[Fredslist] about being left-handed:

[Bambe Levine]

Left-Handedness & Left-Handed People

1. Between 10-12% of people on earth are “lefties.” Women are more likely to be right-handed than men by about 4 percentage points.


2. August 13th is “Left-Hander’s Day.” Launched in 1996, this yearly event celebrates left-handedness and raises awareness of the difficulties and frustrations left-handers experience every day in a world designed for right-handers.


3. At various times in history, left-handedness has been seen as many things: a nasty habit, a mark of the devil, a sign of neurosis, rebellion, criminality, and homosexuality. It has also been seen as a trait indicating creativity and musical abilities.


4. Some scholars note that left-handers may be one of the last unorganized minorities in society because they have no collective power and no real sense of common identity. Additionally, left-handers are often discriminated against by social, educational, and religious institutions. Social customs and even language set the left-hander apart as “different” and even “bad.”

5. Many sources claim that left-handers may die as many as nine years earlier than right-handers.


6. The word left in English comes from the Anglo-Saxon word lyft, which means weak or broken. The Oxford English Dictionary defines left-handed as meaning crippled, defective, awkward, clumsy, inapt, characterized by underhanded dealings, ambiguous, doubtful, questionable, ill-omened, inauspicious, and illegitimate.


7. Phrases in English suggest a negative view of left-handedness. For example, a “left-handed complement” is actually an insult. A “left-handed marriage” is not a marriage but an adulterous sexual liaison, as in a “left-handed honeymoon with someone else’s husband.” A “left-handed wife” is actually a mistress.


8. Research has shown a link between trauma during gestation or during birth with an increased chance of being left-handed.


9. Tests conducted by St. Lawrence University in New York found that there were more left-handed people with IQs over 140 than right-handed people. Famous left-handed intellectuals include Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, and Benjamin Franklin.


10. Mothers who are over 40 at the time of a child’s birth are 128% more likely to have a left-handed baby than a woman in her.




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