Where are the deaf militants/absolutionist??

 After following closely the Gallaudet crisis from afar, through blogs and vlogs, I have noticed many strange things about how people deal with things. More specifically, I refer to how Jane F. took offense to the “not deaf enough” issue and IJK’s op-ed on “Deaf absolutists.” 

First, I will talk about Jane. If she were so comfortable being a Deaf individual working at the leading Liberal Arts University for the Deaf, Why would she feel the need to defend herself that she is Deaf enough? If for whatever reason, someone said I was not Deaf enough, I would laugh it off and not even bother to answer it. On resume, my involvement with the Deaf community may be a lot shorter than Jane’s resume. I am simply comfortable with deaf people in any setting; I do not feel the need to justify myself at all nor do I need the feel to address it. There is a major responsibility to represent the best of the University as an employee, especially the position of the provost or the president-select.  Painting the worst picture of the Deaf community to the mass media is deplorable, and caused many people to believe that “Deaf militants” were on the rise or always existed. 

Let us fast-forward to IJK’s editorial; he said we must not give in to the absolutists. IJK goes as far as to say the absolutists are a small but vocal group. Why is IJK going after these so-called absolutists? It seems ironic that a college president would narrow his scope to one small group, as if they have all the power. I find it puzzling IKJ talks about the deaf community, but not a group on campus. Is IKJ giving credit to the deaf community in the sense that they have tremendous power and influence on a college campus? He claims to be a positive spokesperson, so why didn’t his 18 years of being a positive spokesperson do him any good?  

If Jane and IJK were individuals secure in the deaf world, they would never worry about being deaf enough or about deaf militants, if there were any. If Gallaudet was not inclusive enough, which seems to be the sound bite for both Jane and IJK, so what has IJK been doing about it for 18 years?   

The president of the U.S does not waste any time talking to extremists on the political spectrum, especially when they are such a small minority. Suppose Bush writes, “If we give in to the absolutists, the future will not look good.” Everyone will be puzzled and wonder why this small group is even being mentioned at all. Perhaps, we have delved into the psyche of Jane and IKJ. No person of any ethnic group would be intimidated if one person had a longer ethnic lineage than they had, or was more involved in the culture. People who are intimidated by Deaf people with a strong deaf or ASL background are creating a myth that is harmful to the Deaf community. Personally, I do not even know who qualifies as an absolutist or deaf militant, but I would have the power to make others think that I am one to my advantage. This happens in sports all the time, there is a perceived black superiority in basketball, football, and track. There is no biological fact that blacks are better athletes. Consider this argument; if white people captured all the slow black people in Africa, then shouldn’t all the fastest black people still be in Africa because they managed to escape from white people? The strong cultural emphasis on sports, especially prevalent in basketball and football, drives many inner-city kids to excel. Because football and basketball are the highest profile sports, many inner city kids dream of a way out and know they can make millions if they practiced hard. The best ping-pong players may be from because of their strong cultural emphasis on the sport. Lately, in world basketball championship, white dominated teams have won the gold medal. Therefore, many white people in America do not want to play basketball because they are intimidated and feel inferior to black athletes. This is the same for many deaf people, and seemingly prevalent in Jane and IKJ. They are intimidated and feel inferior to individuals who seemingly possess the “mythical” deaf power, thus feel threatened. If I went to and stereotyped everyone as a fanatic, I have already given them power over me and will have given up an even negotiating field with Iraqis. My mindset will be of defensiveness and hostility in dealing with Iraqis. I suspect the same happened with IJK and Jane, and they simply lost touch with the rest of the university.  

It is the few misguided individuals, even if they are deaf, in higher positions that do the most damage. Because of their counterproductive attitudes about their own selves and the pseudo-threats, they feel from people with a strong cultural background. Why does people with strong cultural ties have to be viewed as a threat is beyond my comprehension. Sadly, to the rest of the world, Jane and IJK are misinforming people that deaf people are absolutists. I have not heard one positive categorization about the deaf community from either one of them in a long time, and it remains to be seen if they will continue the good fight for the deaf world, and face these mythological deaf absolutists, wherever they are, repeatedly without being subservient in intimidation. Perhaps this is why Ryan Commerson was quickly arrested when Jane was announced as the next president, and that means IKJ gave Ryan too much power because of his own fears. 

I will end this with a thought provoking statement and question. So many deaf people mythologize Hard of Hearing folks, thinking they have more power and thus they end up resenting them for whatever reason. The reverse occurs, but we cannot afford individuals, deaf or not, in high positions jump in and lead people when they do not truly understand and accept people from within. Does this mean that DPN failed; surely, we cannot be content in just getting any person with a hearing loss as president who in the end seemed to crash and burn within the deaf community.