“I still remember when I was six or seven years old and putting out my left hand for an adult to shake — and being told that I had done something wrong,” says Till Veerbeck. “They said that hand was dirty. I thought it was so weird that my strong hand — the hand I preferred to use — should be called ‘dirty.'”
28-year-old Veerbeck grew up long after the idea of “retraining” left-handed people to use their right hands had been phased out in Germany. Since then retraining has been branded as an unacceptable far-reaching intrusion into a person’s mental development.
But Verbeek has still faced challenges, both as a child and an adult, in a world built for right-handed people.
‘Left-handed people don’t have the same opportunities’
August 13 is the International Day of Left-Handers, first marked in 1992 to draw attention to the estimated 10-15% of the world’s population who are naturally left-handed and the struggles they experience.
Bias against left-handed people begins in childhood.
“A stumbling block for left-handed children in primary school is that there is not the right kind of equipment for them — for example scissors,” says Johanna Barbara Sattler, founder of the German advisory service Left-Handers’ Consulting and Information.
Johanna Barbara Sattler was among those who was “retrained” to use her right hand as a child
“Those children don’t have the same opportunities to lear to write, build, draw and so on, because the tools at school simply aren’t right for them,” she added.
Sattler, a psychotherapist who has written several books on the topic of bias against left-handed people, set up the advisory service in the 1980s after she’d received an overwhelming number of requests for help from doctors, teachers and parents.
Read more: International lefthanders unite! Here are five cool things about being a leftie
Smudging your writing
A left-hander herself, Sattler grew up in Germany in the the 1950s, and so she was “retrained” to write using her right hand. She remembers being told that in the Bible the right hand was designated the “hand of God.”
Writing with your left hand usually presents a problem when the writing goes from left to right. Children are forced to either move their hands awkwardly above or below the flow of writing to avoid smudging ink.
“I remember my schoolwork always looked messy with smudged ink across the page,” says Veerbeck.
But psychotherapist Sattler says the problem is not just aesthetic: Left-handers waste a lot of energy on forcing themselves to use the non-dominant side of their brain, meaning work produced with their right hand might fall short.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Rafael Nadal – tennis
Tennis superstar Rafael Nadal actually started out playing right-handed, but his uncle and former coach Toni Nadal thought it a better idea for him to play left-handed – as in football he was left-footed. Could he have possibly won 18 Grand Slams playing right-handed? We’ll never know.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Pele – football
Pele burst onto the international scene when playing for Brazil at the 1958 World Cup in Sweden. He helped Brazil win that and two further World Cups in 1962 and 1970. He would make 92 appearances for his country, scoring 77 goals. He spent most of his career at his first club, Santos, before finishing his career with two seasons at the New York Cosmos of the old North American Soccer League.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Diego Maradona – football
Like Pele, Diego Maradona is also considered one of the greatest footballers of all time.He represented Argentina in four World Cups, including in Mexico in 1986. In that tournament he won the Golden Ball as best player and led Argentina to the World Cup title, beating West Germany in the final. He also had a distinguished club career with Barcelona, Napoli and Sevilla, among others.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Mesut Özil – football
Even if he’s using his right hand to show where he wants the ball, former Germany player Mesut Özil is actually left-handed – and that’s the hand with which he signed his contracts at Schalke, Werder Bremen, Real Madrid and Arsenal.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Goran Ivanisevic – tennis
In 2001, Goran Ivanisevic pulled off one of the biggest surprises in tennis history, becoming the only person to win the men’s singles title at Wimbledon as a wildcard. The native of Split, Croatia, was ranked 125th in the world going into that year’s edition of the most prestigious tournament in tennis – but had reached the final on three previous occasions, in 1992, 1994 and 1998.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Phil Mickelson – golf
Professional golfer Phil Mickelson swings the club left-handed even though he is actually right-handed. He has 44 PGA titles to his name, including three Masters, one PGA Championship and a British Open Championship. The only major he hasn’t won is the US Open, where he has finished as runner-up a record six times. He is one of 12 players to have won three of the four majors.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Babe Ruth – baseball
One of the most famous left-handers in sports was Babe Ruth. The “Bambino” began his career as a left-handed pitcher for the Boston Red Sox, but is best remembered for behing a left-handed slugging outfielder for the New York Yankees. He had 714 career home runs, putting him third on the all-time list behind Barry Bonds and Hank Aaron.
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Famous left-handers in sports
Timo Boll – handball
Table-tennis player Timo Boll’s accomplishments include numerous German and European singles titles as well as the silver medal in the team event at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing and bronze both in London four years later and the 2016 Rio Games. That’s where the left-hander was given the honor of carrying the German flag into the stadium for the opening ceremony.
Author: David Vorholt, Chuck Penfold
Real-world dangers
Problems for left-handed people are not confined to school life.
“It’s the small things that are still annoying for me every day,” Veerbeck explains. “Ironing is a big one. Door handles are another one. And there are so many electronic devices that are built for right-handed people.”
Veerbeck says that he has learned to adapt: He usually uses a computer mouse with his right hand, for example.
But the problem is more than just annoying — it can also be dangerous.
“So many types of machinery are built with right-handed people in mind,” Sattler points out. “For example, emergency buttons are almost always on the right side of a device. Left-handed people would automatically respond with their left hand.”
Little things, like using tin openers, are the most annoying for Till Veerbeck as a left-hander
Having to find a way to use equipment that was not designed for them slows left-handed people down in their every-day working life and often makes them seem clumsy. Smaller companies, Sattler says, can not afford to buy a second set of equipment for left-handed people, so they may be more reluctant to hire them.
This can have dramatic consequences: The website of International Left-Handers’ Day estimates that left-handed people have a slightly shorter life expectancy, partly due to increased risk of deadly accidents in daily life.
Read more: The greatest left-handed musicians and how to become one
Left-handers around the world
Sattler points out, that in many countries around the world left-handers face bias: Traditionally in Muslim and South Asian countries, she says, the left hand is “unclean,” used mainly for personal hygiene — so eating with the same hand is frowned upon.
But in most countries being left-handed is accepted and provisions exist to ensure equality. And it’s not all bad news for “lefties” — studies have shown that left-handers are likely to earn more than right-handers and are better drivers.
Read more: Retraining lefties to leave the ‘right’ way behind
Former US President Barack Obama is one of many famous left-handers
Left-handers have been able to flourish in all walks of life. Four out of the last six US Presidents were left-handers, including Barack Obama — as is current Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Beatles frontman Paul McCartney is among their ranks too, as is tennis player and former Wimbledon champion Rafael Nadal — commentators say his left-handedness may even have given him an advantage.
However, myths also exist around the creative and intelligent left-hander. Two of Germany’s most famous historical figures are widely reported as being left-handed — composer Ludwig van Beethoven and writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe — despite there being no evidence for this.
The message is clear, says Sattler: Left-handers are every bit as intelligent, creative and integral to society as right-handers, but still sometimes struggle to navigate a world built for right-handers.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Rebel to the core
Nirvana idol Kurt Cobain mostly played with his left hand — here on an inverted right-handed guitar. Once in a while he would pound Dave Grohl’s right-handed drum kit. Cobain was a right-hander — and why he played guitar with the left is a mystery. The customized 1959 Martin D-18E guitar he played throughout the MTV Unplugged performance is being auctioned.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
The best left-handed guitarist
Although his dad tried get him to switch, Jimi Hendrix strummed his guitar with his left hand. He was able to play the other way around, though — and ate and wrote with his right hand. He famously played a right-handed Fender Stratocaster flipped over and restrung. For Left-Handers’ Day, DW presents other musicians who’ve made it big — despite being left-handed, or precisely because of it.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Lord of heavy metal
Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi (left) gave heavy metal its riffs. Iommi always played left-handed, which is almost a miracle: He lost his ring and middle finger tips at the age of 17 in an industrial accident. He could have switched hands, but “decided to make do with what I had, and I made some plastic fingertips for myself. I just persevered with it,” he told “Guitar World” in 2008.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Sir Lefty
Sir Paul McCartney is a virtuoso on almost any instrument. He plays most of them with his left hand — including his legendary Höfner 500/1 bass. One exception: He plays a right-handed drum kit. After the Beatles dissolved in 1970, McCartney continued solo and with his band Wings.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
The other lefty Beatle
Ringo Starr is a lefty too, but plays his drums like a righty. Any drum set can easily be rearranged for left-handed play, simply by mirroring the arrangement of all the pieces. Starr’s left-handed activities limited themselves, however, to off-stage.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Drum legend and pop star
Phil Collins plays drums, and everything else, left-handed. That means he has the hi-hat cymbal on his right — and played with his left hand — and kicks the bass with his left foot. The musician from London became famous with progressive rock band Genesis. When he was younger, the Beatles were among his idols: He saw lefties play from early on.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Drums, tattoos, punk
Blink-182 have done a lot to boost punk rock’s image. Move over Sex Pistols, here comes the pop punk of the 90s. Travis Barker is the tattooed, flamboyant drummer, and he’s a southpaw. One could say he’s a non-conformist through and through — except that he plays a right-handed drum set.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
An inventive southpaw
Elizabeth Cotten, an African-American blues singer, played in an unusual way: She simply took a right-handed guitar and turned it around — without reversing the strings. She is one of the few guitarists to have played the bass strings at the bottom with her fingers and stroke the melody with her thumb. Playing this way is therefore called “cotten picking.”
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Comedy and music
Charlie Chaplin fled London’s poverty early and emigrated to the States. There he reached fame with his short movies, including “The Vagabond” in 1916. In it, he plays the violin with his left hand. Privately he also played violin and cello quite well, always bowing with his left. “Every spare moment away from the studio is devoted to this instrument,” read a press release from 1917.
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10 left-handed musicians from Hendrix to Barenboim
Conductor with a cause
Born in Buenos Aires, Daniel Barenboim learned piano from the masters of his day and is one of the world’s most respected conductors. He is also founder of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, the only joint Israeli-Palestinian orchestra. Since 1992 he has been the director of the Berlin State Opera, where the left-hander picks up the baton with his right hand.
Author: Christoph Trost
Article source: https://www.dw.com/en/left-handed-life-in-germany-little-things-can-be-a-big-problem/a-54548761?maca=en-rss-en-ger-1023-xml-atom
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