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Media 2002
November
Weekend Australian Article
Language of
love in parents' hands
By Michelle Giglio
The Australian
Elderly not heard
The Australian
Science lends an ear
The Australian
Aboriginal
Children at Risk of Hearing Loss
The Australian
Hearing Loss
September FROM
ENGLAND
Cochlear Protest newspaper article Financial
Review
Don't forget the Deaf- Pay TV
The Age
Song for the Deaf (Not quite what it
really thought to be!!)
August Gloves
that Talk from Science News
http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s654514.htm
Babies babble in
Sign Language (Sept 01)
http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s358940.htm
Bible translated for the deaf
(1999)
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/s45031.htm
Equal Rights for the Deaf (WFD
1999)
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/s38955.htm Education
of Deaf Children in mainstream schools (The Age Education section 22/8/02)
http://newsstore.com.au/apps/viewDocument.ac?rc=10&docID=AGE020821VV6014RP7AU&dt=selectRange&dr=1year&sy=age&st=nw&ss=AGE&sid=19318953&so=relevance&pb=all_ffx&clsPage=1&sf=all&rs=1&la=search&rm=200&kw=deaf&cwv=true
Cochlear Shares
looking rosy (august 2002)
To read more please read The Age link below
http://www.theage.com.au/text/articles/2002/08/20/1029114105338.htm
Cochlear Implant
(July 2002) To read about newspaper articles and
websites and discussions
about the cochlear in relation to recent media coverage, then pls
click
click on the link >>>>cochlear<<<<
Man to stand trial
for Murder "over hearing aids" July 2002
To read about this article please click >>>Hearing
aids<<<
Therese Pierce and
SMS July 2002
To read about this article please click >>>SMS<<<
Designer
Babies April 2002
Following is a list of links to read media articles and
letters to the editors
regarding the USA couple to have a Deaf sperm donor to increase the
chances of having a healthy deaf baby.
Editorial in the Sunday Age
Letters to the
Sunday Age
A lot of
Noises
A Culture
Designer babies Letter to
editors The Age
Letters to the Herald Sun Damian
Lacey CEO VSDC Herald Sun Tuesday 16th April 2002
Article in South
Australia Paper on Saturday 13th April (similar to Sydney's article)
Baby by Design An Age
Education report Wed 24th April
National Association of the Deaf
(America) clarifies a few things
Don't breed
disability. An article in the Australian
The man the law can not charge
A story of an aboriginal man who was charged with murder,
but has no means of communication.
Click here to read the story.
Your response to the Cochlear Article as
reported in the Financial Review in February. (See section after the
Andrew Bolts comments)
Andrew Bolts and your
comments
To read Andrew's article please click here >>>**<<<
Here are your comments to the article
AAD Response can be found here at http://www.aad.org.au/news/news.htm
*****************
I would also like to relay my absolute shock and
disbelief at the recent
comments made by O'Mahony. As I was reading I felt completely outraged
that
the above mentioned C.E.O., whilst being in such a high and notable
position
could be so utterly and obviously misinformed and uneducated as to the
cost
of an implanted child. We as a family with Deaf children, have many
contacts
with other families of Deaf children and whilst not mentioning any names,9
out of 10 of those implanted children continue to access Teachers of the
Deaf, interpreters, notetakers and speech pathologists, all inadvertently
at
the expense of the taxpayer. These children access, and quite rightly so
(because after all they are still Deaf ) exactly the same services that
our children, as non implant recipients access.
However our children have not cost the taxpayer one
cent for an operation they themselves choose not to have.
Our children are happy, well balanced and well educated
children purely and simply because they are accepted
for who they are not what we can change them into.
They never use their Deafness as an excuse. Perhaps O'Mahony
needs to do a little more homework before making such typically ignorant
statements!!
*******************
Mr. Bolt, come spend the day with me. Much of that time
would be spent in university lectures from first year to honours level,
from “nematodes in family macropodidae” to “ Weberian theory”. You
may get to work with a Drag King artist preparing for their next public
appearance, or a professional acrobat refining a piece that will tour
internationally, take the stage at a major theatrical performance. I am an
Auslan (Australian Sign Language) interpreter and this is my view of deaf
community. Intelligent, Mr. Bolt, vibrant, Mr. Bolt, passionate,
articulate and fun.
At the end of the day could you honestly tell these bright and motivated
students, these creative performers, they are ““doomed” to deafness,
that their lives are tragic?
I implore you, before you write another piece on Deafness, spend some time
living Deaf community, experience the beauty and creative potential of
this language, but most importantly, make some friends.
There is a place for the cochlear implant, but do not elevate it to the
lofty realms of “cure for deafness”. I was once told that hearing
through a cochlear implant sounded like listening to Donald Duck under
water. Professor Clark himself commented on The Panel that it still does
not convey any concept of music. It does not “work” for everybody. I
am meeting more and more cochlear implant recipients in my line of work.
Think about that. Have you spoken to any one who no longer leaves their
speech processor on, after eight hours of invasive surgery and years in
therapy, finally to find a place, an identity, a language and belonging in
the Deaf community. I have.
The six-year-old child, the emotional pull of your article, will never
“hear everything”, cochlear implant or not. Much better for this child
to foster a positive self image through a positive image of Deafness than
to identify themselves as a broken, not-quite-right hearing person.
Professor Clark and the CEO of Cochlear Australia (interviewed recently in
the Financial Review) have a vested interest in perpetuating the myth of
Deaf community as doomed, isolated, alone and miserable. The reality of
Deaf community is so far removed from this picture.
You quote AAD’s claim that “cochlear implants generate publicity which
demeans Deaf people, culture and language”. This is perfectly
illustrated by the tone and inherent message of your article.
*********************************
I think Andrew Bolt has missed a crucial point in his commentary about mad
multiculturalism. He seems to believe that a cochlear implant cures
deafness. It doesn't. While it does provide access to sound, this sound is
rudimentry at best. The child will still be a deaf child, will still
struggle to understand group conversations, will still rely heavily on
lipreading, will experience difficulty understanding others when the
background noise is high, will probably not be able to distinguish song
lyrics without the words in front of them. I am an "exemplary example" of a
successfully raised oral deaf woman, with hearing-aids that afforded the
same power and style of hearing that a cochlear implant provides. Yet the
above situations exhaust me. I am tired of the pretense that I can hear
everything, tired of trying to keep up. I often prefer to remove my hearing
aids, accept that my natural state is to be deaf, and use sign language, a
form of communication which is as effortless for me as spoken language is
for hearing people. I believe many Deaf adults who choose not to implant
their children are simply trying to spare them from this, trying to
encourage them to accept themselves as they are, rather than focussing on
turning them into a hearing person that they will never be.
There are many issues facing parents with this difficult decision to make,
if the above issue was the only one it would be easy to just whack in a
cochlear implant, and wait and see, but young children with a new implant
are usually so stunned by the sudden noise that they can lose up to a year's
development time as they adjust. These children will need to grow up
wearing a harness, a hearing-aid, a wire that connecting the hearing aid and
the box in the harness, a magnetic head piece. If the child does a
cartwheel or wrestles with someone it almost always becomes displaced, then
someone needs to adjust it until the child is old enough to do it
themselves. There are many more issues to be considered by parents who are
contemplating a cochlear implant.
While I am not against implanting Deaf children, I am opposed to routine
implantation of all Deaf children, and I believe that Andrew Bolt has
presented an overly simplified and uninformed bias on this issue.
*******************
Sir,
Not a deaf sentence
Andrew Bolt (Herald Sun, March 25) claims that deaf
children are suffering as a result of ideologies and “sentenced to
deafness”.
VSDC provides statewide services for deaf children and
their families – with and without cochlear implants. Their needs are
complex and decisions in regard to the implant, varied. Families know the
potential risks to the physical and psychological health of the child.
While we acknowledge the successful results, we also are
aware of the less than expected results and the complete failures.
Families must take the total picture into account, and be given the space
to make their own decisions. To suggest otherwise is an outrage.
Deafness is a life to be lived, not simply a problem to be
fixed. There are no miracles to be found!
Damian Lacey
Your response to the Financial Review
Supplement "The Boss"
As
reported in the VCOD website over a month ago, the Australian Financial Review Supplement called the Boss had an interview with the CEO of
Cochlear, Mr Jack O'Mahony Below
is the link to the article and your comments in relation to that article For
a full text of the above interview go to http://www.boss.afr.com.au/people/2002/02/13/FFXSPJ80MXC.html
Your responses Having read the comment from O’Mahony on cochlear implant (CI), I find his comment distasteful and out of context.
O’Mahony comments are baseless as the CI hasn’t been here since the start of the previous century. S/he cannot compare as the CI industry has been around for what??? 20 years? Certainly, not 80 years and not 40 years even.
Surely, $50,000 to $60,000 is much cheaper than $140,000 presently allocated for children attending to school, but what it did not mention is the resources that $140,000 can buy that $50,000 to $60,000 can’t buy. I have seen many clients who have CI and they have not been able to achieve any better than those who does not have CI. I know a few who are performing well in the workforce; these people do not have CI.
A burden to the society, I don’t think so. Actually, his/her ignorance is a burden to the Deaf community and we don’t need that crap.
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Yeah the cochlear implant article is a bummer. Yeah, while we are talking about productive members of society, let's take a machine gun to those over 65, under 18, Aboriginal, disabled etc to eliminate all those parasites on the body politic :-) really what are they talking about, do they know any Deaf people, and what is bloody worst, it's a total lie about the cochlear implant suddenly making Deaf people "productive" they still remain severely deaf and still need many deaf services (audiology, speech therapy etc) so productivity (or otherwise) is a very moot point.
*********************************************************************************************
Spoken languages have many ways of expressing emotion and meaning –
For example anger or happiness in the tone of voice. Deaf people will never be able to hear those tones of the voice even if they can lip-read very well. This is why sign languages are the most natural because many things are visual and facial expression is often used more than with spoken languages.
Sign language uses space.
I think the remarks are obscene and offensive.
Should be made to apologise.
************************************************************************************************
it isnt good and I find it quite demeaning to myself and all deaf people. Why should we have to put up with this crap? I mean, according to this guy, we are a nuisance. Jeez! where does he get of! I see it as complete disregard for the diversity that we have in this day and age - all just for the sake of furthering his/their own agenda.
I have to say I would rather spend more money on the deaf schools to provide a fair and equitable system (such as the one mentioned by Peter in Sweden) for all deaf kids and know that the deaf kids have got options later in life - the option to choose the language they want to use as well as being emotionally and mentally better adjusted.
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> Well this guy is the sort of person I have mentioned before - arrogant and
> has no idea - these comments are not even worth arguing about - he is just a
> great believer in CI's and is pushing the cause for his own gain.
*************************************************************************************************> >
> > All us deafies without CI's are a burden, crikey I feel ashamed of myself,
> > feel guilty for burdening my society, the quality of my life must be tragic
> > and being tax dependant, (Im not sure when but if he says so it must be).
> > The CI will change all that!!!
> >
> > Dont enough deafies have self esteem problems without these putdowns?
> >
> > Are we a "burden", an "unproductive member of society" and "tax
> dependant"? > > I'm pretty darn sure I'm not!! What an arsehole!! putting deaf people
> down > > to further promote his products. Those comments are highly unethical,
this is exactly the kind of crap why deafies get their backs up over CI's.
And hell how many CI implants does he want deafies to have? once every ten years
> > or so you might get the advertising in the mail "heeeyyyy your model is
> > obsolete get with it, heres the latest model just book yourself in for a
> > teensy weensy brain surgery NOW!!!
> >
*************************************************************************************************
About that "Boss" article. I take exception to "immediately you have..."
There is no guarantee that there will be success, let alone "immediate"
You may remember that Bob Willis had to work very hard to get the most out
of his implant, and he was a hearing person before.
I dislike the promotion of "instant cure" implied in the words they use.
************************************************************************************************
From AAD
Ms Helen Trinca
Editor
AFR Boss magazine
Fax: 02 9282 3137
Dear Ms Trinca
I refer to Bill Pheasant’s article titled ‘The band leader’ on pages 26-30 in the February 2002 edition of AFR Boss.
I would like to draw your attention to the following two paragraphs which appear halfway through the article:
Presuming the original unit is implanted at infancy and the recipient lives to the age of 80, the total outlay, he says, is about $50,000 to $60,000. “Look at the alternative if they didn’t have that,” he says. “How selective is their employment? How specific is their schooling, How [sic] difficult is their family life because everybody has to try to cater for this person?” He quotes American research that has found the additional schooling costs alone for a deaf child are about $US140,000.
Rather than being a burden, an implant recipient becomes a productive member of society. “It is so significant a solution that you are immediately going to get a taxpayer again instead of a tax dependant, and you are restoring a quality of life that was previously unavailable,” he says. “It’s win, win, win.”
The Australian Association of the Deaf (AAD) is concerned that this article implies that cochlear implants are a ‘cure’ for deafness. This notion is false.
The Deaf community is officially recognised as one of Australia’s linguistic and cultural minority groups. This community of at least 16,000 Deaf Australians use Auslan (Australian Sign Language) as their primary language. And at least another 16,000 hearing people also use Auslan on a daily basis.
In response to the questions raised in O’Mahony’s article: there are schools for Deaf people such as the Thomas Pattison School for Deaf children in Sydney and the Victorian College for the Deaf in Melbourne. At these schools, classes are taught in Auslan and English is taught in its written form. The end result: bilingual Deaf students who have access to education on par to that of their hearing peers.
This bilingual approach is no different to education options available to other Australians attending specialist schools such as Aboriginal, Italian or Jewish schools.
Other deaf students attend mainstream schools with support teachers and Auslan interpreters. Again, this is no different to children with cochlear implants who require support teachers and/or note-takers even though they have a cochlear implant. It should also be noted that children with a cochlear implant require ongoing auditory and speech training which does not seem to have been factored into costs quoted in Pheasant’s article.
Thanks to better education options, Deaf people now have the knowledge, skills and abilities to pursue their ambitions including tertiary study and a rewarding career.
Deaf high-fliers, none of whom have a cochlear implant, in the corporate world include Peter Miller, Manager of Service and Network Performance at
Vodafone; Dr Therese Pierce, Principal at Victorian College for the Deaf and Alastair
McEwin, a consultant at Accenture.
The majority of ‘ordinary’ Deaf people hold down a range of productive and meaningful jobs as other ‘ordinary’ Australians. To assume Deaf people automatically receive government support pensions or family support is wrong. In fact, the majority of Deaf people are productive citizens of Australian society who support their own families, often with a Deaf partner.
Deaf people are productive taxpayers as opposed to “being a burden” as described in Pheasant’s article.
Further, families learning Auslan to communicate with their deaf child is no different to learning any other language. It can only enrich and benefit family life.
Pheasant’s article paints a portrait of Deaf people who are unhappy with their lives and who would welcome any opportunity to become hearing. This notion is false.
Most Deaf people have no desire to become hearing and are not interested in ‘miracle’ surgery or medical interventions. Those whose deafness or hearing-impairment was acquired later in life may wish to regain their hearing, but this should not be assumed.
Pheasant focuses on O’Mahony and Cochlear to highlight the effectiveness of O’Mahony’s management style. Without the two paragraphs highlighted on the first page, the article would have been acceptable, however unintentionally, those two paragraphs demean Deaf people, belittles their culture and language, and makes no acknowledgement of the diversity of lives Deaf people lead, or their achievements.
Such articles cause additional stress for hearing parents of deaf children who are struggling to come to terms with their child’s deafness and are given a false impression that the implant will ‘cure’ their child.
Finally, it is my understanding that John Fairfax Publications has offered discount full-page advertisements to a group called ‘Employers Making a Difference’ in Australian Financial Review. These advertisements promote the inclusion of people with disabilities in the workplace, however, Pheasant’s article suggests otherwise.
AAD believes misleading information such as that contained in Pheasant’s article should be challenged. I invite you to consider Deaf people’s contribution to society and their struggle to achieve equal access.
Enclosed are two booklets produced by AAD: Guidelines for the Portrayal of Deaf People in the Media
(www.aad.org.au/media.htm) and AAD’s policy on Cochlear Implants (www.aad.org.au/cochlear.htm) for your information. It would be appreciated if journalists in your organisation could be made aware of this information.
Yours sincerely
Karen Lloyd
Manager
27 February 2002
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I am so very very angry to read what the article said by the Cochelar Implant boss. Most of my friends are deaf, hearing impaired who live a full and productive life. Would that man say i don't lead a productive life because most my communication is Sign? Would that man say I don't lead productive life because I use Interpreters at meetings, because FM Recievers don't work very well for my Cochelar Implant?
Would that man say that I am not productive becuase I am able to work at a responsable job for Deafblind people, and the Deafblind Association?
Would that man say I am not productive becuase I find it very difficult to go to meetings unless i use an Interpreter/guide?
I am a cochlear Implantee for nearly ten years. My CI is very old but i do get some benefits from it.
I also have vision impairment. Many implantees I know still need Interpreters, or significant support with communication help.
This man is speaking thru his (You know what.)
I am an implantee who is both proud of my deaf culture, my language, (Auslan,) and my deafblind culture.
How dare that man say deaf people are not productive. I am so very very angry.
My reason to have implant is so that the device can help my mobility, to get around safely. I will always be so very very proud of my
Auslan, Language and my deaf friends I mix with in the community.
Why is it Cochelar Implant boss and senior people are not proud of Signing, or
Auslan.
We all can live together, Cochlear Implants, Sign Language, and what other means of adaptive listening devices deaf, hearing impaired people choose to use.
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Unbelievable! ... I've heard those words before ... they are so familiar to me. "Rather than being a burden ..." Yes .. I have definitely heard those words before. Ahh ... yes ... here they are! I found the offending words on page 8 of my second Deaf History lecture, one that I give to students of the Diploma of Auslan at Chisholm Institute in Melbourne. Now what do my notes say ....
Heading: "The Middle Ages"
The opening comments - "The fall of Rome in 476 AD and onslaught by the Barbarians".
In the final paragraph of this section, Haj (1970) quotes an ancient source as stating, "He who lacks hearing is deprived in many respects. He loses the ability of communication and debate, he misses the pleasure of sound, entertainment and of charming melodies. PEOPLE ARE BORED IN HIS COMPANY AND HE IS A BURDEN TO THEM. He is unable to listen to any of the peoples stories and conversation."
Next heading: "The End of the Dark Ages - 16th Century Spain". Obviously I was too optimistic!!! The "Dark Ages" are very much still with us, especially in the medical profession where they still refuse to acknowledge the superiority of a native sign language to that of simulated hearing and a lifetime of speech training for ensuring quality of life for
prelingually, profoundly deaf people!
Now let me state up front that I have no personal objection to the use of the Cochlear Implant. If the latest statistics are correct, of the 1,800,000 Australians who are "hearing impaired", only 18,000 are
prelingually, profoundly deaf. It therefore stands to reason that those 1,782,000 who became deaf as adults after already learning a spoken language to proficiency, might benefit from having some of their hearing restored via a Cochlear Implant. They would most likely value regaining environmental sounds and wouldn't mind spending the next 12 months learning to make sense of the simulated sounds provided by the implant.
This is not however the case for those 18,000 Australians who were born deaf or became deaf before learning a spoken language to proficiency (usually in the first few years of life). These individuals are active participants in Australian society, TAX PAYERS and proud members of the Australian Deaf community. I work alongside several such individuals ALL of whom have University degrees, two who have Masters Degrees and one who lectures at a University and is considering commencing Ph.D studies.
It is therefore amazing (and highly embarrassing for me) to read the words of Jack
O'Mahony, the CEO of Cochlear and a supposedly educated man. Two facts are very obvious - Jack O'Mahony knows little to nothing about the Australian Deaf community, and, he has never studied sign language. If he had, he would not have made such ignorant, misinformed comments. If he had, he would not have allowed his staff to present their latest statistics at last year's Audiological Symposium at the Royal Children's Hospital. At the symposium, Dr. Peter Blamey reflected on the "improvement in SPEECH PERCEPTION abilities" of recent implantees - graphs included, but went on to state that "LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT" was still significantly below that of their hearing peers. Notes taken by myself at Dr. Blamey’s presentation state, “Data shows that children who ARE implanted have similar results in regards to DEVELOPMENT OF LANGUAGE to children who ARE NOT implanted”. Furthermore, Dr. Blamey acknowledged that those implantees who continued to use sign language had language development levels close or equal to their hearing peers - graphs glaringly absent! Professor Adrian Davis from Nottingham, UK provided data that showed children with a profound hearing loss who used BSL to communicate generally tested with a I.Q. over 100. However, those who relied on Oral/Aural forms of communication tested with lower
I.Q.s, i.e. 65 - 90?
During the two days of the symposium, no-one tackled the most important question: "Does the cochlear implant improve the 'quality of life' of
prelingually, profoundly deaf implantees?" Prof. Davis stated, “We tend to look at mild/moderate/severe/profound but don't study implications of the effect on quality of life”.
Do these businessmen & medical specialists notice that young implanted child who is sitting at her dinner table, surrounded by her family who are talking and laughing and sharing the events of their respective day? Do they see her struggling to discern from which direction the voices are coming in time to watch their lips to supplement their own still impaired hearing? Can they imagine how lonely this child must feel -sitting amongst those who are the most important people in her life, but unable to be fully included? Is this child destined to spend the rest of her life being perceived as a "damaged" hearing person rather than a normal and happy Deaf person?
Mr. O'Mahony - I challenge you to sit on both sides of the fence before condemning that side which you have only peeked at through the knot-hole. Go into the Deaf community, speak to the Deaf people, learn their language and then .... and ONLY then .... make comment about them - NOT BEFORE. Deaf people are NOT a burden to Australian society - on the contrary - most are vibrant, active, educated,
Auslan-literate participants of the community who marry, raise children (hearing & Deaf), work, pay taxes and contribute to making this country the exciting melting-pot of cultures and characters for which it is famous.
In the immortal words of one Derryn Hinch - "Shame Mr. O'Mahony, Shame!"
Deaf
Australia Online II with Janice Knuckey in the Age newspaper
October 2001
Warrnambool and the Department of
Education.
The
full story about the issues in Warrnambool as appears in the newspaper the
Standard.
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