I don't understand you're point of view on this implant thing. How is being deaf not a disability or a hindrance? Parents I believe do this because they want to give their children the best life possible, and I do believe that they are doing this. You're twisting the issue and saying that parents want their kids to be like them, and then you're going on to attack them for that. You sound like those people who also believe they shouldn't tell the baby's gender to people so it can decide itself.
YAY IGNORANCE!!!!
Being Deaf isn’t a disability because Deaf people can do everything we can, save hear. They have a language, that they developed themselves, that is just as complex, if not more so than, as spoken English. It’s not iconic; they aren’t gestures, and it’s not broken English. They have art and poetry and theatre and creative outlets just like we do.
A hearing baby in a hearing family is a hearing individual who knows who they are without a doubt because they have adult role models that they can look to. Deaf children in Deaf families with Deaf parents/adults have this, too. It’s their Deaf identity; they have a community and a support system, a language, a connection. Put a Deaf child in a hearing family, and automatically there’s “something wrong with them.” They don’t have support. They have criticism, people trying to change them, people telling them that they were born wrong. It’s saddening. They grow up hearing that they’re a mistake, then they grow to believe it. They don’t grow up with Deaf adult role models, successful role models, and they don’t see their own potential.
Within their language, there is vocabulary, grammar, syntax, everything that is needed to be a full fledged language; and it’s natural. It occurred and developed naturally and is acquired naturally. And actually if you look, there are programs to teach hearing babies signs to make communication easier in the first years. Why is this? Because every human, hearing or not, is capable of language acquisition and signing is easier than talking. On average, Deaf babies start acquiring language 3-5 months earlier than hearing babies start acquiring English. Think about it; it’s unnatural to teach someone to talk and teach them English when they can’t hear it. All humans, however, can learn to sign.
How can you justify cutting open your own baby’s brain and implanting something artificial in their brain? How can you make that choice for them? They are entitled to choose who and what they want to be.
I’ve met Deaf adults who were implanted. All of their CIs disintegrated and stopped working, and now they’re stuck with a lump of metal and plastic and wires in their heads that do nothing. When you think of that; how does it make sense? You implant your child, it works, they learn English and never learn to sign, and then the implant dies. Your child is left in silence that they’ve forgotten, and then what? What language do they have to naturally express themselves when they’ve lost the ability to artificially hear themselves? They will lose their articulation and have to learn, late in life, their own language.
I said that parents want their child to be like them. I shall explain. When hearing parents give birth to a Deaf child, they don’t know what to do. They turn to doctors, who are also hearing, who tell them, “I’m sorry,” “I have bad news,” “diagnosis is.” All these negative lexical items. The only option they give, most of the time, is implanting the child. There is nothing said about Deaf schools, ASL, support groups for others with Deaf children. There is only implanting, and subsequently oralism programs.
If it’s not the doctors, it IS the parents. Parents who know both sides but still choose implants because they think they are helping, they are too lazy to learn ASL and take that journey with their child, or they want a hearing child. Two of three are selfish. Learn ASL. Take that journey; embrace your child’s uniqueness.
To address your last ignorant statement, I do in fact believe that a child’s gender should also be their choice. Who’s to say that just because you have a penis you are a boy? Or on the flip, that a vagina makes you a girl?
Every human being is entitled to live their life they way they want to live it. As a boy, a girl, hearing, Deaf, whatever. Just because parents give birth to a baby, doesn’t mean they can play God with that child’s life.
Mind you; this is just the ramblings of a hearing girl studying to be an ASL interpreter.
TL;DR you’re ignorant and I can’t help you.
Danni. Nerd. Fangirl. Nudity. Humor. Sex. 