Laurent, SD

Scott Hardie | July 31, 2005
In rural South Dakota, an entrepreneur is building a town exclusively for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. (link)

For years I've been intrigued by the idea of so-called deaf culture, because I simply don't understand it. Racial and ethnic communities I can understand because homeland traditions are difficult to preserve outside of them, but how is deaf culture anything but a vague subset of the existing national culture? What really sets it apart? This article, while more in-depth than the traditional AP human-interest story, doesn't do much to answer the question, other than explaining that deaf people are frustrated not to be understood when communicating, and as such face prejudices.

Maybe I need to be deaf to get it. My own experience is being overweight: Us fat folks experience plenty of prejudice, and nobody understands what we go through unless they themselves are fat. It would be nice to live in a town built for our size, with wider aisles and sturdier benches and bigger booths in restaurants. It would also be great to build some political clout, such as using legislation to pressure/force airlines to widen their sardine-can seats. But seriously, a whole town just for us? That's not even remotely necessary. We're just as capable of shopping in ordinary stores as fat-enabled stores, and except for the occasional jerk we're just as capable of talking to our thin neighbors as our fat ones. We don't need to see fat comedians in order to laugh because "they understand what we're going through." Unlike ethnicity, anyone can become fat and there's nothing about being fat worth preserving, so why should we build ourselves a fat community? I am equally perplexed at the concepts of deaf culture and deaf community. Can anyone enlighten me?

Amy Austin | October 21, 2005
I guess nobody can enlighten you on this one, Scott... but to add a little bit of "What, The, Fuck?" to that query, I submit this (from 2002 -- not recent, although I am only the slightest bit curious for a follow-up):

(link)

(I don't blame anyone who doesn't read the whole thing, word for word -- I found it to be exceedingly long, and I only skimmed it myself -- so I will sum up the gist for you here: apparently lesbian couple, one of whom is deaf, deliberately sought out deaf sperm donor for the deaf partner's pregnancy of their child... because they wanted to increase the chances of a deaf child. Un-fucking-believable.)

Lori Lancaster | October 21, 2005
[hidden by request]

Amy Austin | October 21, 2005
If my parents had ever done anything like that (breeding in a "genetic defect") I'd have been angry with them my whole life.

That was exactly the thought I had, Lori... but as for the rest of it, here's what I think is a better question: if you wanted a deaf child so badly, then why don't you fucking *adopt* one?!?! I'm sure there's a deaf orphan somewhere needing a good home. My estimation of this couple as being a "good home" is questionable, however... I totally agree that these are selfish parents. Did you happen to notice the extra kick in the pants of what they *both* do for a living? Mental health professionals??? I'm not sure if they've been hanging around too many nut-crackers or too many nut-jobs... but I find it just a little bit scary that they are on the business end of that demographic! It's rather like they're conducting a little social experiment in genetics with their own kid -- I think it's just sick.

Scott Hardie | October 22, 2005
I'm also appalled, but let's bear in mind that these women don't consider deafness to be a defect. After all, many people consider homosexuality to be a genetic flaw – everyone knows the breadth of my support for gay rights, but even I have to acknowledge that strictly biologically speaking, homosexuality itself is a defective trait – and yet most of us wouldn't deny these women the right to live together in peace and celebration of their shared "defect." Could we accept them attempting to breed homosexuality into a child? I know I could; the kid's life might be harder for it, but richer too, and besides, it is the parents' choice. Attempting to breed in deafness is not that much further away; we're accustomed to thinking of deafness as a handicap that is caused by physical damage, but to these women, it's a source of enrichment and character just like their sexual preference, not a way to raise a little girl who's "just like Mommy." I would never intentionally breed a kid to be deaf, but ultimately I can't bring myself to judge these women for it any more than I could judge them for aborting a baby; it's their decision and I wouldn't want them judging me for my decisions.

And yet I still don't understand deaf culture. :-)

In other deaf news: There's a documentary out called "Touch the Sound" about deaf drummer Evelyn Glennie. It's generating controversy because the director refuses to release it with subtitles, claiming that the text on the screen mars his visual composition, but his decision prevents the audience most interested in seeing it from getting anything out of it. I haven't seen the film and I have a sneaking suspicion that the director has some basis for his decision, but I'm still wondering if maybe the budget wasn't so small that they couldn't release two versions of it, or produce a handful of prints with subtitles and ship them around the country on a tour. If there truly is a deaf community across the nation, they'll let each other know to turn out for it.

Amy Austin | October 26, 2005
I've been working up the energy to respond to your comment, Scott... as with most "real issues" we discuss here, things are obviously way more complex than they seem on the surface, and crafting a statement of opinion that honors that can be quite difficult and draining. So... where to start?

Well, to take your point of homosexuality as a "genetic flaw"... I don't personally think that's true. That isn't to say that I think it's a "normal" thing or a "good" thing, but I'm fairly certain that it isn't proven to be a genetic predisposition... at least, not yet. I mean, if it were, then by its very definition and nature, it should have weeded itself out of the gene pool, and/or homosexuality ought to be at an all-time low, shouldn't it??? Contrary to popular heterosexual belief, homosexuals are not proselytical... nor do they wish to "breed more of their kind". In fact, I firmly believe that most homosexuals -- even while embracing themselves -- view it as a social handicap and undesirable for their children. Furthermore, I don't think it's a consideration for them at all when deciding to procreate, either by surrogacy or sperm donation. And while I am certain that they would not present the obstacles that they themselves may have faced in "coming out", I don't think that most gay parents would be overjoyed to discover that their children were also gay. Therefore, on all of these points, I think that the general majority of opinion would closely resemble that on this issue... as you, Lori, and myself have presented -- that it is at the very least socially, if not morally, wrong to knowingly predispose your offspring to genetic deficiency, perceived or otherwise!

So... is deafness a known congenital trait? Without doing any fact-checking, I believe that yes, it is... and these women clearly seem to think so as well, since they chose the deaf partner and sought a deaf donor in order to facilitate their desire for a deaf child. While it may very well be true that they consider the deafness "a source of enrichment and character", I disagree that their motive isn't "to raise a little girl [or boy] who's 'just like Mommy'" -- I think that it is, in fact, the bulk of the motive... in the same way that people who are having overwhelming difficulty conceiving seek out the help of fertility specialists, regardless of the costs (both financially and genetically speaking), instead of adopting a perfectly healthy child already brought into the world and needing loving parents. These people (by my estimation, anyway) so value themselves and their genetic material that they place (wrongly, I believe) the importance of that above the well-being of their child and the actual beneficence of parenthood. This alone is enough to disgust me.

But... and here's where the difference of opinion on homosexuality vs. deafness as a "genetic flaw" matters: how fair is it -- not only to the child in question, but to the rest of the world -- to purposely perpetuate something that most consider an unfortunate trait? Suppose, for instance, that these women -- despite their efforts to the contrary -- produce a healthy, hearing boy... who then grows up into a man... who then marries a woman who wants 100% healthy children? What are the odds that she will wind up with the deaf child so badly desired by these two -- again, by my own estimation -- selfish women? Of course, you may counter with "but she will have met the in-laws and know of his history and these risks... and presumably, she's okay with it, or she wouldn't have married him" or "why would he marry a woman for whom it was an issue -- she must not be in complete acceptance of his family then!" Well, I contend that you can (and should) have "acceptance" of deaf people without wanting it for your unborn children... it's this level of "super-acceptance" -- as illustrated by the example that started this discussion (although I can find nothing about a town built specifically for the needs of a certain population that is particularly infringing on the rest of the world...) -- or "political correctness", as it's already known, that is just revolting to me.

By now, I think that if anyone knows anything about me from reading my posts, it should be that I am all for the philosophy of "live, and let live" -- I don't really care how others live their lives... inasmuch as it doesn't negatively impact the rest of the world (and obviously, there are varying degrees of this -- because in reality, everyone has *some* impact, no matter how small, on the rest of the world), and I feel pretty strongly that if more people were this way, it would be a good thing. But I guess that everyone has their own ideas about what that acceptable level of impact is and at what point they won't ignore it. Most everyone in the world would agree that murder is unacceptable -- that one is easy -- but then you get into the areas of war, abortion, and capital punishment, and all of a sudden, it isn't so easy. And while it may not carry the same weight as murder, I still think that what these women are doing is reprehensible.

Scott Hardie | November 19, 2005
Well, your thoughtfully prepared comment deserves a good response, probably better than I can muster at 11pm on a Friday night after a hell of a week. :-) But here are my jumbled, disorganized thoughts:

I don't know if homosexuality is genetic either (probably a very recessive trait if so), but there is a lot of research indicating that it is: (link)

Anyway, as to it being a flaw, that's not to say that it's undesireable. Like deafness, it adds character and can enrich a life, depending on the circumstances, even if most people wouldn't want it. Hell, every one of us probably has a genetic flaw that we wouldn't give up; for me it's the fair complexion that sunburns so easily (though I wouldn't mind giving up this humongous gut I'm carrying around, either, thanks to my heritage). If the purpose of every biological organism is procreation, and homosexuality prevents a person from procreating without taking abnormal measures to do so, and it is a trait that deviates from the biological norm, then yeah, it's a flaw. As infuriating as her holier-than-thou hardline stance can often be, I do believe Dr. Laura was unfairly villainized for her remark that homosexuality is a "biological error." She wasn't calling homosexual people errors, only homosexuality itself. Lighten up, folks; blonde hair and blue eyes are biological errors, and nations have committed mass genocide trying to preserve them.

I doubt most gays would want to produce gay kids, either. I was just saying that if this couple bucked that trend and wanted to attempt it, that they probably wouldn't be demonized for it, except possibly in the Weekly World News. (I also doubt they even could breed such a thing on purpose, just as I doubt they actually could breed deafness. But of course we're talking about the principle of the thing, not the fact.)

What I didn't say at the time was that I started out that comment by writing "I'm only playing the devil's advocate here because I really find these women's choice appalling, but..." As I thought about it and wrote and thought about it some more, I gradually lost all inhibition to the idea of two deaf mothers attempting to breed a deaf child. It's not just a matter of live-and-let-live, since I'd want the freedom to breed a little freakishly white-skinned fatso of my own someday. It's that I really do think our society has progressed far enough that deaf people, like gay people, can have their own comfortable corner of it, instead of being treated like defects who don't deserve any consideration for their special needs. It was scarcely a generation ago that this country was made for heterosexual Christian white males, and everybody else had to adapt themselves to fit in. We still have a ways to go, but in today's society you can be somebody else and still belong; there's room for you at the table at last. That's progress, not ruination. So, while I still consider deafness a flaw in a strictly textbook-definition sense, I don't think it constitutes any significant hardship these days, and I can't bring myself to blame mothers who would want to bring a deaf child into the world. (And I still doubt it's because they want a daughter "just like Mommy," but that's speculation on both our parts.)