Miss-Delectable
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The Cutting Edge News
Deaf advocates celebrated a qualified victory last week when they succeeded in amending controversial California legislation AB2072 proposed by that state’s Assemblyman Tony Mendoza. The legislation has been dubbed “Mendoza Eugenics” by critics who accuse it of seeking to subtract the generation-to-generation deaf community by steering parents of deaf newborns to controversial cochlear implants, and nudge the state back to its dark eugenic legacy. The deaf have openly charged Mendoza’s office with exhibiting a denigrating attitude toward them.
After vigorous protests by a coalition of deaf academics and activists, members of the Health Committee backed off the original bill. Safeguard amendments were added to allow the deaf community to have decisive input into the “informational brochures” and other methods by which the state will approach the parents of deaf newborns with alternatives. The drawback in the minds of the deaf community is that the fractured process is still in the hands of audiologists who are "medical equipment technicians," not qualified to make surgical recommendations and are antithetical to American Sign Language which is the culture incarnation that identifies the generation-to-generation deaf.
As part of their sense of qualified victory was the necessity of enduring public taunts, insults and cruel slurs about their deafness from bloggers who support Mendoza’s AB2072. In today’s society, bloggers can publish venomous remarks against any ethnic or cultural group and generally do so with anonymity, hiding behind fake names and pseudonyms. Among the most virulent of taunts appeared on an Orange County California political blog operated by local political observer Art Pedroza. His blog created a special section with a picture of a passive Adolf Hitler intently listening to a household radio. Pedroza headlined the thread by referring to the American Sign Language deaf opponents to AB2072 as “ASL cultists” and “ASL loons.” The thread went on to cruelly portray the deaf with epithets and as “crazy.”
Replies from deaf academics and activists were quick. Deaf activist Tim Riker, replied, “Calling Deaf people cultists is just another symptom of your hate and prejudice toward them. For the last ten years, I have seen that kind of hate and prejudice growing, and I’ve seen oppression and discrimination against deaf people increasing. All of it’s irrational.” Later, in response to further denigrations, Riker added, “The people behind AB 2072 are the bullies. Your attempt at spreading misinformation and hate against Deaf people is exactly why so many people in the community are so adamantly opposed to this bill. …We have done our research and what we have found about the people behind AB 2072 is what spurred us to speak out the way we did. I think we would be crazy to remain silent while Deaf people and other minority groups are targeted for exclusion from American society.”
Exchanges on the topic became bizarre on a blog controlled by an Arizona hatmaker named Barry Sewell, who denigrated “deafhoodized peacocks” in a thread called “Flattened Peacock.” Among other remarks, Sewell taunted the deaf for wearing yellow t-shirts to express their opposition to AB2072. The bizarre became macabre when author Edwin Black, who has been writing about the Mendoza legislation, tried to contact Sewell, who had been using the fake name “theHolism,” for an interview with a public message on the blog listing Black’s public email and inviting a reply by offline email. Black followed up by leaving a message on the blog of Sewell’s publicly discoverable phone number. In an online thread approaching the absurd, Sewell claimed the e-mail and posting by Black, using his own full name as well as Black’s namesake website, Edwin Black - Home, were all frauds created by “an Edwin Black imposter.” Sewell stated he had compared the voice quality of the answering machine message with public video tapes of author Black and the two did not match sonically. Moreover, Sewell stated he had contacted law enforcement to investigate the identity of so-called “imposter.” He quipped, “I think I have a good idea who this [sic] imposter [is].” Comments by other bloggers suggesting the Edwin Black - Home website was not an imposter site and that Black was indeed not impersonating himself did not convince Sewell, who asserted he said he was afraid of visiting the site.
The theater of the absurd that played out on Sewell’s site, and the taunts publically leveled against the deaf on California blogs only underscore the contentiousness surrounding AB2072. The bill is now working toward reconciliation in the California legislature and is due on the governor’s desk shortly.
Deaf advocates celebrated a qualified victory last week when they succeeded in amending controversial California legislation AB2072 proposed by that state’s Assemblyman Tony Mendoza. The legislation has been dubbed “Mendoza Eugenics” by critics who accuse it of seeking to subtract the generation-to-generation deaf community by steering parents of deaf newborns to controversial cochlear implants, and nudge the state back to its dark eugenic legacy. The deaf have openly charged Mendoza’s office with exhibiting a denigrating attitude toward them.
After vigorous protests by a coalition of deaf academics and activists, members of the Health Committee backed off the original bill. Safeguard amendments were added to allow the deaf community to have decisive input into the “informational brochures” and other methods by which the state will approach the parents of deaf newborns with alternatives. The drawback in the minds of the deaf community is that the fractured process is still in the hands of audiologists who are "medical equipment technicians," not qualified to make surgical recommendations and are antithetical to American Sign Language which is the culture incarnation that identifies the generation-to-generation deaf.
As part of their sense of qualified victory was the necessity of enduring public taunts, insults and cruel slurs about their deafness from bloggers who support Mendoza’s AB2072. In today’s society, bloggers can publish venomous remarks against any ethnic or cultural group and generally do so with anonymity, hiding behind fake names and pseudonyms. Among the most virulent of taunts appeared on an Orange County California political blog operated by local political observer Art Pedroza. His blog created a special section with a picture of a passive Adolf Hitler intently listening to a household radio. Pedroza headlined the thread by referring to the American Sign Language deaf opponents to AB2072 as “ASL cultists” and “ASL loons.” The thread went on to cruelly portray the deaf with epithets and as “crazy.”
Replies from deaf academics and activists were quick. Deaf activist Tim Riker, replied, “Calling Deaf people cultists is just another symptom of your hate and prejudice toward them. For the last ten years, I have seen that kind of hate and prejudice growing, and I’ve seen oppression and discrimination against deaf people increasing. All of it’s irrational.” Later, in response to further denigrations, Riker added, “The people behind AB 2072 are the bullies. Your attempt at spreading misinformation and hate against Deaf people is exactly why so many people in the community are so adamantly opposed to this bill. …We have done our research and what we have found about the people behind AB 2072 is what spurred us to speak out the way we did. I think we would be crazy to remain silent while Deaf people and other minority groups are targeted for exclusion from American society.”
Exchanges on the topic became bizarre on a blog controlled by an Arizona hatmaker named Barry Sewell, who denigrated “deafhoodized peacocks” in a thread called “Flattened Peacock.” Among other remarks, Sewell taunted the deaf for wearing yellow t-shirts to express their opposition to AB2072. The bizarre became macabre when author Edwin Black, who has been writing about the Mendoza legislation, tried to contact Sewell, who had been using the fake name “theHolism,” for an interview with a public message on the blog listing Black’s public email and inviting a reply by offline email. Black followed up by leaving a message on the blog of Sewell’s publicly discoverable phone number. In an online thread approaching the absurd, Sewell claimed the e-mail and posting by Black, using his own full name as well as Black’s namesake website, Edwin Black - Home, were all frauds created by “an Edwin Black imposter.” Sewell stated he had compared the voice quality of the answering machine message with public video tapes of author Black and the two did not match sonically. Moreover, Sewell stated he had contacted law enforcement to investigate the identity of so-called “imposter.” He quipped, “I think I have a good idea who this [sic] imposter [is].” Comments by other bloggers suggesting the Edwin Black - Home website was not an imposter site and that Black was indeed not impersonating himself did not convince Sewell, who asserted he said he was afraid of visiting the site.
The theater of the absurd that played out on Sewell’s site, and the taunts publically leveled against the deaf on California blogs only underscore the contentiousness surrounding AB2072. The bill is now working toward reconciliation in the California legislature and is due on the governor’s desk shortly.