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From: Lou Heite
Date: 04 Oct 2006
Time: 11:23:08 -0500
Remote Name: 24.237.249.158
I think it is very important for people in any of the "helping professions" to get some training in counseling. Even one or two credits, if your schedule will allow, will give you access to tools that you will find extremely useful when you get out into a practice or a professional job. The "grief cycle" has been addressed regarding disabilities in a number of other locations. (Even by me! See ISAD 1998 http://www.mnsu.edu/comdis/isad/papers/stages/heite.html Oppression is different. Oppression is done by a majority (or a very powerful minority) to a subject population. In Western society, the "norm" is established, usually unconsciously, as a healthy white heterosexual male. Other societies may have other norms but they are mostly very close to that description. Any other expression is deviant from the norm, and any member of a deviant population can be subject to both conscious oppression such as bullying, infantilization, denial of privelege and so forth, or to unconscious oppression such as stereotyping in the media. It's one way societies establish define themselves. People who find themselves on the outside of the "normal" boundary may suffer grief, self-loathing, poor self-esteem, economic deprivation,and a host of other ill effects from their status as an "other." That's why "out-groups" tend to form special places where their differentness is a norm, and that can be very powerful indeed. The sense of relief and liberation at a NSA meeting is palpable, but it also is an indication of the level of oppression that some people who stutter do feel. It's why some people try to "pass" by going covert, and why some people rather give up and don't reach for their maximum potential. This can become a vicious cycle, where people meet the expectations society has of them, which then justifies the societal prejudice. As a budding professional, you will realize that you can't change society all by yourself. But you can stand in the way of little, individual acts of oppression when you encounter them. Lou Heite