Why I Can Relate To (And Sympathize With) Joe Biden

[Shuri]

I haven’t written a My Take in a while simply because there just hasn’t been anything I’ve been passionate about until now.

I’m not on G@G too often, so I’m willing to bet most everyone reading this doesn’t know that I’m a teacher. I teach 8th grade Language Arts. It has its challenges, but overall, I do enjoy working with my students. The politics, parents, and administration are a totally different issue.

I am off track. You might be wondering why I sympathize with Sleepy Joe, right? Of course, you do. Why else would you click on the article? It is simple, really.

I have a speech impediment, and it is annoying as fuck.

Let me tell you. It is, in fact, NOT cool.

Joe Biden has a speech impediment. His is different from mine. He had a severe stutter that he is still battling while I never learned how to move my mouth when I speak. I can literally have a full ass conversation without moving my lips at all. My students call it my ‘super-duper power’, and they think it’s really cool.
Speech impediments are annoying for multiple reasons. Mine in particular is annoying because it’s hard for people to understand me. Unfortunately, unless I am consciously making an effort, I just natural don’t move my mouth when I talk. This often means I have to repeat myself (something I hate with a fire red).

The second reason is also the reason why I sympathize with Joe Biden.

Speech impediments make you sound dumb. And I don’t mean dumb because you can’t understand me. They make you sound dumb because your mouth and brain don’t work together. You might notice that sometimes Joe doesn’t always…say things that make sense.

Something people without a speech impediment don’t understand is that they often make you create something called a ‘word salad’. Basically, your sentence starts out great and then by the end, it is a mess. So, in my mind and Joe’s, I’m saying one thing, but my audience is hearing something totally different. I might think I’m saying, “Lord of the Flies is an interesting book, and you’ll see how Jack and Ralph are in conflict from beginning to end” but what I really say is, “Lord of the Flies is an interesting Jack plus like with Ralph like when they argue make a conflict in lots of books just like Lord of the Flies and that’s what we are looking at with pigs in the mountains.”

In case you were wondering, that is an exact quote from a recorded online Zoom class meeting I had with my students back in April. My students (sweet bunch, really) just nodded like they understood until about ten seconds later, a kid asked me to repeat what I said because it didn’t make any sense. Also, just for your information, I always tell my students on the first day of school that I have a speech impediment and to just ask me what I said if I don’t make any sense. Usually when I repeat it, I say it correctly.

I have had some embarrassing gaffes in front of my students with my impediment. For example, during my student teaching, I said ‘the fox cocks the rabbit in the rabbit hole’ when using Aesop’s Fables as a review for themes. I’m not sure what I was SUPPOSED to say, but my 9th graders didn’t let me hear the end of it for about a week. My cooperating teacher was mad at me, too, and I recall her telling me that speech impediments don’t cause ‘word salads’.

However, my cooperating teacher was not only a cunt, but she was also a moron. Speech impediments are neurological disorders. When I said earlier that my brain and my mouth don’t work together, that wasn’t an exaggeration. Think of it like the tortoise and the hare. My brain takes it slow, allows itself to piece my sentences together. However, my mouth is like the hare, just racing to get through the sentence because I was so into or excited about what I was saying.

The person who noticed this first was my mother. She thought I’d just grow out of it, as did my dad. However, my 2nd grade teacher noticed it getting significantly worse to the point where she was asking me to write down everything I was saying. I didn’t know why she did that until maybe a month ago when my parents revealed to me that I was on an IEP (Individual Educational Plan) after she recommended it.

The teasing was terrible. I had kids mock me a lot until maybe 5th grade. We played games, and their favorite was the imitation game. My imitation was always the same. “Guess who I am? WAH WAH WAH WAH” and the entire class would yell my name and giggle. Or my personal favorite was Retarded Speed Racer in 1st grade because I spoke so fast that my words not only made no sense, but you just couldn’t understand half of the words I said.

I remember volunteering to answer a social studies question. My hand was the only one that was raised, and my teacher said, “Anyone else? Sorry, but we can’t understand anything you say” and proceeded to pick a student who didn’t know the answer. I actually had a guy ask me in college if I was deaf because of how mumbled and slurred my words were.

Joe Biden had similar stories. One story was of a nun mocking his stutter or the nickname he had from classmates as Joe Impedimenta.

I’ve noticed, though, that it doesn’t come out when I read. It only seems to be a problem when I’m speaking freely.

I also know that a lot of people don’t like Biden. And you don’t have to like him. I don't particularly care one way or the other. But when his words don’t make sense, I can relate. I often sound like him when he stutters. It’s frustrating because you don’t even realize what you said until you’ve already said it and someone has to TELL you. It makes you feel stupid. What makes it worse is that you know you aren’t stupid. I also have Asperger’s and Bipolar disorder. My IQ test showed my IQ is in the 92nd percentile, and I took it only back in July. I know not everyone believes in those tests. The one I took was Wechsler if you’d like to look it up.

This MyTake was sloppy. I wrote this in the spur of the moment without really reviewing it, and I was tired of working on my master’s paper. Please forgive any spelling errors. I just felt the need to clear up some of Biden’s ‘word salads’, and why he has them.

[The1honestguy]

I really don’t care at all if he has a speech impediment or how he speaks or an accent with English he speaks in possibly where language it does not matter is your actions as the president and he has screwed up every single thing he has done from the very first day in office so there’s nothing I can support that man on I want our president to do a good job and Office to be for the people elected by the people if that’s really how it went but do you job for the United States and not all the political garbage that he got tied into and he steals this day

[strateguy632]

that was so clear, you did not even need commas! awesome skill. i mean it.

[joeldalton]

This take would hold weight if we hadn’t had 40+ years of him being able to form and express complete thoughts. What we have now is a man with dementia, whose mental faculties are gone. This is elder abuse.

[strateguy632]

good point.

[JoyGirl]

👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾

[DeliriumCordia]

Joe Biden has dementia, not a speech impediment. If you watch his early speeches and compare them to what's coming out of his mouth now, you'll easily identify what the problem is. I normally feel sorry for people with disabilities, but Joe Biden is not a good person and has never helped anyone except himself, despite spending 40+ years in a position of power and fully capable of making a positive difference.

[strateguy632]

good contrast

[DCooper]

I've been told this song from Mary Poppins helps with speech impediments.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/POwb2yIcMUc

[strateguy632]

i share your empathy he could be "retiring in style" i wish he had.

[Waffles731]

Shit like this is why I respect speech pathologists

[MasonAlucardthethird]

He is just old.