For the record I have nothing against hearing aids. In fact I wore them myself from fourth grade up till my late teens when my hearing dropped beyond the aid of them. And today the HA's are better for some people then a CI. How I look at it is this. If an HA will give them the ability to hear as well as they can or want to. Then that's the way to go. If their hearing has dropped below the ability for hearing aids to help. Then they should, if they want to be able to hear, look into the CI.
On a side note. In my mind if someone can use technology to hear but makes a conscious decision not to use it. I respect that. But I also feel that once they do that they no longer have the right to complain about society not accepting their deafness. They give up the right to complain about all the things society will place before them when they made that decision. They shouldn't complain about movie theaters not having captioning, about people treating them unkindly about it. How there is technology out there that would make life much easier for the deaf but no one is putting them together for this use. I'm not talking about the CI or HA when I say "Technology is out there". I'm talking about technology that does exist that could help people like voice recognition and devices that make tasks easier.
I can't stand all these negative things in the world. But think about it. If you "Can" remove these issues but decide not to. Then that's fine, but you'd have known that these things existed when they made the decision not to use the technology offered to them.
I guess what I'm getting at is the decision to get or not get a CI or a HA should not only involve the physical, but also the other areas of life that decision will effect.
The only ones I think have the right to complain about all these negative things deaf people have to deal with are the ones who have no choice in the matter. IF you fit in this situation then you have every right to complain about those things.
I hope that makes sense. 
Ron Jaxon
