This Friday, theaters across America will be the sites of protests as the National Federation of the Blind pickets Fernando Meirelles' Blindness in what is either the greatest viral marketing stint of all time, or the worst irony in a film title since Adaptation.

The movie, based on the book by Jose Saramago, tells the story of an eye doctor (Mark Ruffalo) and his wife (Julianne Moore) who are quarantined after their city contracts a condition where no one can see. The physical blindness the characters suffer was Sarmago's allegory of society falling apart, but the NFB says this protest (which will be the largest the organization has ever staged) is over the movie's portrayal of blindness which "reinforces inaccurate stereotypes, including that the blind cannot care for themselves and are perpetually disoriented."

Without having seen the movie however, couldn't an argument be raised against the NFB that there is a difference between blindness as a real condition, and blindness as an epidemic that strikes suddenly an entire town? Doubtful that this movie is actually suggesting that when people are blind they are more likely to turn to violence or "trading sex for food," but rather as a culture, we are prone to mass hysteria and dehumanization during traumatic events. Can anyone argue with that fair analysis after 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina?