Cut this, people

That was originally going to be Cut this, bastards. Then I thought that was unnecessarily harsh.

See? I do too have filters.

Anyway, I don't have a whole bunch on the brain today (and I have to go set up for a program in a while) so I thought I'd pass on a bit of information to those of you out there who may be the non-lefty parents of left-handed children. I maybe should have done this before school-supply buying time, but while I do have filters I never said I have a sense of proper occasion. Ready for the information? Here it comes:

There are no such things as scissors that are built for both left-handed and right-handed people.

Really.

Yes, I know they advertise them as "good for right or left hand", but they only advertise them that way because they want you to buy them. And stores stock them because they don't want to be left with a whole bunch of unsold lefty scissors.

The fact is that so-called right-or-left scissors are only called that because the finger holes are moulded without the part that's supposed to fit better in your hand. That sort of tilt to the holes that feels great to a person using the hand that they were designed for, but cut right into the joints of a person using the opposite hand. The logic used by the producers, I guess, is that if they leave off the moulding altogether ANY hand can use the scissors easily.

It's not quite that simple, though.

It's the blades that matter, you see. Not really the handles. The blades on left-handed scissors are reversed from the blades on right-handed scissors.

Don't believe me? Run out and get a pair of each -- proper ones, mind -- and have a look at them. On a right-handed pair of scissors the blade that goes down when the scissors are opened is on the left, and on a left-handed pair of scissors it's on the right.

See? I told you.

And right about now all you uppity dextral types are wondering why this matters.

Simple.

It's how you see.

A left-handed person (especially a young left-handed person) using a pair of right-handed scissors may find it difficult to cut on a line because the line itself is blocked by the upper blade. This might not sound like much, but when you're just learning to use scissors it becomes very frustrating in a hurry. Especially if you're in a classroom and notice that your right-handed friends don't seem to be having nearly as much trouble as you are.

Um, voice of experience here.

Actually, I was lucky in that sense. I didn't get stuck with right-handed scissors too often when I was little, and it was mostly because no one was advertising scissors as right-or-left back then. There were right-handed scissors and there were left-handed scissors (usually with a big, embarrassing lefty embossed on the blade) and even though it was sometimes a pain in the arse to try to find left-handed scissors in the small town where I grew up, my parents generally managed.

I wonder if I'd have had the same luck as a kid today, though. Well-meaning parent buys right-or-left scissors and then concludes that clumsy left-handed child is just a little slow at catching on to how scissors are supposed to work? I don't know, but I do remember the surprise of a long-time college teacher of early childhood development when I was taking her art course and demonstrated the difference between left- and right-handed scissors to her. That was a professional who knew her way around children and their learning patterns, and she'd never realised that proper scissors could make such a difference to a child. I can't imagine the average parent knowing any better.

Erm... this has gone on a lot longer than I was planning it to, you know.

And why?

BECAUSE ALL WE HAVE AT WORK ARE RIGHT-HANDED SCISSORS, DAMMIT.






What can I say? Self will intrude...

Now go out and buy your kid some proper scissors, already.