medical industrial complex

"here are more failures than success stories with CIs, the industry buries these failures and builds up the success stories, giving hearing parents everywhere the idea that a CI surgery will make their child hearing. It doesn't. Hearing parents of deaf babies are innocent people being preyed on by the CI industry, using their fear of the unknown to promote surgeries and methods that have been time and time again proven NOT to work. If a child gets a CI surgery, but ALSO has full access to ASL and visual communication, that would be wonderful. I know a few deaf couples who decided to implant their deaf child while giving them access to ASL and I think it's wonderful. Unfortunately, the majority don't do this. They decide to normalize their child in every way possible, denying them access to ASL and the deaf community and culture. As a result, these children grow up with significant cognitive delays, limited social opportunities, and ostracized by their peers. You know me, I went to hearing schools all my life because I was hard of hearing and I could function fairly well in that environment. When I got to high school I started feeling the effects of my limited hearing abilities. I would avoid large groups because I'd always be lost in the conversation. I avoided raising my hand in class because a few times I repeated what others had already said because I couldn't hear them. Now that I'm older and my hearing is getting worse, I'm so grateful that I grew up knowing ASL and involved in the deaf community. Otherwise I'd be a very lonely person right now. At the end of the day, even with a CI, that child is still deaf. There will never be a 100% fix for it. There are people who are fighting hard to prevent deaf children from learning ASL, joining the deaf community, and acquiring deaf culture. It's a crime against humanity because in the long run, the child suffers irreparable damage, not only to their ears, but to their social, emotional and intellectual well being."-Vivienne Schroeder

Appreciating Beauty or Objectifying Women?

In the days since this experience, I have thought a lot about it.  Why did I, someone committed to the antithesis of this reality, participate in the way I did?  Why did I not question the situation or the language used by the men there?  Another thing that really has stuck with me is that the women in this space had bodies that were probably the closest to the unhealthy standard of beauty that our society has constructed that I have seen in a long time, and it left me wondering, a standard to which I am sadly attracted.  Is this healthy for them?

I can’t say for sure and I can’t judge because undoubtedly there are infinite numbers of body types and I am not a woman, but I imagine that it could be unhealthy in a few ways.  To achieve this body type, I imagine many women would need to pursue one of two unhealthy courses.  First, they could eat very little while toning their bodies through exercise, thus depriving their body of nutrients and calories that are needed for everyday functions.  Second, they could eat relatively normally but work out so regularly that it could become an unhealthy obsession, working out every day to the point that it is no longer healthy emotionally or psychologically (even if their bodies are rather healthy).

http://changefromwithin.org/2010/08/04/appreciating-beauty-or-objectifying-women/

Outcomes of cochlear implantation in deaf children of deaf parents

OBJECTIVE: This retrospective study compared the cochlear implantation outcomes of first- and second-generation deaf children.

METHODS: The study group consisted of seven deaf, cochlear-implanted children with deaf parents. An equal number of deaf children with normal-hearing parents were selected by matched sampling as a reference group. Participants were matched based on onset and severity of deafness, duration of deafness, age at cochlear implantation, duration of cochlear implantation, gender, and cochlear implant model. We used the Persian Auditory Perception Test for the Hearing Impaired, the Speech Intelligibility Rating scale, and the Sentence Imitation Test, in order to measure participants' speech perception, speech production and language development, respectively.

RESULTS: Both groups of children showed auditory and speech development. However, the second-generation deaf children (i.e. deaf children of deaf parents) exceeded the cochlear implantation performance of the deaf children with hearing parents.

CONCLUSION: This study confirms that second-generation deaf children exceed deaf children of hearing parents in terms of cochlear implantation performance. Encouraging deaf children to communicate in sign language from a very early age, before cochlear implantation, appears to improve their ability to learn spoken language after cochlear implantation.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/22906641/

Hey White Liberals

"Your constant prioritization of the lives of white people over the lives of people of color is taking a serious toll on my psyche and those of many in my community. And by that I don't mean what you might expect. Most of us already know that racism and its BFF white privilege have detrimental effects on people of color. Racial oppression leads to any number of unhealthy conditions, including high blood pressure, depression, heart disease, diabetes and even asthma. But what I’m talking about is something different. Something I’m going to call DSWP: desensitization to the suffering of white people."

http://blackgirldangerous.org/new-blog/2013/4/22/hey-white-liberals

ASL - research

This disagreement over the best approach for educating deaf students is not simply a discussion over which language or code is best to use, but rather it represents profound, and often polarized, differences in educational philosophy. That is, specific educational methods are grounded in, and driven by, the philosophy, or metatheory, one subscribes to. Metatheory refers to a way of thinking or a viewpoint about issues (Baars, 1986; Bunge & Ardila, 1987; cited in Paul & Jackson, 1993). The current conflict in deaf education, at the metatheory level, is between the clinical-pathological model (hereafter referred to as the clinical model) and the cultural model. The clinical model represents one point of view, namely, a view in which deafness is characterized as a disability stemming from a biological deficit (i.e., a lack of hearing). Thus, educational goals focus on overcoming, or compensating for, hearing loss so that students can learn to speak, read, and write English. Educational methods used to accomplish this goal include amplification, speech reading, and representing English on the hands (i.e., manually coded English).

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/article/Exceptional-Children/21053234.html

Introvertness

• They are very, very good at entertaining themselves for long periods.
• Seems exhausted after parties or social gatherings. Needs down time.
• They have one or two close friends and don’t feel the need for more.
• You have to pry information out of them, such as how their day was or if they had a good time at their friend’s house.
• They have a very highly developed sense of personal space and are disturbed when it is not respected.
• They are a very private person.
• They do not like to have to participate in classroom discussions or be called upon for an answer.
• Hate making mistakes in public.
• Enjoys their own company.
• Does not understand the need for small talk.
• Tires easily in large groups or crowds.
• Tends to withdraw from large social gatherings.

http://www.wired.com/geekmom/2011/04/are-you-raising-an-introvert/

You Become an Anti-Racist Feminist

"You find a community of like-minded people who call themselves white, anti-racists, which intimidates you, but intrigues you. You remember Gloria Anzaldúa, bell hooks, Audre Lorde. They whispered poetry into your memories and compelled you to do better.

You are amazed at the collective humility of this group. This group of white people who talk about race. There are deep pauses in their group conversations. They all are thinking and hearing and reaching outwards. You take their workshop. You join their cause."

http://thefeministwire.com/2013/04/you-become-an-anti-racist-feminist/