Reflection: Deaf by Design

What's your favourite pass-time? Perhaps listening to music, chatting with your BFFs over the phone, or simply relaxing by the beach and listen to the beautiful sound of the ocean waves? For many of the things we enjoy in life, we hardly ever give it a second thought - we just take it for granted. But imagine how it would be like if it were taken away from us, and suddenly we couldn't hear anything. Everything's like a silent movie playing over and over again, except to everyone else, it's not. You feel like an outcast, a weakling, disabled. You feel devastated, yet helpless.

However, did you know that some deaf people actually enjoy being deaf? They wouldn't want to hear, even if they could. And even more shockingly, they would wish for a child that also cannot hear, even to the extreme of aborting a hearing child! Yes, I understand that as a parent, they want their child to be more like them, but don't you think that's such a selfish thought? Don't they want their child to experience the world they had never been able to? Do they really want to make their child suffer like how they did? When I watched the parents in the documentary Sound and Fury who refused to let their deaf child receive cochlear implant as she wished, I was outraged. How can they do that to their child? She obviously desired to hear, to experience the many faces of the world. But yet, her parents were so close minded, so selfish. Their defence? They wouldn't know how to educate her if she weren't deaf. Well, it's not like she doesn't know how to sign, nor will she ever forget. She will simply get the best of both worlds. They can still communicate fine with her, so I don't see what's wrong with being able to hear AND sign at the same time.

That's not even the most extreme case. There are actually deaf parents who expressed that they would abort a hearing child because they want to conceive a deaf one. To be honest, I don't even think it's really ethical for hearing parents to abort a deaf child. Maybe I'm the ignorant one here, maybe I'm the one being close minded here. I don't understand the Deaf, and I'll never be able to, unless I become deaf. I don't see being deaf as a lifestyle, as they see it, but I see it as a disability. I see it as a disability that refrains them from fully enjoying life; a barricade for career and marriage. It's too difficult for me to completely understand their point of view, but I do know one thing - if I were to have a deaf child, I would want the best for them (in my opinion), and let them get cochlear implant.

Aww, look how happy she is with her cochlear implant!