Chase

Irony: One of my pet peeves is just meeting someone (for instance a sales clerk asking to help me or a washing machine repairman comi ng into my house) that I'm deaf. Before I can finish, I get flashed that vapid thumbs-up sign (above). Somestimes I ask, "Ten what?"

Aqua, I agree with Travis that painting all hearies with the same brush is unfair. It's also unfair to assume all people with some degree of deafness are members of the deaf community. I attended ONE local meeting of SHHH and found nothing in common with them. No one signed (except fluttering hands like that was supposed to help understanding while they yelled at each other). Everyone spoke fairly well (except for the yelling). The big complaints circling the room were about horrible cafeteria noises picked up by their hearing aids and that too many people complained about their loud radios and TVs.

I think why some use "hearies" as an all-inclusive term is that even hearies who claim to be sympathetic sometimes just don't understand the vast diversity among deafies.

Some are frustrated because we don't all use the same signs . . . or for that matter, the same sign language.

Some want us all to immediately get cochlear implants, forget all signing, and learn to talk.

Some wonder why we all can't speech-read like stereotypical super-deafie in movies and on TV.

Some wonder why many who sign ASL "write so funny."

Sometimes we're just an annoyance, something to roll eyes at . . . like when we want "them stoopid words" on the TV that get in the way.

It's a long list, so many of us wrongly stereotype hearies just like they stereotype us.