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In my previous vlog, "Are Deaf people meant to be here on Earth?",
a Hearing person made a comment.
But it must be noted that this person has Cerebral Palsy. He said:
that he's noticed throughout history, there has always been a certain percentage of handicapped people
that has been consistent throughout time.
I got to wondering about him and his perspective.
so I asked him, "if tomorrow, you could have a cure and not have CP anymore, would you accept it?"
His response was "what for? CP is who I am and what made me who I am? Why would I want a cure?"
He added "I know many CP people who feel similarly to me
who don't want to be changed, they don't want a cure.
and many of us are sick of the "professionals" who look down on us as "retarded"
and we roll our eyes at that!"
I thought "Wow! This is very interesting!"
I've long been resistant to the idea of working with different handicapped groups
since I thought they were more aligned with the idea of mainstreaming and assimilating into the Hearing world.
But now looking back on a book I read, "No Pity" by Joseph Shapiro,
he makes a point that handicapped groups don't seem to have a culture,
but they have been developing a sense of identity and pride in being part of their specific disability group.
Maybe now it's time for us Deaf to start thinking about, seriously considering,
working with these disability groups
and working with them to help us to advance our agenda.
It's likely that these groups will not understand our culture argument,
but they CAN understand the idea of a group's wanting self-determination
and not wanting a cure or to be changed from outside of the group,
and definitely not to try to "fix" the children!
They don't want children to be "fixed", either.
They want them to have that option to be able to decide for themselves.
Just like us Deaf.
I think it's worth considering.