Reply to thread

I'm a hearing person, and only in the past year have I really begun to understand deafness, as I've started to learn sign and worked with my ASL teachers (who are culturally Deaf).  I understand why deaf people are often afraid to vocalize.  There are a lot of ignorant people in the world.  You can go to YouTube.com and see examples of people's stupidity and ignorance on many levels, including deaf awareness.


Of course, people's ignorance is their own fault, but it occurs to me that NAD, ALDA, and other groups could lessen this effect if they spent a bit on public service announcements.  I know their primary role is advocacy, but advocacy could include making the general public more aware, couldn't it?  I think a lot of hearing people would experience a kind of "light bulb moment" if they saw a commercial with a very educated intellectual Deaf person explaining that their voice does not reflect their education or their ability.  I think a lot of hearing people just don't even think about it, and their day to day experience with people who have difficulty speaking more often reflects people with mental disabilities.  This in turn feeds into the culture of paternalism that hearing people often have toward the Deaf.  It seems like an awareness problem more than an intentional disrespect (at least for most people).


Back
Top