“Hi, my name is Pete and I’m left-handed.
“Hi, Pete.”
I don’t believe anyone has formed a LAA (Lefties Anonymous Association) organization; however, someone should start one real soon. Since a southpaw’s IQ is generally 20 to 30 points higher than the other 90% of the nation, right-handers, there’s not a lot of sympathy and understanding for us, and that’s just not cool! Frankly I’m fed up with the blatant discrimination of this disregarded segment of society that for far too long has gone unnoticed.
Today I proudly announce the formation of the USA Foundation: United Southpaws of America. Unless you’re left-handed you have no idea of the undo hardships and calculated bias lefties face every day in our culture. It is high time to shed some light on this disturbing issue and those victims who suffer from its effects. For most lefties, me included, the first vivid sign of inequity was realized the moment we entered our kindergarten classroom for the first time and began searching for a left-handed desk we could actually rest our arm on as we wrote. Finding none, we quietly sat at a rightie’s desk and obediently learned to make do. To this day I have a recurring nightmare where I’m in a long line of left-handed children being herded into a dark, murky room by a sinister-looking dwarf with a lazy eye. I can clearly see the kids exiting on the far side. Their left arms have been removed and they are carrying a No. 2 pencil in their right hand while a trio of circus clowns points and laughs at them. Give me a minute please. Lefties need those 20 to 30 extra IQ points to survive a public school education that stacks the deck against them from day one. I still have a black lead-pencil smudge on the side of my left palm from dragging my hand across the written paper for 12 years.I’ve tried everything short of plastic surgery to remove this “scarlet letter” from my damaged skin. And I refuse to wear one glove; much like Michael Jackson did, while in public, to hide the disfigurement! Oh, by the way, you’ll never view a heart-wrenching, tear-jerking documentary on the National Geographic channel regarding this American tragedy. You won’t turn on Oprah anytime soon and see her sitting across from a couch full of sobbing, somber, suffering southies with permanently pencil-stained hands, while she wipes a tear from her eye and awards her entire audience a free car. September 1969, my second day at U.S. Army boot camp is a day that will live in infamy. As all soldiers quickly learn when walking past an officer, you salute. Unfortunately for me, my salute that day was a result of instinct, and not Army protocol. I saluted the sharply dressed captain with my left hand, a capital offense in the military. The officer abruptly stopped and unleashed upon me an outburst of profanity Redd Foxx and Lenny Bruce would have admired. He then placed me on two days of KP duty (kitchen police — better known as scrubbing pans, hauling garbage and peeling thousands of potatoes). To this day every time I apprehensively move through the produce section at the market and spot the bin of stacked potatoes, I begin sweating and gasping for air.
Possessing an IQ of 40 or 50 points higher than those dim-witted Northpaws (yep, just made up a new word) is some conciliation; however, it’s not enough for the years of trauma and distress suffered by potential USA members. We will be lobbying Congress soon to change the military salute from right-handed to left-handed. We will also be launching a grassroots effort to officially transform the handshake to a left-handed greeting. And lastly, if you suffer as I do from PPS, permanent pencil smudge, we will be offering surgical removal at no cost to the deformed party. As an added bonus, below is a list of all the Southpaw presidents.
Left-handed U.S. Presidents
James A. Garfield (1831-1881) 20th
Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) 31st
Harry S. Truman (1884-1972) 33rd
Gerald Ford (1913- 2006) 38th
Ronald Reagan (1911 -2004) 40th
George H.W. Bush (1924- ) 41st
Bill Clinton (1946- ) 42nd
Barack Obama (1961- ) 44th