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> would go a long way to making it hard for deaf people to communicate with each other or form their own communities outside of hearing spaces. True. > One of

by zepto 5y ago

> would go a long way to making it hard for deaf people to communicate with each other or form their own communities outside of hearing spaces. True. > One of the first things you do if you want to integrate a community or break up a culture is you invalidate their language. This is affirming the consequent once again. You assume the goal is to break up a culture, and claim this is a tactic for that purpose, but that doesn’t actually tell us this is the intention. As a counterpoint, it is hard for autistic people to get accommodations in workplaces especially without strong legal support. Is this because bosses ‘want to break up a culture’? I would say not. I would say it’s because management culture has a ludicrously simplistic idea of what humans are in general, and what I’d like to think are false beliefs about cost/benefit of making accommodations.

danShumway 5y ago
Sure, I'll concede that theoretically all of this could happen accidentally. I'm not sure that changes much about the experience of the communities it's happening to though. Bell could have had perfectly innocent reasons for making it harder for people to learn sign language, but the end result still kind of ends up being the same, and it seems reasonable to me for people in those communities who do feel isolated to push back and to argue that they have a right to exist and that they aren't being given full voices[0]. ---- [0]: no pun intended with the deaf community, except yes pun sort of intended because sign language itself can be described as a voice that allows deaf people to more easily communicate and advocate for themselves, and I think that labeling is kind of accurate. So pun partially intended.
- zepto 5y ago
  I don’t think it helps to call the reasons ‘innocent’. Your description of Bell makes him sound like a eugenicist. Most people wouldn’t regard that as particularly innocent today. I think it matters a lot whether communities have the wrong idea of why things are happening to them, and what other people’s intentions are. It seems profoundly disempowering to not have this understanding. I understand that you don’t.
  - mbilokonsky 5y ago
    If someone is stepping on my face it doesn't much matter to me if they're doing it on purpose or if they just don't realize I'm there -- the goal is to make them stop stepping on my face. What you're describing is a very privileged perspective that doesn't really map cleanly to many peoples' lived experience. It's not the case that I need to check whether the person stepping on my face really means to hurt me or not -- it may be the case that I need to object to the entire system that makes it easy for others to step on my face. Of COURSE the face-steppers would rush to assure me that nobody means me any harm, it's just how the world works, etc. Why on earth would that matter to me?
    - zepto 5y ago
      Nobody is stepping on anyone’s face and privilege is not a prerequisite for clear thinking. I really don’t know why you insist on portraying people as cartoon victims, whether we are talking about autistic people or deaf people. There is no justification for assuming that an autistic person or a deaf person is either incapable or uninterested in reasoning about people’s motivations. This is especially true when we are being harmed. Many autistic people have excellent systematizing skills, and as you have yourself taken pains to point out - no deficits when it comes to understanding other people. Once again you seem to have anointed yourself speaker for large groups of people who you know little about. This time to claim that they cannot think for themselves because their faces are being stepped on. We here now are just having a discussion. This is also something many deaf and many autistic people can do. Acting as if someone is stepping on your face during a discussion is not going to lead you to any good conclusions.
      - danShumway 5y ago
        > Nobody is stepping on anyone’s face I mean, this just isn't true though, Bell was hurting people. I don't think these communities are making this stuff up; oppression is real. I also don't think anyone is saying you personally are stepping on people's faces, what people like me are saying is that discrimination and anti-community policies/actions against disabled communities exist. I'm not sure why that statement is controversial. Bell was advocating for eugenics. I actually don't think he got up in the morning and thought he was doing something bad, I think he probably thought he was trying to help deaf people. But he was doing something bad, he was contributing to deaf cultural suppression and advocating for eugenics. Separating people's actions from their intentions can be good, but only if we don't allow the intentions to completely override their actions. And I've read enough accounts of people who have gone through BMT to know that there is actual harm that's happening around these communities, they're not making it up. > to claim that they cannot think for themselves because their faces are being stepped on. I think you might possibly be reading some intentions into the author that aren't there. No one is claiming this, it's your own leap of logic. People are pointing out there there are policies (intentional or not) that suppress communities and hurt people. GP isn't saying you're part of those policies, nor are they saying they speak for everyone about what that oppression looks like, the comment you're replying to never uses the words "we" or "us", only "I" and "me". This seems relatively uncontroversial to me. We can agree that suppressing sign language or performing electroshock therapy on autistic kids is wrong -- regardless of what anyone's intentions are.

by zepto 5y ago

danShumway 5y ago

Sure, I'll concede that theoretically all of this could happen accidentally. I'm not sure that changes much about the experience of the communities it's happening to though. Bell could have had perfectly innocent reasons for making it harder for people to learn sign language, but the end result still kind of ends up being the same, and it seems reasonable to me for people in those communities who do feel isolated to push back and to argue that they have a right to exist and that they aren't being given full voices[0]. ---- [0]: no pun intended with the deaf community, except yes pun sort of intended because sign language itself can be described as a voice that allows deaf people to more easily communicate and advocate for themselves, and I think that labeling is kind of accurate. So pun partially intended.

zepto 5y ago
I don’t think it helps to call the reasons ‘innocent’. Your description of Bell makes him sound like a eugenicist. Most people wouldn’t regard that as particularly innocent today. I think it matters a lot whether communities have the wrong idea of why things are happening to them, and what other people’s intentions are. It seems profoundly disempowering to not have this understanding. I understand that you don’t.
- mbilokonsky 5y ago
  If someone is stepping on my face it doesn't much matter to me if they're doing it on purpose or if they just don't realize I'm there -- the goal is to make them stop stepping on my face. What you're describing is a very privileged perspective that doesn't really map cleanly to many peoples' lived experience. It's not the case that I need to check whether the person stepping on my face really means to hurt me or not -- it may be the case that I need to object to the entire system that makes it easy for others to step on my face. Of COURSE the face-steppers would rush to assure me that nobody means me any harm, it's just how the world works, etc. Why on earth would that matter to me?
  - zepto 5y ago
    Nobody is stepping on anyone’s face and privilege is not a prerequisite for clear thinking. I really don’t know why you insist on portraying people as cartoon victims, whether we are talking about autistic people or deaf people. There is no justification for assuming that an autistic person or a deaf person is either incapable or uninterested in reasoning about people’s motivations. This is especially true when we are being harmed. Many autistic people have excellent systematizing skills, and as you have yourself taken pains to point out - no deficits when it comes to understanding other people. Once again you seem to have anointed yourself speaker for large groups of people who you know little about. This time to claim that they cannot think for themselves because their faces are being stepped on. We here now are just having a discussion. This is also something many deaf and many autistic people can do. Acting as if someone is stepping on your face during a discussion is not going to lead you to any good conclusions.
    - danShumway 5y ago
      > Nobody is stepping on anyone’s face I mean, this just isn't true though, Bell was hurting people. I don't think these communities are making this stuff up; oppression is real. I also don't think anyone is saying you personally are stepping on people's faces, what people like me are saying is that discrimination and anti-community policies/actions against disabled communities exist. I'm not sure why that statement is controversial. Bell was advocating for eugenics. I actually don't think he got up in the morning and thought he was doing something bad, I think he probably thought he was trying to help deaf people. But he was doing something bad, he was contributing to deaf cultural suppression and advocating for eugenics. Separating people's actions from their intentions can be good, but only if we don't allow the intentions to completely override their actions. And I've read enough accounts of people who have gone through BMT to know that there is actual harm that's happening around these communities, they're not making it up. > to claim that they cannot think for themselves because their faces are being stepped on. I think you might possibly be reading some intentions into the author that aren't there. No one is claiming this, it's your own leap of logic. People are pointing out there there are policies (intentional or not) that suppress communities and hurt people. GP isn't saying you're part of those policies, nor are they saying they speak for everyone about what that oppression looks like, the comment you're replying to never uses the words "we" or "us", only "I" and "me". This seems relatively uncontroversial to me. We can agree that suppressing sign language or performing electroshock therapy on autistic kids is wrong -- regardless of what anyone's intentions are.