Are Deaf People (from birth) Disabled?

jillio said:
Thank you. That's just the way I see it after 20 years of being involved with the deaf community and the issues that affect that community.
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Uhh....clarification please.

We, deaf people are now known as "that community?"

I thought you were part of our community as a mother of a deaf son? If so, why the statement of, "....and the issues that affect that community."

I think it should read, "and the issues that affect our community." :)
 
Byrdie714 said:
Uhh....clarification please.

We, deaf people are now known as "that community?"

I thought you were part of our community as a mother of a deaf son? If so, why the statement of, "....and the issues that affect that community."

I think it should read, "and the issues that affect our community." :)
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I stand corrected. Our community. I used that as a way to keep from being redundant by stating deaf community twice in one sentence. Here's your tomato!
 
RilianSharp said:
Not everyone who is deaf or associated with a deaf person is part of the "deaf community".
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No they are not. But what does that have to do with the effects of mainstreaming? Unless it is to illustrate that those who do have a connection to the deaf community generally fare much better psyhcosocially in the mainstream that those who are more isolated by having no connection.
 
jillio said:
I stand corrected. Our community. I used that as a way to keep from being redundant by stating deaf community twice in one sentence. Here's your tomato!
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Is that a Big Boy tomato, hot house tomato, Roma tomato or a tomato on the vine? :giggle:
 
Byrdie714 said:
Is that a Big Boy tomato, hot house tomato, Roma tomato or a tomato on the vine? :giggle:
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A Big Boy on the vine! I got so many cultures swimming around inside of me that I sometimes forget to claim affiliation with one or two!:giggle:
 
jillio said:
No they are not. But what does that have to do with the effects of mainstreaming? Unless it is to illustrate that those who do have a connection to the deaf community generally fare much better psyhcosocially in the mainstream that those who are more isolated by having no connection.
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Someone said that the mother of a deaf person would be in the deaf community. Not so.

With this post, you imply that if a deaf person is not part of the deaf community then they are part of no community and have no connections. That is also not true.

Also, I had thought that, to the extent that one is mainstreamed, one is not part of the deaf community.
 
blonde1 said:
Hi. I am a junior in high school and right now we are working on our junior paper. My topic is, "Are Deaf people disabiled." I would like to get some insight about the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) and how Deaf people feel about being put under that act. Do Deaf people concider themselves disabled? Why or Why not? Thank you for your opinion and info. It will help me a lot with my paper.
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In my opinion, deafness is a disability, plain and simple- we cannot, without some level of accommodation (or sometimes we cannot at all) communicate as hearing people do.

We CAN communicate, of course, but we are forced to change our method of approaching a communication style or change our communication styles altogether in order to effectively do so .

But being disabled is not wrong or shameful or something to fix. I'm proud of my disability- it just happens to be Deafblindness.
 
RilianSharp said:
Someone said that the mother of a deaf person would be in the deaf community. Not so.

With this post, you imply that if a deaf person is not part of the deaf community then they are part of no community and have no connections. That is also not true.

Also, I had thought that, to the extent that one is mainstreamed, one is not part of the deaf community.
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That is not what I implied at all. Please go back and reread the posts. You have misunderstood the first time around.

How exactly is it that a hearing mother of a deaf child is not part of the deaf community is she so chooses to accept that community, its values, its norms, and its language? You are decidedly incorrect on this one.

Incorrect again. While mainstreaming quite often does inhibit access to the deaf community during the hours that one is in school, it does not inhibit access during the hours that one is not in school. Access to the deaf community, for the majority of mainstreamed students, is inhibited most often by audist hearing parents.

Let me take a guess at your demographics. Young oral deaf student, hearing parents, so sign in the home environment, raised to believe that oral only will give you more advantages than a child who signs, upper to middle class Causasion, and no contact with other deaf individuals. How on the mark am I?
 
Please, jillio. I meant that a deaf person or relative of a deaf person is not *automatically* in the deaf community. They must choose to be so.

I'm sorry, I thought mainstreaming meant keeping one away from the deaf community and from signing for fear of limiting "potential" for the child. I see you mean putting in speech taught school.

I have this thought, what of a group of people who sign with each other, but are not associated with the larger deaf community. They have connection with each other, and they can be deaf or hearing. Just, what do you think about that.
 
RilianSharp said:
Please, jillio. I meant that a deaf person or relative of a deaf person is not *automatically* in the deaf community. They must choose to be so.

I'm sorry, I thought mainstreaming meant keeping one away from the deaf community and from signing for fear of limiting "potential" for the child. I see you mean putting in speech taught school.

I have this thought, what of a group of people who sign with each other, but are not associated with the larger deaf community. They have connection with each other, and they can be deaf or hearing. Just, what do you think about that.
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Mainstreaming, as applied to the deaf student, means placement in a public school, with or without accommodations necessary to access the curriculum.

That group would have contact with one or more other deaf, or hearing tha embrace the cultural deaf values. Generally, the deaf community is terminology used to mean the larger global community, but a community can also be as small as 2. Signing is but one facet of the deaf community.
 
jillio said:
Mainstreaming, as applied to the deaf student, means placement in a public school, with or without accommodations necessary to access the curriculum.

That group would have contact with one or more other deaf, or hearing tha embrace the cultural deaf values.
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They would? How do you know?
Signing is but one facet of the deaf community.
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Please elaborate or direct me to a resource that would explain further.
 
RilianSharp said:
They would? How do you know?Please elaborate or direct me to a resource that would explain further.
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How about years of study and experience? Does that satisfy you?

A resource that would explain further? Try your closest library...look anthropolgy up and check out an intro volume. That will provide you with a basic understanding of the concept of community. Then, you can take that newfound knowledge, and check out a few books on Deaf Culture. Apply what you have learned from the intro anthropology text to the texts on Deaf Culture. Presto-chango: learning has occurred.

You could also stick around the board and take in the wealth of information that is available here.
 
How do you know that a small group of people who sign with each other would necessarily have contact with someone from the deaf community.

And, I'm asking you to elaborate on what is the facets of the deaf community. That's why I signed up on this board.
 
Aleser said:
In my opinion, deafness is a disability, plain and simple- we cannot, without some level of accommodation (or sometimes we cannot at all) communicate as hearing people do.

We CAN communicate, of course, but we are forced to change our method of approaching a communication style or change our communication styles altogether in order to effectively do so .

But being disabled is not wrong or shameful or something to fix. I'm proud of my disability- it just happens to be Deafblindness.
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If a bodily function isnt working, then its classed as a disability, thats how i see it, we have to use vision whatever we do, that is enough strain as it is thanks....i do think things could be changed around a little, i.e as in uk they have disabled living allowance...some countries have whats called communication allowance<<that i think would be better, but governments being tight with money would lose, as it costs a lot for many things a deaf person would want, we have speech to text reporter here, but if you wanted any official place to have 1, it would cost them a FORTUNE, so government here would keep deaf on Disabled Living Allowance, so we classed as disabled, i understand some deaf dont like being called that, and thats fair enough. This is good topic that can go in all directions.....

But as i said bodily function not working is classified as a disability..

Stu
 
My deaf friend says he knows hes disabled, but he doesnt feel like he is! Thats his take on it!

I dont think of deaf people as being "disabled" but more as "differently abled". Thats my take on it!
 
Sharan said:
My deaf friend says he knows hes disabled, but he doesnt feel like he is! Thats his take on it!

I dont think of deaf people as being "disabled" but more as "differently abled". Thats my take on it!
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Or of having a disability. Having a disability does not necessarily equate to being disabled.

The ADA requires that one "have a disability". It is worded that way for a reason.
 
I, for one, DO NOT consider myself disabled but I would have to admit that deafness is one of the disabilities as a disability to hear, I say, HEAR. Not talk. It can't be denied. It's a fact, we have to accept that deafness is a part of the disabilities. Depending on local education or background or whatever the reason could be, some or many people talk or even stutter some sounds.

The person born deaf from birth is definitely not disabled but rather have the hearing defect. There's not one thing, NOT ONE, that lessens their ability to do anything than hearing.

Well, though I don't like the ADA to make things more free for us: for instance, free videophones, TTYs, webcams provided from selected VRS company, interpreters to accompany for the job interview, etc, you get the idea but I'm not TOO PROUD so I think once in a while that deaf people, like us, should get something free because we might can't get something we want regardless of our good education - hearing people wouldn't let us get that kind of opportunity. They are just being jerks, to themselves and to all of the people including deaf community. That's one of the reasons deaf people don't have that much of money when they should have! I feel ADA promotes that deaf people are in need of help when they can do it without any help but I'm not against ADA, ADA does make things more easier for deaf people, you know, they do need some assistance sometimes. So I thank ADA for that sorts of things they could do their best to protect our rights.

But then, I keep thinking to myself that HEARING people do have the disability is not able to accomplish a single goal the first time nor have they achieved everything, I mean EVERYTHING - not ONE that ever failed, without a failure. For example, if a hearing father or mother (however you want to put, or even deaf father/mother, too) tries to discipline a child and would the child obey the first time and stay good as in forever? Of course not. Not every parent could do that. It's simply out of their reach. They are not perfect therefore we, deaf people, are also IMPERFECT that at least one or more of our abilities are being taken away due to our sin. Adam and Eve took that away from us. So in the current world... we (altogether hearing and deaf people of all of the kinds), in the both hearing and deaf world, ALL are having such a hard time struggling to perfect ourselves when we couldn't. It's impossible, I say at least for NOW. Again, in the final conclusion... I begin to question myself... I might be disabled in your eyes. What do you know, you might be one, too in my eyes?
 
mebedeaf said:
I, for one, DO NOT consider myself disabled but I would have to admit that deafness is one of the disabilities as a disability to hear, I say, HEAR. Not talk. It can't be denied. It's a fact, we have to accept that deafness is a part of the disabilities. Depending on local education or background or whatever the reason could be, some or many people talk or even stutter some sounds.

The person born deaf from birth is definitely not disabled but rather have the hearing defect. There's not one thing, NOT ONE, that lessens their ability to do anything than hearing.

Well, though I don't like the ADA to make things more free for us: for instance, free videophones, TTYs, webcams provided from selected VRS company, interpreters to accompany for the job interview, etc, you get the idea but I'm not TOO PROUD so I think once in a while that deaf people, like us, should get something free because we might can't get something we want regardless of our good education - hearing people wouldn't let us get that kind of opportunity. They are just being jerks, to themselves and to all of the people including deaf community. That's one of the reasons deaf people don't have that much of money when they should have! I feel ADA promotes that deaf people are in need of help when they can do it without any help but I'm not against ADA, ADA does make things more easier for deaf people, you know, they do need some assistance sometimes. So I thank ADA for that sorts of things they could do their best to protect our rights.

But then, I keep thinking to myself that HEARING people do have the disability is not able to accomplish a single goal the first time nor have they achieved everything, I mean EVERYTHING - not ONE that ever failed, without a failure. For example, if a hearing father or mother (however you want to put, or even deaf father/mother, too) tries to discipline a child and would the child obey the first time and stay good as in forever? Of course not. Not every parent could do that. It's simply out of their reach. They are not perfect therefore we, deaf people, are also IMPERFECT that at least one or more of our abilities are being taken away due to our sin. Adam and Eve took that away from us. So in the current world... we (altogether hearing and deaf people of all of the kinds), in the both hearing and deaf world, ALL are having such a hard time struggling to perfect ourselves when we couldn't. It's impossible, I say at least for NOW. Again, in the final conclusion... I begin to question myself... I might be disabled in your eyes. What do you know, you might be one, too in my eyes?
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you are incredibly full of contradictions, even puzzling sorry to say, you have an inexact view.

and finally I doubt much so you really know what does "disabled" really means.
a child born into a society that already decides what a child can and cannot do, unless the child fights for their place, EVEN then - that struggle is a syptom of being disabled because of the screwed up attitude society have on placed hardship on people of differences.

Thought I can understand 'why' you are relunctent to praise ADA, and yet you still maintain it has its place, however your accusation on making equipment 'free' for disabled people is undesirable do you feel bad about this? like does it make you feel as so you are forced to feel 'needy' I can understand that. However we can't escape the fact we NEED tty, or video phone or interpreters, these things/services are GOOD, and ADA is trying to foot the bills on thing which we have the rights to have, in so why should deaf people be forced to buy such EXPENSIVE euqipment ? when in fact Most deafs are severely disadvantaged in economically to make a purchase to 'function' more at ease a society.

Although I do get annoyed that most of those assistence equipments/services are over-priced/oercharged and this make me angry like the disabled people(this includes d/Deaf people) are being used as a means of providing these professionals lucrative careers and oppurtunitys. What is worse some of the deafies have crossed the line from being oppressed to be oppressors - saying they can only provide coordination but not advocacy (in the real sense) , they do advocate however - but ONLY if it means creating pathways for (hearing) interpreters to have a contract (job) to be paid, as does the organisation which deafie co-ordinators contribute to this as per following their job descriptions. Often the hold-back the oppression is carried out by following their job description !!!
This is the ultimate fuck up that we have to get rid of, until then we, D/Deaf are going to experience more oppression. Lastly I Do understand whyou not too proud, its like youre being insulted, but yup we do Need assistence however like you say, it just needed to be changed in the way its approached.

Cheers
 
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