Some people are Deaf, others are (small-d) deaf

I wrote this for Silent News (July 1992) and am reprinting it here after seeing someone’s recent edict that the word deaf “is to be capitalized.”

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I got a catalog in the mail this week for a collection of products targeted to the deaf community.  A note on the inside front cover caught my eye.  It said:

Note:  In recognition and respect of the culture of Deaf people, the word Deaf is capitalized throughout this catalog.

Uh oh.  Does that mean that Silent News does not recognize and respect the culture of deaf people, because we do not capitalize the word deaf?

Of course not.  But it does give me an opportunity to explain our thinking on the subject.

The capitalization of the word deaf is a fairly recent phenomenon.  For those who are not familiar with this topic, I’ll offer a simplified explanation:  When deaf is not capitalized it generally refers to deafness as a medical condition or a physical disability.  When it is capitalized, it denotes deafness as a cultural trait, much the same as Hispanic or Russian is capitalized.

Therefore, a person who grew up deaf, attended deaf schools, communicates in ASL and associates primarily with other deaf people is (capital-D) Deaf.

A deaf person who was mainstreamed in public schools, does not use sign language and knows few, if any, other deaf people is (small-d) deaf.

Some publications in the deaf community make a point to capitalize Deaf each and every time it appears in print.  Like the publishers of the catalog, they feel they are showing recognition and respect to the Deaf community.

So why doesn’t Silent News capitalize deaf?

Because it’s just too tricky.  To capitalize deaf at every usage would be inaccurate.  For example, consider this statement:  “Captioned TV is beneficial to Deaf people.”  Is it accurate?  Is captioned TV something that only benefits culturally Deaf people?  No, not at all.  It is something that benefits all deaf people regardless of their cultural leanings.

Suppose someone sent us a newspaper clipping about a deaf man who entered a burning building and saved someone’s life.  The newspaper would not have capitalized deaf – mainstream publications never do.  Should we change it to Deaf?  Before we could do that, we’d have to track down this person and find out if he considers himself culturally Deaf.

You can see the problem.  For us to presume that everyone who cannot hear is culturally Deaf would be irresponsible.  To try and accurately portray everyone as either deaf or Deaf would be impossible.

Therefore we have taken what we believe to be the sensible approach and simply use the (small-d) deaf throughout the publication, with the exception of letters to the editor and opinion pieces.

No one recognizes and respects the culture of Deaf people more than Silent News, but we also recognize and respect the fact that not all deaf people are Deaf.

No Interpreter, But I Went Anyway

By Tom Willard

This is a parable, a fable, a make-believer, whatever you want to call it.

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The event sounded interesting so I sent in my registration form and fees.  In the “notes” section I said I was deaf and would need a qualified sign-language interpreter.

As is the custom, they turned me down flat.  (They said I could bring my own and they’d only charge that person half price.)  But this time I decided to do something different.  This time I decided to go anyway.

I arrived in the big room as people were getting settled.  Hundreds of people were on hand.  It didn’t matter where I sat, so I sat up front.

I sat there awkwardly, looking around as others chatted.  I mused about the cost of the floral decorations vs. the expense of an interpreter.  A woman came up to me and said something.  Before I could reply, she said something else, roared in laughter and hurried away.

Things came to order and the first speaker got up.

Oh good, he had a Powerpoint, something to look at.  He then left a slide with the workshop name up for 10 minutes.  With nothing else to do, I analyzed the font and graphics and colors and design and what he was wearing and how he parted his hair.  I didn’t understand a word he was saying so all I could do was entertain myself with my own thoughts.

I felt kind of bad for him since I couldn’t laugh at his jokes.  Surely he noticed in the crowd that one person seemed oddly out of it.  I didn’t applaud either.  Why should I?  I’m not going to be a fake hearing person and pretend to understand when I don’t.

My phone buzzed.  It was a friend asking me what’s up.  I said I was in a workshop and all.  It was nice to have a little interaction with someone.  I clicked send, looked up and saw that everyone was looking at me.  I turned to the speaker and he said something.

When I didn’t reply, he got a little angry.  I could tell by his gestures that he wanted me to come up there.

So I went up there.  And he said something.  I waited a bit and then I said something back.

I didn’t say, “I’m sorry, I’m deaf, I can’t understand you.”  Why should I apologize?

I said, “I’m deaf.  When I signed up for this event, I asked for an interpreter.  This is my right under the ADA.  They refused.  I came anyway to show you what happens when you don’t comply with the ADA.  THIS is what happens when you don’t comply with the ADA.  I can’t understand a word you are saying.

“Now if you don’t mind, I’m going back to my seat, where I will continue to not understand you while thinking bad things about you and your organization.”

I sat back down.  The speaker seemed flustered.  He looked around and said something.  I could tell he was asking if anyone knew sign language.

Finally a hand went up.  A person came up.

The person signed:  “How you?  Fine.  Thank you.  You welcome.  Shit.  Fuck.  Penis.  Vagina.”

Then said, “That’s all I know.”  And sat back down.

I let out an Al Gore-like sigh and pulled out a crossword puzzle and started working on it.

But everyone kept looking at me.  I don’t know why the speaker didn’t get on with his program.  I guess I was a disturbance, a disruption, a bother, a nuisance, an unwanted presence.

I should have just stayed home.  But wasn’t the whole point of the ADA to let people with disabilities do things?

A couple of burly guys in suits gestured for me to get up.  I did, and they grabbed me by my shoulders and hustled me out of there like a president getting shot at.

I was arrested, handcuffed, fingerprinted, jailed and put on display in the town square (actually the mall since that’s where people are nowadays).

The sign underneath said, HAD THE AUDACITY TO EXPECT ACCESS FOR DEAF PEOPLE AT A PUBLIC EVENT.

THE END

(and again, fiction, fairy tale, fable etc.)

They had a family reunion and didn’t tell me

At Mom's estate sale, May 2007 - brother John Willard, sister Kathleen W. McGuire, brother Bob Willard, and me.

A few days ago, while perusing Facebook, I came across a photo album and discovered that my oldest brother’s son had gotten married earlier this month.

Maybe I’m just weird, but I think when someone in your family gets married, you ought to learn about it from someone in your family, not by stumbling across some pictures on Facebook.

But this is nothing new.  It brought back memories of a painful incident that occurred nearly four years ago.  I’ve decided to write about this incident both for therapeutic reasons and because it speaks volumes about what happens when a deaf person has the nerve to try and exist in an all-hearing family.

Sadly, my experience is not unique.  Many deaf people have shared their own stories of mistreatment at the hands of their hearing family members.  Too often, deaf people are left in the dark about family developments, because let’s face it, we’re just too damn difficult to communicate with.

Here’s what happened to me:

My mom went in the hospital in Oct. 2006 for surgery.  I live 350 miles away and my mom did not want me to come down.  I have three siblings who were taking care of things.

Mom experienced a number of setbacks, and in January 2007 she was still hospitalized.  I was told that I should visit, as Mom was getting worse.

I flew down on a Tuesday and went straight to the hospital, where I spent the day.  That night I went to Mom’s house.  It was sad.  Whereas the house had always been warm and cozy, this time it was cold and blue.

The next day I woke up and my sister had already left for the hospital.  Before going there myself, I decided to check out a drawer in the dining room where Mom always left recent family photos.

Right on top was an envelope of pictures.  The first few shots showed my sister and her husband and kids at some kind of social event.  Oh.  I guess she had a party and sent Mom some pictures.

But then I saw my aunt and uncle.  Then I saw my brother and his family.  And then I saw my other brother and his family as well.

And then it dawned on me.  They had a family reunion and didn’t tell me.

All day long I mulled over this puzzling find while my sister and I visited Mom at the hospital.  Finally, that evening, back home, sitting in the living room with my sister, I asked her about it.

“I know I don’t have the best memory,” I said, “but was there a family reunion recently that I forgot all about?”

She went quiet, staring straight ahead.  Finally she said, “I don’t want to talk about it.  We’ll talk about it later.”

That told me all I needed to know.  My return home had been open-ended, but I immediately got on the computer and bought a ticket home for the next day.  I did not want to be around these people.

The next morning my sister saw my suitcase by the door and asked what was up and I said I was going home.  I went to the hospital and spent some time with Mom.  When my sister and oldest brother showed up, I said goodbye and left.

Of course, I didn’t tell Mom what was going on.  I simply said that I had to get back home for my son, as I was a single dad and my son was 14 and staying with a friend’s family during my absence.

I never really got a good answer for why I was excluded from the party.  After a lengthy delay, my sister sent me an email titled GET OVER IT!!!  She said I was not invited because I had been feuding with one of my brothers.

This is true.  But … so??  What gives her the right to get involved in someone else’s feud?  What gives her the right to choose sides and favor one person over the other?

It’s not like I’m an axe murderer or something.  I’ve never done anything to justify being treated like a leper.  When I was a teenager I published a family newsletter to keep my far-flung family together.  I was also the clan’s official photographer, taking pictures at events and making copies and sending them to everyone.

Later there were denials that the event was a “family reunion.”  I was told that it was just a party thrown by my sister to honor her daughter, who had earned a Ph.D. Who cares what words are used to describe the event?  Family members had flown in from as far away as California for this event, the first such gathering in many years.

Families are supposed to be a refuge from a cold and uncaring world.  My own family was cold and uncaring to me.

If I were invited to a family event and knew that one member was purposely being excluded, there is no way I would show up and support that kind of behavior.

Frankly, I can’t believe they put my mom in this situation, where she had to play a role in the cover-up.  She wrote to me all the time, telling me everything, but never said a word about this family get-together.

It was the last chance my mom ever had of seeing her whole family together.  I was told that Mom did not attend, as her back was bothering her.  Stupid family!  Don’t they realize that Mom BOYCOTTED the event because my kids and I weren’t invited? In the same spirit, I have no doubt that she purposely left those pictures there for me to find.

What they did, they didn’t just do to me.  They did it to my mom, and they did it to my kids, who missed a rare opportunity to hang out with their aunts and uncles and cousins.  Their next chance would come at Mom’s funeral in April 2007.

My family gets mad when I talk about this situation.  They don’t want people to know what they did to me.

But I have always felt that if you don’t want people to know about the bad shit you do, don’t do the bad shit in the first place.

This is just one story of one deaf person being mistreated by his own family.  Unfortunately, I’m sure there are millions more.

Most families have conflicts, but they work through the problems and get over it.  When you’re deaf, they use conflicts as an excuse to write you out of their lives so they don’t have to deal with the fact that they never learned how to communicate with you.

Marlee’s Right, Hollywood’s Wrong. Right.

Whoa. Stop. I can't believe what I'm hearing.

What would you do if you created something and entered your work in a contest but it didn’t win?

1.  Accept it and move on.
2.  Tweak it and try again.
3.  Get all your friends to pressure the judges into changing their minds.

Only a few people would choose the third approach, but Marlee Matlin, unfortunately, is one of them.

She wanted to do a reality TV show about a deaf family and she put together a presentation, “My Deaf Family,” and shopped it around Hollywood.

TV execs chose not to bite.

This is what happens in Hollywood every day.  People with ideas pitch to people with money.  Sometimes the ideas get a green light, sometimes they don’t.

After all, it’s the people with money who take the big risk.  They didn’t get where they are by having poor judgment.  They have the right to say no.

One could choose to respect their understanding of the TV business and accept their answer.

This is not Marlee’s approach.  Her approach is to get people to pressure the TV industry into reversing its decision.

She posted her pilot on YouTube as if it were a big deal — um, can’t any schmo post something there? — and now, through her supporters, she is drumming up a campaign to change Hollywood’s mind.

Petitions, protests, the holding of one’s breath until one’s face turns blue — you know, the deaf way.

But here’s the thing.  The vast majority of people who watch the YouTube pilot or sign the petition are either deaf people or those who are inclined to be friendly toward the deaf.

So what?  Is it really noteworthy that deaf people support a show about deaf people?

Heck, a lot of deafies would be happy to sit and watch a show about deafies sitting and watching a show.

But our support means nothing to Hollywood. To them, we are a miniscule and insignificant portion of the vast viewing audience.

Marlee’s show has to appeal to the vast masses, not to us.  And what she put together did not pass the test.

She could have said, “Oh well, back to the drawing board,” and fixed the weaknesses, but she chose a different tack.

She is going to prove Hollywood wrong.

The funny thing is that while she continues to beat her dead horse, somebody else could come along and say, “A deaf reality show? What a great idea!” and put together a much better proposal and leave Marlee in the dust wondering what happened.

That’s what can happen when you marry yourself to your ideas and don’t know how to listen to people who know what they are talking about.

Jack Jason Unfriended Me!

Jack Jason

Marlee Matlin’s people have their panties in a twist because I critiqued their new show, “My Deaf Family,” and then posted a summary of their response to my critique.

It has come to this:  Marlee’s interpreter/business manager, Jack Jason, unfriended me on Facebook today.

As I ponder a Facebook world without Jack’s shillings for Marlee, his actions have led me to think about the roles of two very different kinds of people.

The first group will say you did a great job and pat you on the back and send you on your way.

The second group will tell you what you did wrong and how it could be done better.

I belong to the second group.  That is a byproduct of being a journalist.  I was writing editorials 35 years ago and I’ve never really stopped.

Journalists are by nature a progressive group of people.  We want things to get better.  And we don’t have any problem with pointing out how that can be accomplished.

I read the New York Daily News almost every day and they are in your face about making the world a better place.  I appreciate that stance.  I appreciate people with the guts to stand up and say what they think and point out things that aren’t right.

Occasionally those people will pay a price, such as an unfriending on Facebook, but in the long run, the people who point out how things can be done better are the ones who keep society on a constant path toward betterment.

10 Ways to Fix “My Deaf Family”

Marlee Matlin unveiled her new reality TV show My Deaf Family on YouTube this week after failing to sell it to a TV network.

Of course, everyone in the deaf community is competing to see who can kiss Marlee’s backside most fervently, assuring her that the show is the greatest thing since sliced bread and the TV execs are nuts — NUTS!! — to pass on such a wonderful, wonderful show.

That will do wonders for Marlee’s ego, but it won’t make the show any better.  Marlee told the Los Angeles Times that network execs “loved” the show, but if that were true, why did they all turn it down?  If it were that great, someone would have picked it up.  If it even showed potential, someone would have taken a chance and tried to make it better.

Upon watching it for the first time, it was painfully apparent to me why it was rejected.  I’ve watched it a few more times and compiled the following list of 10 ways that Marlee’s people could fix the show so that it could be resubmitted and have a better chance of success.

1.  Make it run the correct amount of time, around 22 minutes.  It’s supposed to be a pilot and it’s only 9 minutes long.  How is that supposed to fit in a half-hour time slot?  Frankly, I’m skeptical that they can come up with enough ideas to fill a full season and here they can’t even fill up the first episode!

2.  Add titles at the beginning and credits at the end.  The show jumps right in with no indication of what it is, and ends the same way.  It looks sloppy and half-baked without titles and credits, which is only something that every other TV show in existence has.  And by the way, when the family finishes signing “My Deaf Family” at the start of the show, it kind of looks like they’re all giving us the finger.

3.  Make better use of Marlee Matlin.  It was bizarre when suddenly Marlee showed up a third of the way through the program, asking the dad a question that made no sense:  “What was your parents’ reaction?”  Huh?  What?  Where did she come from?  No worries, she was soon gone, but not before she registered shock — SHOCK!! — that dad didn’t learn sign language until middle school.  What’s so odd about that?  She was later glimpsed in the school bleachers and at the very end she popped up with the family posing outside their home.  They need to decide if she is a part of the show or not.  If so, she should do it right and forget the silly cameos.

4.  Teach Bridgetta Firl how to smile.  She was deadly serious, earnest and humorless throughout the entire program.  Who wants to watch that?  When she talks of how deafness is a gift and how her life is so rich, her entire face looks botoxed.  Aren’t deaf people supposed to be expressive?  Her husband didn’t make much of an impression, either.  Deaf can be fun and funny, but these people came across as deathly dull.  And that’s too bad because there are some really wacky characters in the deaf world.

5.  Who are these people anyway?  This is the pilot and it’s supposed to set up the premise of the show, yet we are left clueless as to what the parents do in life.  Work?  Hobbies?  Anything?  I read in the LA Times that the Firls both work for the California School for the Deaf, Fremont.  Oh, how exciting.  A deaf couple who work at the deaf school.  Never heard that one before ….

6.  Is Jared going to sit there and whine about his parents in every show?  It got tiresome even before this first episode was over.  At one point, he says the deaf community “is just like a unity of suffering.”  Umm .. what?

7.  DO SOMETHING!  The family seems to sit around a lot talking and signing about deaf deaf deaf.  At one point, when Jared is eating pizza with his friends, they suddenly cut to him saying, “I think the worst thing is when people openly show pity.”  Where did that come from??  They can’t just talk about these things, they have to get out there and show it happening.  Go somewhere and show us the people showing the pity, even if it has to be staged a little, just like they do on every other reality show.

8.  Get a better editor.  The show was choppy, as if the scenes were written on index cards and then thrown in the air.  There were so many things that didn’t make sense, like when a car pulls into the driveway and then no one shows up inside.  And there were entirely too many times when the dialogue had nothing to do with what we were seeing on screen.  Toward the end we had to choose between watching little Sabrina fingerspell “I love you a lot” or following dad’s off-screen musings on “deafhood and blackhood and womanhood.”

9.  TV needs excitement and conflict, but the biggest conflict in this episode was about cinnamon rolls.  Reality shows are heavily scripted but this show seemed to forget to set anything up.  At one point it seems there might be a problem with Jared’s friend Kris, who never comes over to visit, but then he shows up and is quickly forgotten.  It feels like they set up the story line for nothing.  Same as when they show Gideon playing basketball with his friends in the street, and nothing comes of it.  Or when they go to a school basketball game and the most exciting thing is when someone makes a basket.

10.  Create a bible for the entire first season.  Maybe Marlee already did this, but I doubt it.  The suits are going to want to know what these people will be doing over the course of an entire season.  God help us if they plan to continue sitting around saying/signing “woe is us.”  This family has to get out of the house and get into some weird and interesting situations.  Marlee and her people need to map this all out in great detail if they hope to convince a network exec to bite.

Ultimately “My Deaf Family” has promise, but it can’t be all about the deafness.  The deaf thing has to be an undercurrent to other, more interesting things.  Most viewers won’t be able to relate to being deaf, so give them something they can relate to.  Show the family doing the same things that hearing people do, though with unique challenges.  (Trying to order at a drive-through is an obvious example.)  Show how things are the same, yet different.

If it’s going to be all deaf, all the time, no one is going to tune in to watch, or listen.

What Ever Happened to Alan Hurwitz?

Remember Alan Hurwitz?  What ever happened to that guy?

It wasn’t long ago that much ballyhoo was made over Alan’s selection as the next president of Gallaudet University.  Last I heard, he was supposed to take the reins on January 1, almost a month ago.  Does anyone know if this has actually happened?

The reason I ask is that I cannot find anything on the Web about Alan in his new role.  I did a search on DeafRead for “hurwitz” and the first six items that popped up, in chronological order, were from The Deaf Sherlock (who frankly seems to be a bit obsessed with Dr. Hurwitz).  The seventh item was a newspaper article from the middle of December, and that’s the last we’ve heard of him.

I did a Google news search and found him mentioned only twice … a January 4 RIT story about the search for his NTID replacement and a January 1 press release from rabble rouser Brian Riley of gallyprotest.org.

Then I went to Gallaudet’s website.  Surely here there would be some acclaim and recognition for a new president who was getting settled in on campus.

A site search turned up a lot of old news (“Hurwitz Named Finalist”) but finally I was able to dig deep and find in the Daily Digest that Alan had given a State of the University speech.  At last!  Some tangible proof that Alan Hurwitz had indeed taken over the reins of Gallaudet.

I can’t help but compare this to a year ago when the USA had a new president and you couldn’t go a day without hearing something about President Obama.  In contrast, Alan Hurwitz got off to an incredibly silent start.  How did that happen?

I contacted Gallaudet’s public relations office for answers.  I wrote:

“I was just wondering if Alan Hurwitz has become president of Gallaudet yet.  It’s been a month since he was supposed to start, yet in all my searching for deaf-related news, nothing has come up about Dr. Hurtwitz being the new leader of Gallaudet.  There was so much news during the selection process, it seems odd now that he has been on the job a month and hasn’t been the subject of any news article.  Maybe you guys should take the initiative and get something out there because I can’t be the only person who wonders if Alan Hurwitz has fallen off the face of the earth …”

So far I have not heard back from them.  Frankly I think Alan is getting gypped.  If you ran an organization that had its own PR department, don’t you think they could make a little noise when you become the president?

My Pics of Deaf People in the News

I went through my photo archives to find pictures I have taken of deaf people who are currently in the news.  Enjoy this slide show that includes pictures of:

– T. Alan Hurwitz, NTID CEO and Gallaudet University president-elect, and his wife Vicki (1991 & 1992)
– Jim DeCaro, NTID’s interim CEO (1998)
– Bob Davila, Gallaudet’s retiring president (1997)
– The late Larry Fleischer of CSUN (2002)
– Matt Hamill, wrestler and subject of upcoming movie (1998)
– Roz Rosen, CSUN/NCOD leader (1992)
– Marlee Matlin (you know who she is) (2009)
– The late Marcella M. Meyer of GLAD (1997)

My Email to California

The state of California has been running an ad for quite some time that is designed to make people want to visit the state.  The ad features numerous locations and several famous people, including Gov. Schwarzenegger.  Of course, the ad is not closed-captioned, cuz who can be bothered providing accessibility to us pesky deaf people?  Here’s the email I just sent them:

Hello California …

Well, I just saw your TV commercial again and it is still not closed-captioned for viewers with hearing loss.

I can’t figure out why you go to so much trouble to make your ads and pay to air them, and yet you can’t be bothered to make the tiny effort required to add closed-captioning so that deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers like myself can understand them.

Closed-captioning is nothing new, it has been around for almost 30 years and it costs only about $200 to caption an ad.  Since 1 out of 10 Americans has a hearing loss, it makes no sense why you are being so ignorant and insensitive.

Forcing non-captioned commercials upon viewers with hearing loss is like telling black people to sit in the back of the bus.  It is discriminatory, it is wrong, and it must end now!!

Please reply to this note.  I want answers!!

Tom Willard

The Mets Get What They Deserve

You may recall that I wrote a few earlier posts about the New York Mets and their refusal to caption their baseball games on Sportsnet New York (SNY).  During the past season, the Mets finally began captioning their games but did it in the most minimal way possible .. i.e. pregame and postgame reports were never captioned.  No matter, the Mets lost me as a fan two years ago after 40 years of dedication.  Anyway, I just fired off an email to SNY (with a CC to the Mets and to Neil Best at Newsday, who wrote about the captioning situation) and here it is for your enjoyment:

SNY:

The Yankees parade is currently being shown on both SNY and YES and as usual the programming is closed-captioned on YES and not closed-captioned on SNY.

Do you people ever get tired of being so freaking lazy and cheap?

I just want to let you know that on March 16, 2010, your four-year-new-station FCC exemption on closed-captioning will expire.  I have already put it on my calendar and I plan to watch your station all day that day and file separate complaints with the FCC for each and every show you dare to air without closed-captions.

You have been warned !!!!

PS … The Yankees have always been good with closed-captioning and the Mets have always been awful.  The Yankees are enjoying a ticker tape parade today while the Mets are home watching on TV.  Coincidence?  I doubt it.  The Yankees are classy, the Mets suck.

Tom Willard
Editor, Deafweekly
www.deafweekly.com
Rochester, NY