I also think he’s right, by the way.

“Jordan said the protests over the selection of an unpopular provost as the university’s next president were sparked by people who wanted the school to be a place apart, a center of deaf culture dominated by American Sign Language. “I believe strongly that if we give in now to the ‘absolutists,’ ” Jordan wrote to the board in November, urging a more inclusive view, “that the future of Gallaudet is threatened.”"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....121_2.html

I started to do that when I wrote “And to boot: that isn’t even Scrooge’s beef. His problem with Santa is not that there’s a labor dispute down at the workshop, but that the bad press is hurting business.” In other words, non-Deaf people could care less what was causing the unrest, just that it was distracting them from their idealized, ingrained view of Deaf people.

Thank you for elaborating. It’s an extremely salient point.

Imagine, instead, the mother said to the daughter, “Well, the behavior certainly didn’t endear ladies to the men,” would anyone admit to the following, “Right there at the table with her, I acquiesced”? I would not tell women to be mindful of how men perceive their battles, including even those of infighting. Ditto for blacks and gays. And we deaf people shouldn’t feel shamed into becoming a league of apologists, either.

We can and need to effect attitude and thought change. Taking a page from these other minorities, we should do it through celebration and the arts. We need filmmakers, writers, performers. We need parades. And yes, we need DPHH and deaf coffee nights. I love this blogsite.

But, Allison, you speak a truth. Nobody should go through life disregarding perception. The perception of the overwhelming majority out there stings me. What everyone should remember is that it has always stung, even before the Gallaudet protests. I tell myself this DeafDC blog is populated almost wholly by socially underdeveloped HoH nerds who are thus most susceptible to barbs like that elf cartoon. To everyone here who still go, “I worry about the protests for what their legacy might do to me,” I say to them: Toughen up. Especially in the face of satire; examination is necessary, and the more unforgiving the better.

Until we are no longer compelled to say “Well, it’s those other deaf people” with that feigned ambassadorial attitude but instead say, “Yeah, I heard about it too, I’ve been talking about it with my other deaf friends,” I will unflaggingly pride myself in my community, warts and scars, and try give strength and confidence to others who find themselves wanting.

My brother once said to me a long time ago, “Why am I being taken advantage of, not you, by hearing people or audists? Don’t they appreciate it that I’m not like you?” It broke my heart and he is right. I could easily be like him and many other deaf people without claws and fangs, but I saw many things wrong early on.

What bothers me a great deal is about hearing people being afraid of us. Who has been oppressed all those years? Deaf people. Who has to live in the hearing world? Deaf people. Who has to deal with all those issues imposed on them? Deaf people. Hearing people have the luxury of many things at their fingertip while we have to fight.

Thanks for your great post!

I also have hearing parents who didn’t understand the protest and its complex issues…as well as some hearing friends.

The small and simplified opinions really were a result of the Gallaudet PR machine and Fernandes’ infamous “not deaf enough” remark.

The truth is that, we need a Deaf media…sort of like Al Jazzera. Right now, all we have is deafread.com and the blogs. This is enough in itself to inform the deaf community, but not enough to influence opinions outside of the deaf community.

One thing I was appaled by during the protest was the number of opinions I read that came from hearing people that had nothing to do with deaf culture. I do not see white people in the media offering up opinions about the African American community.

Screw Em’, we are on our own now. We control our fate as deaf people now. We can’t care about what they think anymore. It has to be all abot us now and we have been marginalized too long because we have been “nice”..it’s time to grow some claws and fangs like other minority groups have.

With the new congress sworn in with a brand new majority in the mix, I wish Dr Davilia and Gallaudet well.

And then it was not “man enough” (because she was a woman) and then not “white/black enough” (because she had a hispanic name). Nowhere was the real issue admitted to– that she wasn’t competent enough, even though her actions in response to the protest showed it richly for those who understand what real leadership is. Unfortunately, based on the country’s politics, understanding of leadership is at a low.