he navigated the world.

He moves through the same steps in the same sequence each time, but each loss is unique, and uniquely stressful. And he can still see the disdain of sighted people, which makes him long to lose all his vision at once:

I thought about my periodic desire for the eye disease to just get it over with, and take the rest of my sight. I wanted to be relieved of seeing the way people look at blindness: the scorn, the condescension, the entitled, almost sexual leer. Skepticism, pity, revulsion, curiosity. I know I’ve looked at blind people this way too […] But I was a different person then: I didn’t really think of myself as blind.

Blindness, creativity and memoir

Responding to the idea that James Joyce’s blindness influenced his writing of Finnegans Wake , his biographer Richard Ellmann asserted:

The theory that Joyce wrote his book for the ear because he could not see is not only an insult to the creative imagination, but an error of fact. Joyce could see; to be for periods half-blind is not at all the same thing as to be permanently blind.

What Ellmann presents as a fact is actually a common myth. 85% of permanently blind people have sight . (I am one of the 15% of blind people who is totally blind, and the even smaller minority born this way.) And the line between blind and sighted is not straightforward. The results of a number of tests, and other factors, are taken into account.

Ellmann sounds like he is uncomfortable with thinking of Joyce as blind, and thinking of blind people as creative.

By contrast, during the writing of Finnegans Wake, Joyce himself was relaxed about the losses and gains of his situation. Responding to a letter from a friend on this topic, he wrote: “What the eyes bring is nothing. I have a hundred worlds to create, I am losing only one of them.”

Review: The Country of the Blind: A Memoir at the End of Sight – Andrew Leland (Penguin Press), Life Unseen: A Story of Blindness – Selina Mills (Bloomsbury Academic)

These tensions of identity and creativity between those who are sighted and those who are blind existed long before Joyce, and are still prevalent a century later. They are explored with candour and thoughtfulness in two recent memoirs, by Selina Mills and Leland .

Like Joyce, their versions of blindness mean they have sight that gradually decreases over decades. And they are writers – both are journalists.

While their memoirs are obviously written from personal vantage points, Mills and Leland detail much more than their own stories. Interwoven with their experiences of becoming blind are the experiences of blind writers, performers, teachers, activists, inventors and so on.

Mills, who is from the UK, researched blind women throughout European history. The few famous blind women she mentions are from outside Europe (which demonstrates the need for her research). One of them is American activist and author Helen Keller (1880-1968). Another is Tilly Aston (1873-1947), also known as “Australia’s blind poet.”

As Mills’ own sight decreased, she felt surrounded by sighted people’s stereotypes of blindness. She was compelled to research the real members of her community, for herself and her readers. As she writes:

so much of our knowledge of blind people has relied on how sighted people have interpreted blindness. […] We fear it, we punish with it, we find it powerful and alluring all at the same moment and have done so for centuries. Principally, we rarely hear the voices of blind people themselves. Why not? Who were these blind people who lived and died, who were not just heroes or burdens of the sighted world?

Similarly Leland, who lives in the US, concentrates on the recent and present US blind community in order to encourage both himself and his audience to develop a more nuanced understanding of what it means to be blind:

I met people who said that their blindness meant nothing to them – that it was a mere attribute, like hair color – and others whose blindness utterly defined and upended their lives. […] I sympathized with all of these positions, even as I wondered which attitudes I would adopt for my own life. I tried to understand how blindness was changing my identity as a reader and a writer, as a husband and a father, as a citizen and an otherwise privileged white guy.

Read more: The amateur’s age of unriddling: Finnegans Wake on stage

What blind people have in common

I was drawn to both books by their exploration of historical and philosophical questions. But as I read, Leland and Mills’ experiences of being blind with some sight also became compelling for how universal they are.

I have talked with many people losing sight as they transition to blindness, and am well aware of the shape of the sight-loss journey. Yet these books emphasised to me the significant number of experiences blind people have in common, regardless of how much sight we have, or where we live, or when we were born.

Mills and Leland have both been losing sight for two decades now. But they began at different levels of sight and the cause was different for each of them.

Leland’s sight loss began as night blindness when he was a teenager. His research on the early internet suggested the cause was retinitis pigmentosa (RP), a degenerative condition where night blindness is followed by peripheral vision loss, then central vision loss, sometimes ending in total blindness. After his first year of college, he went to an eye clinic where his self-diagnosis was confirmed.

Read more: Happy birthday, Braille: how writing you can touch is still helping blind people to read and learn

Leland’s interest in understanding blindness as an identity develops another dimension when he learns his retinitis pigmentosa is part of his Ashkenazi Jewish heritage. He discovers that throughout history, blind people and Jewish people were often denigrated in similar ways.

Medieval literature and disability studies researcher Edward Wheatley points out, for example, that both groups were branded as greedy, lazy, and dishonest. And both groups were said to be responsible for their marginalisation by Christian society – Jewish people for refusing to convert, and blind people for sinfulness.

Significantly, both blind people and Jewish people were early and constant victims of the Nazis. And the threat multiplied if you belonged to both groups.

Read more: Disabled people were Holocaust victims, too: they were excluded from German society and murdered by Nazi programs

The borderlands between blind and sighted

Mills’ sight began to decrease in her early thirties. However, she was already accustomed to living in the borderlands between blind and sighted: she was born with no sight in one eye.

Growing up, she attended mainstream schools. Her childhood, though, had many experiences in common with other blind children. Teachers incorrectly assumed that she had learning difficulties when she was six and she got a prosthetic eye when she was ten. She was left to drift rather than being supported throughout her schooling and she finished school without having been taught braille or how to use a cane.

Having only spent time with sighted people, she was used to thinking of herself as similar to them, even though she was often exhausted and they were not.

In her twenties, she became a journalist and travelled throughout Europe. She only sometimes carried a cane, just as a precaution. Mills was in her early thirties when bus numbers and step edges became difficult to see. This prompted her to go to an ophthalmologist, who discovered she had an inoperable cataract.

Other people’s prejudice

Mills and Leland have to manage a range of emotions that accompany losing sight, as well as the reactions of their families and friends. But the most difficult aspect of being blind, they discover, is other people’s prejudice.

Echoing the experiences of the blind people whose lives they explore, they are exhausted by the frequency and variety of prejudice they have to manage in their daily lives.

Sometimes it is overt: being denied education or work, being told to not have sex or have children, being refused entry to a venue if not accompanied by a sighted person. Sometimes it is questions disguised as concern – about whether you can cook, or how you are sure you have performed a work task properly, or whether you actually need to learn braille.

It always contains the message that being sighted is superior to being blind, and blind people should feel envious of sighted people and ashamed of who we are.

I suspect it was this prejudice Joyce was reacting to when he said, “What the eyes bring is nothing.” I don’t think he meant he had no use at all for the tiny amount of sight he had. I think he was exasperated by so many people continuing to insist it must be more difficult for him to write as a blind person. Certainly, he felt sight was not a prerequisite for creativity and that blindness had enhanced his writing.

This prejudice even extends to sighted people believing they have the knowledge to distinguish between blind and sighted strangers within seconds of seeing them. And they believe they are entitled to call out anyone they are convinced is faking it.

This happens to Mills at a train ticket barrier when the guard asks her for her ticket, then for her disabled person’s travel card. Like most blind people, she keeps the card in a specific place in her wallet, ready for these occasions. But the guard associates blindness with slowness and incompetence, so takes her organisation as evidence she is faking blindness:

“How did you get that then?” “Get what?” “Your disability travel card? – I mean, you can see all right, can’t you?” Having learnt to be patient with other non-believers, I was calm. “Oh, I know, but I have only got about 20 per cent vision on a good day. The doctors tested me.” Unconvinced, the guard continued: “You think you can get your card, and just get away with it. I saw you walking down the platform, bright and breezy. You are faking it!” He was quite proud of his little diatribe and seemed unkeen to let me through unless I confessed to my high crimes and misdemeanours.

Fortunately she has an irrefutable piece of evidence – her prosthetic eye, which she removes and presents to the guard:

“ The queue gasped. I was shaking with fury. You really think I had my real eye plucked out and went through the pain of having a false eye made, just to get a discount on my f*king train ticket?

Blind people are harassed in this way regardless of our level of sight. As a totally blind person, I have many similar anecdotes. However, these experiences can have a particularly devastating effect on someone adjusting to blindness.

Both Mills and Leland discuss how incidents like this make them reluctant to use a cane. "Sometimes I left the cane behind, just to have a day off from the reactions, but the falling over and bashing into lampposts is not always worth it,” writes Mills. “The more I need to use my cane to find curbs and doorways, the more patronizing and intrusive (and sometimes hostile) strangers become,” echoes Leland.

Read more: Henry Lawson and Judith Wright were deaf – but they’re rarely acknowledged as disabled writers. Why does that matter?

Blind women from history

Connecting with other blind people helps both Leland and Mills not just accept, but value their blindness. The blind people they encounter show them how to minimise the effect of sighted prejudice on their identity, and to understand that being blind is inherently creative.

Mills connects with blind women from history who deserve to be better known. And it is thrilling to learn about them with her, and to know that details of their lives are finally more publicly accessible.

They include Saint Odile of Alsace (an area now occupied by France and Germany), born in 660 AD, who travelled throughout Europe and founded two monasteries. Therese-Adele Husson , born in 1803, was a French writer of children’s books and romantic fiction. And Maria Theresia von Paradis , born in 1759 in Austria, was a talented pianist from a young age.

As an adult, Maria Theresia’s life was divided between being subjected to one horrific so-called cure after another and performing throughout Europe. She was friends with Haydn, as well as Mozart – who composed a piano concerto for her. She was a composer herself, of more than five operas and more than 30 sonatas, and in Vienna she established one of the first schools for blind musicians.

As Mills points out, “unlike Mozart and Haydn and a few other known women composers, who died penniless or unpublished, she had what few musicians had in the age – a successful profession and an income.”

Developing a blind identity

Leland feels connected to a number of 20th-century blind writers, such as James Joyce, and to many current blind writers, as well as advocates, engineers and artists.

Many blind people devoted years of their lives to argue for the rights of all disabled people to have equal access to public spaces, education, employment and more.

Meanwhile, so much technology in everyday use over the last century has been created or enhanced by blind people, from long-play records to internet chat forums. And every step of the way, many blind people generously shared their knowledge to help others who were still developing their skills.

One of the people who shared their knowledge with Leland was American activist and teacher Barbara Loos. Leland met Loos at a blindness convention. She encouraged him to attend the residential training course that later accelerates Leland’s cane skills and confidence.

She then pinpoints the problems with how he’d been taught to read braille. This sets him on the path to reestablishing and reinvigorating his identity as a reader by learning to read braille correctly and obtaining a braille display – a device that connects to a computer and displays the screen one line at a time.

once I’d finished my last course, I brought it [the braille display] out again, and fell in love. Reading on the braille display was a palliative against my anxiety about going blind. The more facility I gained with it, the more I could imagine a rich life for myself as a blind reader.

Reading these books, and the lives and work they explore, I feel extremely proud of my community.

• James Joyce
• Finnegans Wake
• Disability coverage

Casual Facilitator: GERRIC Student Programs - Arts, Design and Architecture

Senior Lecturer, Digital Advertising

Service Delivery Fleet Coordinator

Manager, Centre Policy and Translation

Newsletter and Deputy Social Media Producer

Essay Resources

• Research Papers
• Term Papers
• Book Report
• Movie Review
• Article Critique
• Annotated Bibliography
• PowerPoint Presentations
• Testimonial

Sample Essay

Literary Analysis of Guy de Maupassant’s ‘The Blind Man’

‘The Blind Man’ is a short story written by Guy de Maupassant. It is a relatively short piece that examines the experience of the blind man and the severe treatment he experienced in the hands of his family and the community. Operating from a third-person point of view, the author enables readers to view the situation as it is happening from afar. By offering this distant view, the piece is able to highlight the different levels of oppression and cruelty exhibited to the old man. Though he continued to be passive and non-responsive to these acts, the acts continued until eventually he succumbed to the winter cold and experienced a bitter death. It is through such depiction that de Maupassant offers a chilling reality surrounding evil and man’s capability in the promotion of oppression.

One of the important themes emphasized by de Maupassant in this piece reflects man’s cruelty to people who are considered to be physically inferior. As the author tries to convey the story to readers, the detached perspective demonstrates how the people, including the man’s family treated the blind man. By using certain dialogues from some relevant characters such as his brother-in-law, de Maupassant is able to showcase the severity of abuse committed to the man. Longhurst and Grant provide that “de Maupassant succeeds in rousing our disgust, maybe self-disgust, at the image of this silent, passive, yet imperturbable blind man victimized and in the end “eaten” by the cruel “natural ferocity and savage merriment” of his family and community” (1623). The thing that is more saddening of course is the willingness of the blind man to accept his fate without complaining or saying a word.

Another reality highlighted by de Maupassant in this story is the reality of oppression and the way it manifests within individuals and society. From the piece, the blind man symbolizes people who are disenfranchised, subjugated and treated inhumanely by both individuals and social institutions. The severity of actions committed by the anonymous characters in the story seeks to reflect the disparities of human condition and how they are manifested within society. As Richard Fusco provides, “Maupassant thus forces readers to contend with the unresolvable disparity between life as it ought to be and life as it is, leading them to admit the inevitable duality of most perceptions” (48). Applying this quote in this case, the story exhibits the severity of human oppression and how this severity can induce a collective response to doing evil.

Lastly, the passiveness of the blind man also shows the numbness that oppression can create to individuals and groups. It remains to be a saddening feature wherein people, like the blind man are forced to accept the inhumane actions committed against them. For the case of protagonist in the story, the multitude of abuses could have triggered his capacity to fight back but instead chose to accept his fate or be silent about the actions committed against him (de Maupassant 1). One way of looking at this is numbness as the blind man realizes his lack of capability to fight back because of his physical condition. The sad part of this of course is the blind man’s acceptance of his fate, a decision he would soon suffer as he succumbed to the harshness and human suffering.

Overall, Guy de Maupassant’s ‘The Blind Man’ is a story depicting the reality of human oppression within society. It emphasizes the nature of abuse the blind man was subjected to and how he finally succumbed to this evil that has brought him suffering and demise. Written from an observer’s standpoint, the author is able to highlight important themes related to oppression, cruelty and how all these forced the numbness of society towards its use. By emphasizing on this extreme reality, de Maupassant is able to advance the reality of evil within society and if not properly managed can induce a lasting impression to individuals or groups who continue and remain to be oppressed.

Works Cited

de Maupassant, Guy. ‘The Blind Man’ About.com.n.d. Web. Accessed 29 August 2014.

Fusco, Richard. Maupassant and the American Short Story: The Influence of Form at the Turn of  the Century,  Pennsylvania: Penn State University Press. 1994. Print.

Longhurst, Mark and Grant, Hugh. ‘Images of Illness: Blindness’ Canadian Family Physician.  35.1(1989): 1623-1626.

Our Services

Testimonials, essayresources.com, literary analysis essay of william shakespeare’s ‘titus andronicus’, literary analysis essay of alfred lord tennyson’s ‘in memoriam’, get some social.

My Reading List

• Name First Last
• Tell us what you think! * We welcome your feedback, constructive criticism, and/or error reports.
• Email Please enter your email if you require follow-up or would like to stay in touch.

Example: Close Reading Write-up for “Blind Man”

The following write-up is an example of an analysis of Eva Tihanyi’s poem Blind Man :

Eva Tihanyi’s poem Blind Man explores a connection between the senses and music in the life of a blind man. The poem begins with an eclipse, perhaps the source of the man’s blindness, but also the source of a dramatic recalibration of the senses through which the earth / speaks and his hands listen. This reorientation of attention to the earth, to material experiences, and to close listening, produces the jazz-like qualities of syncopation and rhythm that inform the rest of the poem, and which the man enacts through his cane / tapping.

In the second stanza, the poem returns to the man’s blindness, but this time to reorient the reader to the meaning of light. Beginning with the scientific theories of light as both particle and wave, the descriptions rematerialize light by making it into a more tangible thing. Because the particles and waves are falling and flowing , the light becomes a tangible object or liquid that produces bodily sensations that the blind man can interpret as melodies on his eyelids. Interestingly, this reinterpretation of the light also avoids directly referencing the expected sense of warmth on the skin. The flow between senses and meanings is mimicked by a lack of punctuation to signal the end of different thoughts or stanzas, creating a steady flow through the words of the poem as well.

This jazz-like movement of light is worthy of consideration. The translation of this sensation, perhaps obliquely suggesting the heat of sunlight on skin, produces a white melody scored on dark sheets, a musicality of life that is the inverse of a sighted person’s understanding. The translation of light into a musical score, but in an inverse or negative image of typical sheet music, suggests a process of reception and response that alters substantially as the blind man’s senses recalibrate to material experience, such that the earth / speaks … and his hands listen.

Tihanyi further equates the experience of blindness with the sound of jazz in the final stanza that moves beyond the imagery of light. The blind man’s penchant for roses cannot be based on their colour or other visual properties, but instead connects to their feel and smell. Here again, the response is musical, as he hears them sing. This line suggests that the loss of sight recalibrates the experience of the rose, but that it remains meaningful. Tihanyi’s poem proposes a musicality to blindness that opens up the world and makes it accessible in different ways.

Less directly, the poem also opens up, through the references to jazz, an interest in and attempted explanation of the creativity of blind jazz musicians like Ray Charles, Art Tatum, and Stevie Wonder who are so gifted and influential in their creative use of musical forms. At the same time, it offers a liberating perception of disability, since it foregrounds a new accessibility to the world, the gifts of hearing roses sing and feeling melodies of light on your eyelids, while glossing over the anger that initially informs the blind man’s daily movements with his tapping cane.

Perhaps we can go back and think of the eclipse as gesturing to the closing off of possibilities that disability and even gendering impose on people, as soon as they enter the mainstream. One way that this might be signaled is by seeing this man as different from other men, perhaps desexualized by his disability. This categorization of men who are disabled or belong to minority cultures as effeminate or asexual, reveals the ways in which heteronormativity is regulated in language.

Postcolonial critics and feminists often argue that those categorized as outside the mainstream see more because they have to understand the majority culture as well as their own, whereas those privileged members of the elite can remain ignorant of the struggles of the less privileged (e.g. see Godard). It may be that Tihanyi is more interested in exploring synaesthesia (a neurological term for the blending of senses) than politics, but it is possible to read her chosen imagery as a gesture towards these issues.

After this short close reading, there remain some questions one might reflect on:

• Does this poem suggest, by glossing over the negative emotions of the blind man, that being blinded by an eclipse is a good thing since it allows a new way to sense music or light? Or does it want to suggest, by exploring the musical riches of other senses, that readers engage with multisensory understandings of the world by valuing the complex meanings offered by all senses?
• How does this poem reflect on creative writing and daily experiences? Does the focus on a white melody / scored on black sheets —on texts that are not made up of visible, typographic words to be read (Braille and scores)—cause us to read towards a new mode of hearing through the senses that speak?
• The lines about a white melody / scored on black sheets, combined with the poem’s references to blindness and jazz, also call up the image of the blind, Black jazz musician. Consider this racialized imagery in connection to the comments above on the politics of language, difference, and privilege. What do you make of this imagery? Does it just romanticize racialized experiences or does it add to the discussion of creativity in some way?

Works Cited

• Godard, Barbara. The Politics of Representation: Some Native Canadian Women Writers. Canadian Literature 124–25 (1990): 183–225. Print. ( PDF )
• Tihanyi, Eva. Blind Man. Canadian Literature 99 (1983): 46–47. Print. ( HTML )

First Published: Sep 26, 2013 | Last Revised: September 20, 2016

Click and drag to reorder items.

Items = 0 reset

Poems & Poets

An Essay on Man: Epistle I

To Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke Awake, my St. John! leave all meaner things To low ambition, and the pride of kings. Let us (since life can little more supply Than just to look about us and to die) Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man; A mighty maze! but not without a plan; A wild, where weeds and flow'rs promiscuous shoot; Or garden, tempting with forbidden fruit. Together let us beat this ample field, Try what the open, what the covert yield; The latent tracts, the giddy heights explore Of all who blindly creep, or sightless soar; Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it flies, And catch the manners living as they rise; Laugh where we must, be candid where we can; But vindicate the ways of God to man. I. Say first, of God above, or man below, What can we reason, but from what we know? Of man what see we, but his station here, From which to reason, or to which refer? Through worlds unnumber'd though the God be known, 'Tis ours to trace him only in our own. He, who through vast immensity can pierce, See worlds on worlds compose one universe, Observe how system into system runs, What other planets circle other suns, What varied being peoples ev'ry star, May tell why Heav'n has made us as we are. But of this frame the bearings, and the ties, The strong connections, nice dependencies, Gradations just, has thy pervading soul Look'd through? or can a part contain the whole? Is the great chain, that draws all to agree, And drawn supports, upheld by God, or thee? II. Presumptuous man! the reason wouldst thou find, Why form'd so weak, so little, and so blind? First, if thou canst, the harder reason guess, Why form'd no weaker, blinder, and no less! Ask of thy mother earth, why oaks are made Taller or stronger than the weeds they shade? Or ask of yonder argent fields above, Why Jove's satellites are less than Jove? Of systems possible, if 'tis confest That Wisdom infinite must form the best, Where all must full or not coherent be, And all that rises, rise in due degree; Then, in the scale of reas'ning life, 'tis plain There must be somewhere, such a rank as man: And all the question (wrangle e'er so long) Is only this, if God has plac'd him wrong? Respecting man, whatever wrong we call, May, must be right, as relative to all. In human works, though labour'd on with pain, A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain; In God's, one single can its end produce; Yet serves to second too some other use. So man, who here seems principal alone, Perhaps acts second to some sphere unknown, Touches some wheel, or verges to some goal; 'Tis but a part we see, and not a whole. When the proud steed shall know why man restrains His fiery course, or drives him o'er the plains: When the dull ox, why now he breaks the clod, Is now a victim, and now Egypt's God: Then shall man's pride and dulness comprehend His actions', passions', being's, use and end; Why doing, suff'ring, check'd, impell'd; and why This hour a slave, the next a deity. Then say not man's imperfect, Heav'n in fault; Say rather, man's as perfect as he ought: His knowledge measur'd to his state and place, His time a moment, and a point his space. If to be perfect in a certain sphere, What matter, soon or late, or here or there? The blest today is as completely so, As who began a thousand years ago. III. Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of fate, All but the page prescrib'd, their present state: From brutes what men, from men what spirits know: Or who could suffer being here below? The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed today, Had he thy reason, would he skip and play? Pleas'd to the last, he crops the flow'ry food, And licks the hand just rais'd to shed his blood. Oh blindness to the future! kindly giv'n, That each may fill the circle mark'd by Heav'n: Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish, or a sparrow fall, Atoms or systems into ruin hurl'd, And now a bubble burst, and now a world. Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar; Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore! What future bliss, he gives not thee to know, But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. Hope springs eternal in the human breast: Man never is, but always to be blest: The soul, uneasy and confin'd from home, Rests and expatiates in a life to come. Lo! the poor Indian, whose untutor'd mind Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind; His soul, proud science never taught to stray Far as the solar walk, or milky way; Yet simple nature to his hope has giv'n, Behind the cloud-topt hill, an humbler heav'n; Some safer world in depth of woods embrac'd, Some happier island in the wat'ry waste, Where slaves once more their native land behold, No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold. To be, contents his natural desire, He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire; But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog shall bear him company. IV. Go, wiser thou! and, in thy scale of sense Weigh thy opinion against Providence; Call imperfection what thou fanciest such, Say, here he gives too little, there too much: Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust, Yet cry, if man's unhappy, God's unjust; If man alone engross not Heav'n's high care, Alone made perfect here, immortal there: Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod, Rejudge his justice, be the God of God. In pride, in reas'ning pride, our error lies; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes, Men would be angels, angels would be gods. Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell, Aspiring to be angels, men rebel: And who but wishes to invert the laws Of order, sins against th' Eternal Cause. V. Ask for what end the heav'nly bodies shine, Earth for whose use? Pride answers, " 'Tis for mine: For me kind Nature wakes her genial pow'r, Suckles each herb, and spreads out ev'ry flow'r; Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew, The juice nectareous, and the balmy dew; For me, the mine a thousand treasures brings; For me, health gushes from a thousand springs; Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise; My foot-stool earth, my canopy the skies." But errs not Nature from this gracious end, From burning suns when livid deaths descend, When earthquakes swallow, or when tempests sweep Towns to one grave, whole nations to the deep? "No, ('tis replied) the first Almighty Cause Acts not by partial, but by gen'ral laws; Th' exceptions few; some change since all began: And what created perfect?"—Why then man? If the great end be human happiness, Then Nature deviates; and can man do less? As much that end a constant course requires Of show'rs and sunshine, as of man's desires; As much eternal springs and cloudless skies, As men for ever temp'rate, calm, and wise. If plagues or earthquakes break not Heav'n's design, Why then a Borgia, or a Catiline? Who knows but he, whose hand the lightning forms, Who heaves old ocean, and who wings the storms, Pours fierce ambition in a Cæsar's mind, Or turns young Ammon loose to scourge mankind? From pride, from pride, our very reas'ning springs; Account for moral, as for nat'ral things: Why charge we Heav'n in those, in these acquit? In both, to reason right is to submit. Better for us, perhaps, it might appear, Were there all harmony, all virtue here; That never air or ocean felt the wind; That never passion discompos'd the mind. But ALL subsists by elemental strife; And passions are the elements of life. The gen'ral order, since the whole began, Is kept in nature, and is kept in man. VI. What would this man? Now upward will he soar, And little less than angel, would be more; Now looking downwards, just as griev'd appears To want the strength of bulls, the fur of bears. Made for his use all creatures if he call, Say what their use, had he the pow'rs of all? Nature to these, without profusion, kind, The proper organs, proper pow'rs assign'd; Each seeming want compensated of course, Here with degrees of swiftness, there of force; All in exact proportion to the state; Nothing to add, and nothing to abate. Each beast, each insect, happy in its own: Is Heav'n unkind to man, and man alone? Shall he alone, whom rational we call, Be pleas'd with nothing, if not bless'd with all? The bliss of man (could pride that blessing find) Is not to act or think beyond mankind; No pow'rs of body or of soul to share, But what his nature and his state can bear. Why has not man a microscopic eye? For this plain reason, man is not a fly. Say what the use, were finer optics giv'n, T' inspect a mite, not comprehend the heav'n? Or touch, if tremblingly alive all o'er, To smart and agonize at ev'ry pore? Or quick effluvia darting through the brain, Die of a rose in aromatic pain? If nature thunder'd in his op'ning ears, And stunn'd him with the music of the spheres, How would he wish that Heav'n had left him still The whisp'ring zephyr, and the purling rill? Who finds not Providence all good and wise, Alike in what it gives, and what denies? VII. Far as creation's ample range extends, The scale of sensual, mental pow'rs ascends: Mark how it mounts, to man's imperial race, From the green myriads in the peopled grass: What modes of sight betwixt each wide extreme, The mole's dim curtain, and the lynx's beam: Of smell, the headlong lioness between, And hound sagacious on the tainted green: Of hearing, from the life that fills the flood, To that which warbles through the vernal wood: The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine! Feels at each thread, and lives along the line: In the nice bee, what sense so subtly true From pois'nous herbs extracts the healing dew: How instinct varies in the grov'lling swine, Compar'd, half-reas'ning elephant, with thine: 'Twixt that, and reason, what a nice barrier; For ever sep'rate, yet for ever near! Remembrance and reflection how allied; What thin partitions sense from thought divide: And middle natures, how they long to join, Yet never pass th' insuperable line! Without this just gradation, could they be Subjected, these to those, or all to thee? The pow'rs of all subdu'd by thee alone, Is not thy reason all these pow'rs in one? VIII. See, through this air, this ocean, and this earth, All matter quick, and bursting into birth. Above, how high, progressive life may go! Around, how wide! how deep extend below! Vast chain of being, which from God began, Natures ethereal, human, angel, man, Beast, bird, fish, insect! what no eye can see, No glass can reach! from infinite to thee, From thee to nothing!—On superior pow'rs Were we to press, inferior might on ours: Or in the full creation leave a void, Where, one step broken, the great scale's destroy'd: From nature's chain whatever link you strike, Tenth or ten thousandth, breaks the chain alike. And, if each system in gradation roll Alike essential to th' amazing whole, The least confusion but in one, not all That system only, but the whole must fall. Let earth unbalanc'd from her orbit fly, Planets and suns run lawless through the sky; Let ruling angels from their spheres be hurl'd, Being on being wreck'd, and world on world; Heav'n's whole foundations to their centre nod, And nature tremble to the throne of God. All this dread order break—for whom? for thee? Vile worm!—Oh madness, pride, impiety! IX. What if the foot ordain'd the dust to tread, Or hand to toil, aspir'd to be the head? What if the head, the eye, or ear repin'd To serve mere engines to the ruling mind? Just as absurd for any part to claim To be another, in this gen'ral frame: Just as absurd, to mourn the tasks or pains, The great directing Mind of All ordains. All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body Nature is, and God the soul; That, chang'd through all, and yet in all the same, Great in the earth, as in th' ethereal frame, Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees, Lives through all life, extends through all extent, Spreads undivided, operates unspent, Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart; As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns, As the rapt seraph that adores and burns; To him no high, no low, no great, no small; He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. X. Cease then, nor order imperfection name: Our proper bliss depends on what we blame. Know thy own point: This kind, this due degree Of blindness, weakness, Heav'n bestows on thee. Submit.—In this, or any other sphere, Secure to be as blest as thou canst bear: Safe in the hand of one disposing pow'r, Or in the natal, or the mortal hour. All nature is but art, unknown to thee; All chance, direction, which thou canst not see; All discord, harmony, not understood; All partial evil, universal good: And, spite of pride, in erring reason's spite, One truth is clear, Whatever is, is right.

Life As “The Blind Man”

I’m now a different kind of person in the eyes of the world.

Image credit: Singleline / Shutterstock

In January of last year, I received my membership card to a club I’d never imagined I’d be part of. It was from the New York State Commission for the Blind and affirmed that I was legally blind. I had started 2021 fully sighted, but in June I suffered an attack in my left eye of non-arteritic ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION). In simple terms, my left eye had had a stroke as a result of the ceasing of blood flow to the optic nerve due to a drop in blood pressure in the eye. The top half of my left eye is totally blank. In 30 percent of cases, the condition reverses itself; in 20 percent of cases, those who suffer NAION in one eye have it in the other. I was soon to find myself in the smaller minority: in October 2021, 40 percent of the vision in my right eye was obliterated. Though I can see—most who are deemed legally blind can see, though poorly—I have little peripheral vision, and what I do see I see partially and through a milky blur. I can no longer read books (though e-books with the font enlarged to the max are readable). It’s hard for me to make out traffic lights, I have a problem judging heights, and suffer total visual confusion in crowded places. To ease my problems getting around, and to signal my disability, I use a white cane.

When the trainer from the Lighthouse Guild for the Blind brought me my cane and instructed me in its use, I embraced it as an homage to one of the great scenes in American cinema. I’ve always thought the funniest scene in any American comedy is the one with the blind man Mr. Muckle in the WC Fields classic “It’s a Gift.” The marvelous havoc he wreaks was now to be mine, and I set out with Fields’s voice calling, “Watch out for Mr. Muckle” echoing in my head. 

I also realized this would allow me to carry out an important social experiment. I would now be a different kind of person in the eyes of the world. I would be “the Blind Man.” What does that mean? What could I expect of others? David Lodge, in his novel Deaf Sentence , wrote that “the blind have pathos. Sighted people regard them with compassion, go out of their way to help them, guide them across busy roads, warn them of obstacles.” 

Would humanity—at least the sample of it that inhabits New York—rise to the occasion?

My first outing with my cane set me straight. Great brightness, as much as darkness, leaves me helpless, and I was stopped dead as I tried to cross Downing Street and Sixth Avenue in Manhattan. I couldn’t even locate the traffic light, much less determine its color. I stood there, gesturing helplessly, as pedestrians passed me by. I should have been aggressive about it and asked for help, but I was a novice and thought my plight would be noticed and that assistance was imminent. It wasn’t, and I stood there for several minutes until I was able to determine it was safe to cross. The template for my life as a blind man was set.

It’s over a year now that I’ve navigated using a white cane, and if I had a dollar for every time someone helped me to cross the street, I’d have a dollar. One young man, waiting for a bus on busy Kings Highway near my home, saw my predicament and took my arm to guide me. That’s been it. To be sure, some have offered to help me and the situation didn’t require it, so I demurred. I’ll add these instances and say I’d have five dollars after 15 months of blindness. I stand at street corners with my cane, and it’s as if I’m not only blind, but invisible. 

I’m often given a wide berth when I walk down the street, since proper cane technique requires swinging it before me from shoulder to shoulder. It’s not rare for people to abandon the sidewalk to me entirely. The rest of the time, it’s an adventure, an unpleasant one at that. The sidewalks are encumbered with bicycles, scooters, e-bikes, and people with their heads down concentrating on their phones. Add in those who are impatient and cut you off. Catching my cane in people’s legs is not rare, nor is my whacking people on the ankle—sometimes by accident, sometimes on purpose. The latter is my liberal interpretation of what I was told when I was trained in cane usage: I have it to warn me of obstacles, to signal my handicap to others, and to guarantee my space. I’ve developed a mastery of the slight flick that will hit the ankle of anyone who fails to respect my space. No one has ever cursed at me when they’ve received a blow. Whether it’s pity or recognition that they’re in the wrong that inhibits them I can’t say. 

I am aggressive on buses and subways. For some reason there is always a subway passenger who will give me a seat; buses are another matter. If a bus is crowded and none of the handicapped seats are free—usually filled with young people on their phones—I stand in front of them, bang my cane and announce: “One of you is getting up.” It almost always works, but shame shouldn’t be the motivator, decency should. 

It was first and foremost as a signal to cars that I can’t see them, especially when they turn in my direction, that I was overjoyed to be given a white cane. My peripheral vision is negligible, and turning cars are invisible to me until the last second, if then. The proper technique for crossing when blind is to set out only when the light has just turned green, so cars can see you and you can establish your ownership of the crosswalk. The assumption is that drivers, upon seeing you start to cross, will wait until you’re clear before turning. In the majority of cases, this is true, but with many exceptions and a caveat. In many neighborhoods, including my own, stop signs and red lights are merely advisory, not compulsory. Often, before I’ve had a chance to step off the curb when the light turns green, drivers will shoot out as fast as they can to make their turn. More often they’ll simply edge forward as much as they can and as close to me as possible, as if the seconds saved will extend their lives, leaving me with motorized beasts hovering at my side. Worst of all, though, are those who cut in front of or even directly behind me, leading me to feel like a matador executing a paseo , with the car a bull all but grazing me. 

Is there a place or a situation where people act as one would hope they would? There is, and it’s the most unlikely one of all: airports. My wife and I recently traveled to Norway and Iceland, which required several passages through airports. In every case, airport staff, upon seeing my cane, ushered me to the head of lines, from check-in to scanning of boarding passes, and even passport control. I have to be clear, though. It was airport staff, not passengers who deferred to my handicap. Though we were able to board our flights among the first group, the other passengers in every instance jostled past me. The Nordic countries allowed me to expand the scope of my social experiment, and it’s also worth pointing out that I received more assistance in five days in Oslo than in a year in New York. It was in the Norwegian capital that I finally witnessed the decency I’d hoped for and expected. A young woman, when I thanked her for helping me up a flight of stairs, replied: “It’s the least I can do.”

Mitchell Abidor is a Brooklyn-based writer and translator.

Mitchell Abidor

Brooklyn-based writer and translator

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Latest + Beyond the Issues

Public Seminar is a journal of ideas, politics, and culture published by the Public Seminar Publishing Initiative at The New School. We are a non-profit organization, wholly supported by The New School, and by the generosity of our sponsors and readers.

Connect With Us

Talk to our experts

1800-120-456-456

Blind Man Story for Kids in English

Stories and morals for kids.

Among the fondest memories of childhood are the stories that we hear and read as a kid. Short stories and poems that we enjoy as a kid greatly influence our thinking process and personality.

Children's stories like the one mentioned in the articles are often a great way to teach important lessons to the kids. As these stories are short, engaging and have a fascinating narration of the importance of moral virtues in life.

The blind man story mentioned in the article is one such fascinating and inspiring tale of a man who overcomes his difficulties and sets an extraordinary example for kids. Let us look into the story.

Advertisement and the Blind Man Story

An elderly blind man was sitting on a crowded sidewalk on the street. As he was blind, he could not get any job and relied on the kindness of others to survive.

On that day too he begged for money. It was the peak of the commute hours. He sat with a paper and an open tin cup in his lap.

Blind Man Begging 

"BLIND PLEASE HELP!" he had scribbled on a placard beside an open tin cup.

But nobody was willing to lend him money. A young marketing author was walking down the same route when she noticed a blind man holding a placard and an old tin cup.

She also noted that far too many individuals walked by without even seeing the elderly gentleman. She pitied the blind man and wished to assist him.

After some consideration, the marketing copywriter came up with a plan. She took a permanent marker out from her purse and recreated the placard from back to front. She then went on with her business after putting some money inside the cup.

Soon people started putting more money into the cup. After some time, the elderly gentleman noticed that his tin cup was rapidly filling.

After some time, the elderly gentleman noticed that his tin cup was rapidly filling.

"Can anybody read this sign board for me?" the blind man asked a stranger while he was putting some money in the cup.

Since he was a respectable man, the stranger volunteered to read it. "It says, 'IT'S A BEAUTIFUL DAY, YOU CAN SEE IT! but I'm not able to!" the stranger read.

The old blind man then understood the importance of words. He continued being kind and wise with his words and soon he had a decent life.

Moral of the Story

The blind man story for kids teaches us the importance of the words we speak. This story illustrates how crucial word choice and language are when we want to truly connect with and affect others. As depicted in the story, the young lady helped the blind man by writing a captivating message that explained the difficulties of the man. And it was because of it people started helping the old man.

In conclusion, the story of the blind man is a great way to teach kids about the importance of how we use our words. The story can be used to encourage kids to be creative in their writing and speaking exercise. Parents and teachers can use stories like this to help kids learn critical life lessons in a fun and engaging manner.

FAQs on Blind Man Story for Kids in English

1. Why was the old man sitting on the pavement?

The old man was sitting on the pavement as he was begging for money. The old man was blind and did not know any other means to earn a living other than begging. No one would give him a job to earn money; thus begging and surviving at the mercy of others is the only thing he could do. 

2. How did the young writer help the man?

The young writer felt bad for the blind man as no one was helping him, so she decided to help the man by writing a captivating message on the cardboard. The writer pointed out the difficulties that the man faced and how he was not able to enjoy the simple beauty of life. This helped people to sympathise with the old man and help him.

• Free Samples
• Premium Essays
• Editing Services Editing Proofreading Rewriting
• Extra Tools Essay Topic Generator Thesis Generator Citation Generator GPA Calculator Study Guides Donate Paper
• Essay Writing Help
• About Us About Us Testimonials FAQ

Essays on the blind man by kate chopin

• Studentshare
• the blind man by kate chopin
• TERMS & CONDITIONS
• PRIVACY POLICY
• COOKIES POLICY

We use cookies to enhance our website for you. Proceed if you agree to this policy or learn more about it.

• Essay Database >
• Essays Examples >
• Essay Topics

Essays on Blind Man

25 samples on this topic

Crafting gobs of Blind Man papers is an inherent part of present-day studying, be it in high-school, college, or university. If you can do that all by yourself, that's just awesome; yet, other students might not be that lucky, as Blind Man writing can be quite challenging. The catalog of free sample Blind Man papers exhibited below was put together in order to help lagging learners rise up to the challenge.

On the one hand, Blind Man essays we showcase here distinctly demonstrate how a really exceptional academic piece of writing should be developed. On the other hand, upon your demand and for a fair cost, a pro essay helper with the relevant academic background can put together a top-notch paper example on Blind Man from scratch.

Good Example Of Essay On Cathedral

How does hobbes defend the claim that it is never rational to behave unjustly do you find his arguments convincing {type) to use as a writing model.

Discussion Question Journal

Good Essay On Pablo Picasso Blue Period

Free the great gatsby essay: top-quality sample to follow.

The Great Gatsby and the Cathedral

Good Essay About Vermeer Paintings

Good example of essay on how does jesus provide an antidote to cultural selfishness, example of conflict and human dynamics essay, nichelle carroll research paper samples.

Religious Studies 305

Good Example Of Story Called (Cathedral By Raymond Carver) Essay

Example of critical thinking on the things they carried and cathedral, example of article review on descartes: optics, contrast paper essay samples, sample essay on cathedral emotions and redemption, attitudes towards the other essays example.

Compare and Contrast

Redemption In Sonnys Blues And Cathedral Essay Samples

Short story essays examples, religion new testament: dictionary of the bible, james hastings, ed article review.

Introduction

Free Essay On A Rhetorical Analysis Cathedral By Raymond Carver

Sensor stick research paper example.

Table of Contents

Executive Summary 3

Raymond Carver Cathedral Literature Review Examples

Raymond Carver: Cathedral

Example Of Cathedral By Raymond Carver Essay

Literature review on a comparison and contrast of cathedral and what we talk about when we talk about, example of cathedral critique essay.

Caver (1) tells a story of the discovery of the self. In it, he talks about a blind man who visits the narrator’s house. The blind man seems so informed about life’s issues, and they end up discussing the issue of the cathedral. Through the narration, the reader realizes that there are some aspects of life that he does not fully understand and is helped by the blind man to do so.

Escaping Himself Literature Review Examples

275 words = 1 page double-spaced

Password recovery email has been sent to [email protected]

Use your new password to log in

You are not register!

By clicking Register, you agree to our Terms of Service and that you have read our Privacy Policy .

Now you can download documents directly to your device!

Check your email! An email with your password has already been sent to you! Now you can download documents directly to your device.

or Use the QR code to Save this Paper to Your Phone

The sample is NOT original!

Short on a deadline?

Don't waste time. Get help with 11% off using code - GETWOWED

No, thanks! I'm fine with missing my deadline

My English Essay and Composition

When writing becomes a hobby

• Tutorial Website

Monday, October 10, 2011

Helping a blind man (example of recount text).

I had the most unforgettable experience in my life when I was 18, as senior high student. It is an experience about helping a blind man to cross the street.

I still remember that day vividly. That night I had studied at school library; it was around 10 o’clock, and I prepared to go back home. As I passed through the school gate, I said goodbye to my friends. Suddenly I saw a strange thing in front of me.

There was a male standing beside the cross-walk; the traffic light was green, he could walk forward, but he didn’t. He was just standing there and made no actions. I was confused at this sight. Out of curiosity, I decided to walk over to him and to see what was happening. I felt perplexed until I walked next to him. Standing beside him, I could see he was wearing sunglasses and holding a white stick; then I knew this man was blind.

In this cold winter day, pedestrians all wore heavy coats, including him and me. His was gray and mine was black. I also noticed that there was a sign around his neck. The sign said “I am virtually deaf and blind; please help me cross the street. Tap me on the shoulder.” I knew I must help him. So I tapped him on the shoulder, and then he put his left hand on my right shoulder and I led him across the street. All the process was quiet; the only thing I could hear was the sounds of our steps. It was a chilly night too, but I knew he would feel warm at this moment. When we got across the street, he bowed in thanks, and started walking up the block, to the next corner, then the next. While he walked past me, I couldn’t help but start to weep. I wanted to walk him home. It was not a very busy street, almost deserted. He could have been there, on that corner, for 10 minutes. Maybe he is still at another corner, now, waiting. How does he get home? How does he know where his home is? Thinking of this, I cried more loudly.

I can’t image being deaf and blind. You would be so helpless and dependent on other people. Can you imagine going home like that every day: walking a block, then waiting for someone to help you get across the street, then walking another block, and waiting, relying on the kindness of strangers? After this incident, I realized how blessed I am. I should cherish every day and do my best to help the people who need help in my life.

41 comments:

its a great story

It was so touching my heart

Thanks for the example.. THX Bro

Thanks for the example Bro

Thanks for the example bro

Awwwww..... :)

i just confess about "to go back home" it is -to go home- or -to go back home- ?

Fabulous composition!!!!!!!

awesome story

Great story... good job man ����

Awfully moving. So glad you helped that man. Well done with the recount.

Wow nyc storie

Your story make me pass my compo for my test thx

this is such a touching story. this is also a great short story tbh.

Wow...it is an amazing story with a good lesson that I learnt from this story.

Quite good but pls make it better

I think it SUCks

Good story bro

Heart touching story😯😯🤐🤐😭

Interesting story

wow.... I read through and couldn't hold back my tears. I wonder how.... but I wonder why......... only God knows!

Abe muslim.Sab muslim ki maiya rendi.MC.But ke beti chod.

Local boy.It was a fiction fake sTory.

Nice humanitarian act

Thanks wonderfull story

This story is so amazing and full with kindness. I hope people nowaday always help blind man.T^T

sry but im coppying this for my homework...hehehe

Doin the same thing

Karke dekho achha lagta hai..

How many words it have.

Thx a lot it helped a lot and keep on spreading such good messages

Post a Comment

Salina man sexually abused 3-year-old child, deputies say

• Updated: Aug. 13, 2024, 8:12 p.m.
• | Published: Aug. 13, 2024, 10:16 a.m.
• Darian Stevenson | [email protected]

Salina, N.Y. -- A 31-year-old Salina man is accused of sexually abusing a 3-year-old child, according to court documents.

Sean Carpenter was arrested Saturday for performing and receiving sexual acts from the child, according to court documents filed in Salina town court.

Carpenter engaged in forced sexual conduct, according to arrest records.

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

Watch CBS News

Former NFL star Michael Oher, inspiration for "The Blind Side," claims Tuohy family never adopted him

By Khristopher J. Brooks

Edited By Aimee Picchi , Anne Marie Lee

Updated on: August 15, 2023 / 12:06 PM EDT / MoneyWatch

Michael Oher, the former NFL offensive lineman and inspiration for the 2009 box office success "The Blind Side,"  told a Tennessee judge that contrary to the film version of his life he was never adopted by the Tuohy family , and alleged that the family earned millions from the story.

Oher, 37, has petitioned a Shelby County judge to revoke the conservatorship from the Tuohys, arguing that he's old enough to handle his own business affairs. The Tuohys "have falsely and publicly represented themselves as the adoptive parents of Michael," the petition claims. 

In "The Blind Side," Leigh Anne Tuohy was portrayed by Sandra Bullock, while Sean Tuohy was played by Tim McGraw.

"Since at least August of 2004, Conservators have allowed Michael, specifically, and the public, generally, to believe that Conversators adopted Michael and have used that untruth to gain financial advantages for themselves and the foundations which they own or which they exercise control," the petition alleges.

Sean Tuohy said Tuesday that he learned about Oher's allegations when his friend sent him an article about it. The conservatorship in question, Tuohy said, had nothing to do with the movie but was meant to help Oher as he got recruited to play college football.

"They said the only way Michael could go to Ole Miss was if he was actually part of the family," Tuohy said, adding that because Oher was 18 at the time, the conservatorship was a way to make that happen legally since he was too old to be legally adopted. "...We contacted lawyers who had told us that we couldn't adopt over the age of 18; the only thing we could do was to have a conservatorship. We were so concerned it was on the up-and-up that we made sure the biological mother came to court."

If Oher wants to end the conservatorship now, Tuohy said that he would "of course" be willing to end it. He also said that there has been a growing distance between Oher and the family over the past year and a half.

Legally blind-sided?

Oher claimed in court documents that Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy convinced him to sign conservatorship documents in 2004 by falsely telling him that the legal action was "for all intents and purposes, an adoption." Court documents state that Oher signed the documents at 18 after being a foster child for years.

The conservatorship has allowed the Tuhoys to financially benefit from Oher's image and likeness, he alleges in the petition, and "reap millions of dollars" off of the Oscar-nominated movie about Oher, while he "received nothing." 

Steve Farese, a lawyer for the Tuohys, told the Associated Press that they will file an answer to the allegations in court but he declined to comment further. He was among three attorneys who served on behalf of the Tuohys on Monday.

Oher was the 23rd overall pick in the 2009 draft out of the University of Mississippi. He played five seasons for the Baltimore Ravens then another eight NFL seasons, including 2014, when he started 11 games for the Tennessee Titans. Oher finished his career after two years with the Carolina Panthers.

Oher's 14-page petition details his entering the foster care system at 11. During high school, Oher was homeless but lived with friends and classmates including Sean Tuohy, Jr. — the son of Sean and Leigh Anne. 

"Almost immediately after Michael moved in, the Tuohys presented him with what he understood to be legal papers that were a necessary step in the adoption process," the petition alleges. "Michael trusted the Tuohys and signed where they told him to sign."

The petition also claims that Oher didn't truly know what he had signed.

"Michael was falsely advised by the Tuohys that because he was over the age of eighteen, that the legal action to adopt Michael would have to be called 'conservatorship' but it was, for all intents and purposes, an adoption," the petition claims.

Khristopher J. Brooks is a reporter for CBS MoneyWatch. He previously worked as a reporter for the Omaha World-Herald, Newsday and the Florida Times-Union. His reporting primarily focuses on the U.S. housing market, the business of sports and bankruptcy.

More from CBS News

Woman arrested for targeting Elvis' family fraud scheme, feds say

Wally Amos, founder of "Famous Amos" cookies, dies at 88

Feds warn against some baby loungers, cradle swings amid 6 deaths

4 people arrested in shooting death of "General Hospital" actor Johnny Wactor

Man arrested for selling bogus gov't papers in Cebu City

CEBU CITY – The National Bureau of Investigation-Central Visayas (NBI-7) arrested a 29-year-old man for allegedly selling falsified government documents here on Monday, August 12.

A 29-year-old man (center) was arrested for allegedly selling falsified government documents in a buy-bust operation conducted by agents of the National Bureau of Investigation-Central Visayas on Colon St., Cebu City on Monday, August 12. (Photo from NBI-7)

The suspect, Romel Gonesto Panonce, was nabbed in a buy-bust operation on Colon St. where he was asked to deliver fake documents to a poseur-customer.

The NBI-7 said the suspect, a resident of Barangay Mambaling, this city, produced and sold fake Tax Identification Number (TIN) cards and Certificates of Live Birth.

Panonce was caught after an individual, Del Rosario Loctor, was nabbed on August 9 on Plaridel St. for allegedly selling falsified TIN cards.

The NBI-7 traced the source of the fake government documents during follow-up investigation to Panonce that led to his arrest.

These bogus papers were ordered through resellers who advertise their services on Facebook.

Prior to the entrapment operation, undercover agents ordered two TIN cards worth P300 from the suspect.

Panonce arrived on a motorcycle to deliver the items and was immediately handcuffed by NBI-7 agents after he handed over fake TIN cards.

The NBI-7 seized from the suspect several falsified TIN cards, driver’s licenses, birth certificates, death certificates, PhilHealth cards, national IDs and unified multi-purpose ID.

Charges of falsification of public documents and computer related forgery have been filed against Panonce, the NBI-7 added.

The NBI-7 reminded the public to transact only with legitimate and authorized personnel or representatives of government agencies.

The agency discouraged the public from acquiring their documents on social media.

‘The Blind Side' subject Michael Oher says adoption by Tuohy family was a lie and he was cut out of money from movie

Former NFL star Michael Oher, the subject of the book and movie "The Blind Side," alleges that the couple who took him in as a teenager misled him into believing they were adopting him — and that they instead placed him in a conservatorship, according to a court filing Monday.

"The lie of Michael's adoption is one upon which Co-Conservators Leigh Anne Tuohy and Sean Tuohy have enriched themselves at the expense of their Ward, the undersigned Michael Oher," said the petition to terminate the conservatorship in Shelby County Court in Tennessee.

The story of Oher and the Tuohy family became the subject of an Oscar-winning film, “The Blind Side,” starring Sandra Bullock in the role of Leigh Anne Tuohy. The film, based on the Michael Lewis book of the same name, chronicled Oher’s life as a homeless child through his college football career and eventual NFL stardom.

The Tuohys negotiated a deal with 20th Century Fox that left Oher without any payment for the rights to his name, likeness and life story, while the Tuohy family received a contract price of $225,000 and 2.5% of the film’s net proceeds, the petition states.

The film has grossed over $300 million, the petition says. A $200,000 donation was also made to Leigh Anne Tuohy's charitable foundation.

The petition said Oher made no money off the film, which was released after he completed his college career and would not have affected his NCAA eligibility.

According to the petition, Oher does not recall signing the agreement for the rights to his life story. The document has a signature that appears to be his, but "nobody ever presented this document to him with any explanation," the filing says.

The petition accuses the Tuohys of a breach of their fiduciary duty as conservators “so gross and appalling that they should be sanctioned by this court."

Oher was a ward of the state of Tennessee by the age of 11 and homeless as a child, according to the filing. A friend's father helped Oher enroll in 2002 in Briarcrest Christian School, where he played basketball and football.

The families of classmates often let Oher, who fell through the cracks of a "broken social system," stay in their homes, the petition said.

"Where other parents of Michael's classmates saw Michael simply as a nice kid in need, Conservators Sean Tuohy and Leigh Anne Tuohy saw something else: A gullible young man whose athletic talent could be exploited for their own benefit," the petition said.

Oher alleges that the summer before his senior year, after he became a legal adult in July 2004, the Tuohys offered him a place to live with their family in their home. The couple said they would legally adopt him, and Oher believed them, the petition said.

Oher learned only in February that documents the Tuohys asked him to sign under the belief that it was part of the "adoption process" were actually conservatorship papers that would strip away his legal rights, the petition said.

The Tuohys told him that because he was no longer a minor, the adoption paperwork was titled a conservatorship, the petition alleged.

"At no point did the Tuohys inform Michael that they would have ultimate control of all his contracts, and as a result Michael did not understand that if the Conservatorship was granted, he was signing away his right to contract for himself," the petition said.

The conservatorship was granted until Oher reached the age of 25 or until the court terminated the order, but the arrangement was never terminated, Oher's petition said.

In addition to termination, Oher's petition asks the court to issue an injunction barring the Tuohys from using his name and likeness.

The couple said in a statement on Tuesday that they have always been upfront with Oher about the conservatorship and have split any profit from “The Blind Side” with him equally.

“Even recently, when Mr. Oher started to threaten them about what he would do unless they paid him an eight-figure windfall, and, as part of that shakedown effort refused to cash the small profit checks from the Tuohys, they still deposited Mr. Oher’s equal share into a trust account they set up for his son,” the statement from attorney Marty Singer said.

The couple also alleged that Oher has attempted to “run this play” before but struggled to find a lawyer who would represent him.

“The Tuohys will always care deeply for Mr. Oher. They are heartbroken over these events,” the statement said. “They desperately hope that he comes to regret his recent decisions, makes different choices in the future and that they someday can be reconciled with him.”

In a statement Monday, Oher said that he was “disheartened by the revelation shared in the lawsuit today."

"This is a difficult situation for my family and me," he said."For now, I will let the lawsuit speak for itself and will offer no further comment.”

An attorney for the Tuohys declined to comment. The Tuohys' former representatives at Creative Artists Agency said they have not worked with the family since 2007.

Sean Tuohy Jr., known as SJ, told Barstool Sports that he believes the issues between Oher and the Tuohy family built over time. He alleged that Oher asked for money from the family around 2021.

He added that he will never say anything negative about Oher.

“I get it, why he’s mad, I understand," SJ Tuohy said. "It stinks that it will play out on the public stage. ... That part sucks, but oh well.”

SJ Tuohy also said that he was not aware of the details of the movie deal but knew that his father gave him a check a few years after the movie came out. He added that he did not know why his parents chose a conservatorship over adoption but assumed it was because of Oher's age.

"There's no, like, money being held anywhere. ... There's no power of attorney still being held," he said. "I was accusatory of my parents to some extent, like I want to make sure I'm not defending the wrong side of this."

Doha Madani is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News. Pronouns: she/her.

Diana Dasrath is entertainment producer and senior reporter for NBC News covering all platforms.

NEWS... BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW IT

Love Is Blind viewers ‘uncomfortable’ as one contestant ‘crosses a line’

Share this with

A Love Is Blind UK contestant has urged fans to ‘be kind’ after claims she has crossed a line.

The series, which is hosted by Matt and Emma Willis , is based on a simple premise or whether or not love is truly blind, as contestants are tasked with falling in love and getting engaged, without actually seeing what the person they are talking to looks like.

Fans have been enjoying seeing a potential romance blossom between Cat and Freddie , but some viewers have criticised the dental nurse for her apparent behaviour towards the funeral director.

Reddit user No_Many8525 wrote: ‘Is it just me, or did anyone else find it very hard to watch Cat and Freddie scenes? The way she kept undermining him, talking him down and with the whole flirting with Sam.

‘I really feel for Freddie… I don’t think he is perfect by any means and think it comes from a place of insecurity on her end but there’s a line that she constantly crosses.’

Other fans have echoed the sentiment, but Cat herself has responded on Instagram and addressed the backlash while reminding people about how reality TV works.

‘I would just like to come on here to say thank you so much for all the lovely messages,’ she wrote on her Instagram Story.

She added: ‘However people need to remember this show was filmed over a year ago and TV is edited and a lot happens that viewers do not see!’

Cat pointed out that ‘months of filming’ is cut down into ‘1 hour episodes at a time’, meaning ‘a lot has been missed that the fans will not see’.

She continued: ‘TV is edited so public and fans can enjoy and get gripped into the show. It’s real people’s feelings and emotions and certain situations have been made to be something that they are not! #bekind.’

Her plea for kindness comes after plenty of fans heaped criticism on her after seeing things unfold on screen.

Viewers referencing Freddie admitting to past cheating, but insisted his honesty now should be commended, as they said: ‘Kudos to Freddie for being honest about cheating but I’m not a fan of Catherine’s reaction to it. First of all they should’ve spoken about it in the pods. Why now all of a sudden?’

‘Freddie trying to tone down who he is as a person because it annoys Catherine is exhibit no.5382863819 in my case against them being together. He looks so disheartened when he talks about their relationship,’ argued one X user.

Another fan added: ‘Protect Freddie at all costs. Dude is a funeral director for a living. Let the man have his jokes and levity in his personal life 😭’

Others pointed out it was ‘likely editing’ doing Cat no favours.

Hot Property Picks from Metro

Cheapest UK city for first-time buyers revealed — but it's ‘bleak’ for some

What I Rent: As a Bake Off finalist, my £2,800 a month flat has more ovens than bedrooms

We bought a mouldy narrowboat on Facebook Marketplace — it saves us £10,000 a year in rent

This Dorset beach hut is only 6ft wide and has no toilet — but will set you back £110,000

Selling your home? Here's what viewers are really looking at

Love Is Blind UK is streaming on Netflix.

Got a story?

If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us [email protected], calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you.

MORE : Devastating update on ‘mind-blowing’ Netflix thriller ahead of final season

MORE : 00s TV show hailed ‘one of the best ever’ lands on Netflix on eerie date

MORE : ‘I lived in the Emily in Paris building – our lives are eerily similar’

Get us in your feed

Advertisement

Supported by

Fact-Checking Claims About Tim Walz’s Record

Republicans have leveled inaccurate or misleading attacks on Mr. Walz’s response to protests in the summer of 2020, his positions on immigration and his role in the redesign of Minnesota’s flag.

• Share full article

By Linda Qiu

Since Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota was announced as the Democratic nominee for vice president, the Trump campaign and its allies have gone on the attack.

Mr. Walz, a former teacher and football coach from Nebraska who served in the National Guard, was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2006 and then as Minnesota’s governor in 2018. His branding of former President Donald J. Trump as “weird” this year caught on among Democrats and helped catapult him into the national spotlight and to the top of Vice President Kamala Harris’s list of potential running mates.

The Republican accusations, which include questions over his military service , seem intended at undercutting a re-energized campaign after President Biden stepped aside and Ms. Harris emerged as his replacement at the top of the ticket. Mr. Trump and his allies have criticized, sometimes inaccurately, Mr. Walz’s handling of protests in his state, his immigration policies, his comments about a ladder factory and the redesign of his state’s flag.

Here’s a fact check of some claims.

What Was Said

“Because if we remember the rioting in the summer of 2020, Tim Walz was the guy who let rioters burn down Minneapolis.” — Senator JD Vance of Ohio, the Republican nominee for vice president, during a rally on Wednesday in Philadelphia

This is exaggerated. Mr. Walz has faced criticism for not quickly activating the National Guard to quell civil unrest in Minneapolis in the summer of 2020 after the murder of George Floyd by a police officer. But claims that he did not respond at all, or that the city burned down, are hyperbolic.

Mr. Floyd was murdered on May 25, 2020, and demonstrators took to the streets the next day . The protests intensified, with some vandalizing vehicles and setting fires. More than 700 state troopers and officers with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources’ mobile response team were deployed on May 26 to help the city’s police officers, according to a 2022 independent assessment by the state’s Department of Public Safety of the response to the unrest.

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .