To this day, I find myself astonished that the deaf community continues to be one of the most misunderstood minorities. I believe it’s one of the most misunderstood minorities in North America and around the world. It’s due to the lack of awareness among the society.
Yes, the Internet has brought so many deaf and hard-of-hearing people together. It has done us a lot of good. Yesterday, I witnessed something amazing on the Internet. It wouldn’t have been possible to achieve ten years ago. Some of the deaf bloggers communicated with each other using their computers, laptops, and mobile devices and doing a live report on the Gallaudet arrests. The live report was being published in Los Angeles while the reports were being submitted by several bloggers via their mobile phones or laptops from the Gallaudet campus in Washington, D.C. That’s on two entirely different coasts with a range of 2,700 miles between them, yet all of them were communicating with each other and publishing new information from every few seconds to a couple minutes.
Unfortunately, the news media outlets often get their stories all mixed up. I see it in nearly every deafness-related article they publish in newspapers. They often lump all of us into one category, which send the readers the wrong impression. Journalists often try to put themselves into our shoes and walk in them, then come to a conclusion. Usually it’s the wrong one. I don’t often believe the news stories I read to be completely accurate. There’s always more to a story that they print. They often leave out the details that I would consider important. They just keep on using clichés in their articles. Just like I said, it’s the lack of awareness. There are 30 million Americans and 3 million Canadians with a degree of hearing loss. For most, it’s not a big issue as they are often minimal and weren’t born with it. The severe deafness occurs at a far lower rate in comparison. These who were born with hearing loss or became deaf during their first 5 years are more likely to hold deafness as an identity.
I do believe that we are often misunderstood as a minority. People unfamiliar with people who have a cultural identity associated with their deafness tend to assume that they represent the whole “hearing impaired” community. It’s one of the worst misconceptions around. We do not represent every single living deaf and hard-of-hearing individual living on the soil of North America. Nor do we share all the same interests, beliefs, faiths, opinions and more. It’s an identity that we hold close to our hearts because of our language, ASL (American Sign Language) and that we understand each other, especially when it come to the frustrating experiences of being in families that doesn’t sign. I must say that I’m grateful that my family believes that communication is the key to keeping a family together and that includes signing. Not many families are willing to adapt to a child’s disability. As you may remember, I had written a blog entry a few months ago, it was titled “The Importance of Communication”. It’s one of my personal favourites.
I have to admit that I’ve had some resistance to the concept of Deaf Culture, which would had been shortly after I graduated from the school for the deaf. I had my reasons for having issues with the concept as I had a very difficult year as a senior due to a big change in the administration and how they were handling all of the educational programs and the problems surrounding it. That year nearly made me lose all of my faith, and it wasn’t helping that I was going to college. Mind you, I did love college on so many different levels in comparison to high school due to the advantages of acquiring a better education. However, I did miss having deaf friends in my classes because we all understood each other and we would always have a good laugh. It was a big change for me to adapt to, and I would talk with some hearing students, but it wasn’t the same.
Having a deaf friend is incredibly different from having a hearing friend. I’m not saying that they are better at being friends; I’m just saying it’s different. I have hearing friends, but I don’t often discuss deaf-related topics with them. For instance, it’s like a graphic designer discussing the difference between process and spot colours with a tax accountant. You cannot expect a tax accountant to understand the concept because they don’t deal with it on a daily basis. Having deaf friends add more to your character and your life experience.
I don’t expect everybody to understand why some of us choose to remain deaf. We are given choices, and we made them. I’ve already adapted to being a deaf person, and I don’t plan on changing that. If there’s a pill that cures deafness, I would be hesitant to take it because I’ve already been deaf my whole life. To think of not being deaf is just hard for me to imagine. It is a life-changing experience and it may radically change my personality and my identity. There is a movie that makes a good example of what I’m saying here, it’s called ‘At First Sight’ starring Val Klimer. He portrays a blind man who is operated on to have his eyesight restored. Later into the movie, he begins to resent his ability to see and went back to being blind as a comfort. Mainly, because blindness is what he identifies with. Just like I identify myself with deafness.
It’s a concept that I don’t expect most people to understand. That is why I believe we are one of the most misunderstood minorities. Remember, we don’t represent every single deaf and hard-of-hearing individual. We are all individuals and we have our identities, not all of us share the same identity. In my experience, it has been a wonderful experience despite a few years of hard times in between. I don’t believe in criticizing people for their choices, that’s the best part about living in a free country, you get to be who you want to be.
I consider my deafness to be part of who I am. I don’t know what I would become of if I were to lose that part. For you, it may be different. Not everybody are the same, everybody’s different in their own ways. We are often forced to adapt to the world instead of the other way around. I believe it builds character. I was at a crossroad a couple years ago, and I chosen to stay true to myself and I believe it was the right path to go on. I just can’t go the other direction pretending it’s not there. It’s a part of me.
I just can’t live my life with a lie.
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10/15/2006 6:13 AM
I could make much the same case for my sexual orentation, its been something that has been with me since I was little, though not quite as profound as being deaf, would I take something to make it go away, no, it has enriched my life in ways I cant describe
10/15/2006 12:10 PM
While I believe that Richard Roehm's comment is irrelevant in relation to the topic here, I'm not going to delete anybody's comments here.
I just don't want to censor someone, even if it's ridiculous. Let's just stay on topic here.
I believe the protesters were incredibly brave to allow themselves be placed under arrest. It'll probably go onto their permanent records, but it's just a misdemeanor. Many protesters often get charged with that at first, but they don't get probation or jailtime or anything most of the times.
10/15/2006 12:12 PM
Aloha Wolf,
Thanks for your interesting response. Yeah, I can understand what you mean by having your life enriched and it cannot be described in words.
Sometimes, we just can't find the words to describe it because there are none. People just have to step in our shoes to experience it.
:-)
10/15/2006 1:27 PM
"Yes, the Internet has brought so many deaf and hard-of-hearing people together. It has done us a lot of good. "
I'm not so sure about this. I'm a born deaf but mainstreamed person. I am profoundly deaf, though, this isn't some little ol' HOH thing. Nevertheless I do not know any sign language beyond the basically useless fingerspelling.
But reading through all the blogs and such on DeafRead has made me really question whether or not Deaf people would ever find me acceptable. I've always wanted to learn ASL but the first time I did, I was harrassed for not having already learned it (I was 19 at the time), so I left. At this point I've considered whether I want to make the time & investment to learn it, but as I said, after reading all the vitriol on the DeafRead blogs toward "not deaf enough" (believe me, I'm picking that up from the bloggers, not from JKF) I may drop those plans again.
I'm perfectly happy with being deaf. I wouldn't try to cure it (although I do keep my HA top notch). But neither do I really know any other deaf people and I'd like to change that. But I don't know if that will happen.
To be honest, I'm rather shocked at the extent of the deaf/Deaf divide as I've seen it on the Internet as exemplified by Carl Schroeder on one end and Richard Roehm on the other. (I'm particularly distressed that the latter appears to run the advocacy center in my area!!) It was easier to view my initial experience with ASL as an anomaly, an artifact of the times but 20 years later it seems that's still a huge issue.
10/15/2006 5:14 PM
Anonymous, I'll accept you for who you are. Period.
Like I said, it's always a personal choice and people should be respected for who they are. It's unfortunate that you came across some rude people when you were trying to learn sign language.
I know that it does happen. There's always some stuck-up snobs among us. Diversity is about respect, a lot of people don't always get that part.
If you want to learn ASL, you can always go to a community college because they're often filled with hearing students with a deaf instructor. That way, you won't get harassed.
Some people are just plainly mean. We both know that.
10/16/2006 1:30 PM
Banjo,
I must say that I am proud of you for several reason. One, your written language is very good for a deaf person. And two you understand the primary needs for the deaf community - communication
First a little about me. I am borderline profound Deaf who married a profound deaf woman. I spent 1st to 6th grade in a mainstream school, 7th to 12th grade in a hearing public school with speech practice 2 times a week. I attended a deaf coolege for 3 years on two different times (total of 6 years). If given a chance to do all over again, I will go thru same thing again. Why? Because now I am independence from the needs the tools to live in my everyday life. Don't get me wrong, those college days are one my best memories even though I was treat as an outcast. I was so poor in ASL because I was trained to speak English. I lived thru discrimination in my high school days and it has prepared me to persistence and makes friends in college.
So my point? It is sad that only every 2 out of 10 of my deaf and hard hearing friends are doing something to improve the quality of life. One of my friends who is a strong ASL has a nice $40k in Fla but is on shaky ground and could lose his job because of his language barrier. It came to the point of me telling him to go and take English classes so he can communicate in writing. I work for a company who would be glad to hire a deaf person that CAN communicate without the need of an interpreter. We had 3 deaf walk in the door for job and they all left without being hired. All because they did not know how to write in good English, they all wrote in ASL. I agree we can’t group them all in one group but as you stated “30 million Americans and 3 million Canadians with a degree of hearing loss” and there are almost 330 million people in America that I can’t understand why many of the ASL are not willing to learn English to improve their life. It’s almost as if they want to stay a minority that needs help at every turn of their life. I know a few of them when thing don’t go their way that scream “Discrimination!”. Question is “what discrimination?”. Discrimination because of deafness or discrimination because the lack ability improve ones life.
Now this Gallaudet thing is an example about what I am saying. I will be first to tell you I don’t know the whole story but when I stood back and look at the big picture. One of the first thing comes to my mind about these tent cities that’s popping up everywhere is that “do these people have jobs to go to?” The second thing is “Is it possible that this new Prez may see it to help the deaf community improve the quality of live in the real world?”
Banjo, sorry for my rambling, but if you write this good in English, how about writing one in ASL, for those that need to read this article the most, the one that need to learn that communication must start on their end.
I am on my way to be an outcast again. This time its with the deaf community. I have usher syndrome and currently going blind but that not going to stop me from trying to improve my quality of life.
BG
10/16/2006 2:52 PM
Bill, thank you for the great response. I appreciate it.
Unfortunately, what you said about people being not fluent in English couldn’t be any truer. You made a good point on the part of where the deaf accuse someone of committing discrimination. I have to say that the word, discrimination rarely occurs to my mind. Though it does occur once in a while in my life. I cannot discuss some of it here.
“do these people have jobs to go to?”
You're not alone on that question. Quite a few people have asked that question too. Though it’s common knowledge that unemployment rate among the deaf/hoh population tend to be higher. I’m glad I’m not a part of that statistics, which I can tell you.
I know several deaf people with user syndrome; I know how frustrating it can be. In fact, one of my English teachers had the syndrome. He was a good teacher; he must be retired by now. I also know some deaf people my age with it. But I’m glad to see that you’re not letting it get into the way of your life.
Again, thanks for making a great contribution to the discussion.