Coming out of my class the other day, I saw this advertisement for a California Proposition in which the sign said “Don’t erase race, erase racism”. As I thought about what this meant, the implications for how this applied to Deaf people came to me, which I tell you here.
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(Transcript of video):
I will admit something I will almost never say…. I’m old. I can remember the early days of the Feminist movement. Back then, women would say to men, “That’s sexist!” Men would respond it was no big thing or that it was just a joke or women were taking everything too seriously and to relax. But women kept arguing the point. It was the same thing back during the Civil Rights period, Black people would say to White people “that’s racist, you ofay honky!” White people would deny it and argue why it wasn’t so. But since then, laws have been developed protecting women and Blacks, and there are more definitions of what sexism and racism means, and clearly defined examples of what each are. It all comes from the people who label that behavior, discuss it, and create a common understood definition.
I remember back when I was in Graduate school at Gallaudet — studying School Psychology. I had the opportunity to be involved in a big research project, traveling and helping with the research under a team of researchers. It so happened that there was a woman who was involved with that research team — she was also a student at Gallaudet with me at the same time I was. We’d known each other since we were Freshmen. She was Jewish like me, and I would flirt a little bit with her, when I would see her I would say “Hi cutie!” It was nothing serious — we never dated, I never asked her out, I never touched her, it was just some mild flirting. It was just my “thing” with her — say “Hi cutie!”, we might chat and that was it. But later, she would say “I’m not cute! Cut it out!” I didn’t think she was that mad. So back to that research project — I had the opportunity to go, but when that woman found out my name was on the list, she went to her boss and objected she didn’t want me to go, she “didn’t feel comfortable” with me. So my Department Chair, Skip Williams, who was a dwarf and used crutches to get around, he called me into his office and told me that woman didn’t want me to go, that my behavior made her feel uncomfortable, and that it could be considered “sexual harrassment”. At that time, sexual harrassment was a new concept. I explained that I was not trying to harrass her, it was just mild flirting at worst. The end result was that I couldn’t be involved in the research project. I was mad, and from then on, I never said one other word to her. If I would see her around, I just looked the other way and went about my business. Even today, I still don’t consider what I did to be “sexual harrassment”. But the important thing is that women had set up a definition of what “sexual harrassment” is, and they fleshed out and came to a consensus on it. Laws were codified and protections given to women against it. And it came to be applied against me, whether I agreed with it or not.
Now, some of you say audism has no definitions and you can’t force it on people without that. But the thing is, women started setting up definitions of sexism before laws came into place to enforce those definitions. Same thing with Blacks. They established definitions of racism before the laws were put into place to give protections against racism. From those explanations of racism and sexism, people engaged in a common discourse about those topics, and became aware and enlightened about those topics and the common understanding of these terms were expanded upon with more knowledge and discussion. It’s the same thing with audism. We have to establish a standard understanding of what audism is regardless of whether it is codified into law or not, to start more awareness and understanding and discussion toward enlightenment. And then it WILL get codified into law later.
But if WE don’t establish that “golden standard” now, who will? And when?
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(Transcript of video)
Last week, I announced that audism should not be considered acceptable, and gave Tayler one week to change his “R-list” to include audism within that list. That hasn’t happened. Our society recognizes certain groups as minorities that have been historically oppressed and has created laws establishing protections for these groups against discrimination on the basis of racism, sexism, heterosexism, anti-semitism, ethnicity, and so on. The reason we have these laws is because our society recognizes that everyone has the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” be becoming all that we can be and want to be, without being told that we’re wrong for wanting to be that way.
Businesses recognize and apply policies protecting these groups because they want their customers to feel happy and safe, so that they will come back and buy more of their products.
Audism is all around us. Even a professional journal like the Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education thinks nothing of publishing articles saying Deaf people should want to be like Hearing people, and it is not a problem if Deaf people become Hearing or Deaf culture becomes assimilated into Hearing culture. That is audism. But there are no protections for Deaf people against audism.
DeafRead and DeafVideo.TV are businesses. Tayler set them up as businesses, to earn money, as his goal. That is fine. I applaud him for his entrepeneurship. There is nothing wrong with that. How does he earn money from DR and DVTV as a business? When people go to his sites, this creates “hits”, and the more “hits” these sites get, the more profits he earns. When people post vlogs and blogs that are audist, and people click on those vlogs, Tayler earns profits from those “hits”. Therefore, Tayler is directly profiting from audism.
But Tayler’s business model is a failing business model. Look at DeafRead. It was a thriving place where many vlogs and blogs were posted and a lot of discussion was happening. And now, it’s a virtual “ghost town”. People are basically posting only second-hand information; almost no vlogs or blogs are showing up at DeafRead anymore. We’re now seeing more “walkouts” at DVTV, for basically the same reasons. People are not feeling happy or safe, not able to “be all they can be or want to be without being told they’re wrong for wanting to be that way”, within those particular websites (DR & DVTV).
I have long since been speaking against audism. I have taken a stand against audism. I believe that if you “talk the talk”, you must “walk the walk”. Audism hurts, and it hurts worse when it comes from one of our own. But it hurts worst when one of our own allows it AND profits from it.
That is the reason that I feel I can no longer be involved in DVTV, if audism is allowed to continue. I cannot let someone directly profit from audism. It’s bad enough when Hearing people, like at Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, profit from audism, but we Deaf should not allow it, we should not accept it.
If you know me, you know I don’t like to “quit”. I feel I must continue to fight on. But I don’t feel I am ”quitting”. I will not be involved with DVTV, but I will still be around, through my website www.deafhooddiscourses.com and in YouTube under the username “DrDonGCSUS”. I look forward to continuing the fight against audism and raising Deaf awareness at those sites, but not in DVTV, until the R-list is changed. I will now be asking Tayler to remove my account from DeafRead and DVTV.
I also want to mention that I, and some other Deaf people, have been working for over a year to create a new “aggregator” website where there will be formal rules against racism, sexism, gender, etc., including audism and linguicism. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you exactly when it will be ready; we are still working on a few technical issues. But for now, you can see me and other vloggers on YouTube and their own websites, and keep watching me for the announcement very soon!
