From: REMOVE_THISdwilkins@means.net (Don Wilkins)
Newsgroups: rec.crafts.metalworking
Subject: Re: Why are "righthand" threaded fasteners the standard?
Date: Fri, 11 Jun 1999 12:33:21 GMT

On Thu, 10 Jun 1999 15:34:46 -0700, Grant Erwin
<grant_erwinREMOVETHIS@halcyon.com> wrote:

>That was kind of a left-handed comment, Tom!
>
>I will refrain from speculating what your unspoken comment on the
>French language was, as implied by your lowercasing it .. at any
>rate, French is a Romance language, which means it was derived from
>Roman, i.e. Latin. The word "sinister" was a fine Latin word for
>left as opposed to right, and to my knowledge it carried no stigma,
>that was added later by people who believed the Devil was on the
>left of God for some reason .. I'm a lot better at languages than
>I am at religious history.

In Africa some societies use a food container in the center of the
eating area (table or on the ground) and one dips out their food by
using the fingers. If you are left handed you damned well better not
dip into that container with your left hand.

Toilet paper was (is) not a common item in those areas and the left
hand was used to wipe what normally would be removed using toilet
paper. Hence the outrage when anyone dipped into the food with the
"wrong" hand.