Another easy way to fix it would be for cops not to just automatically beat the shit out of people for no reason.
Funny how in all the years deaf people have existed in this country it is only now that we need a sign that says to the police “I’m deaf don’t assault me.”
Too many oral boards have been hiring candidates who say that they want to be “police officers,” “because” they “want to see some action.” That’s a public corruption flag, and the Public Integrity Section of the Justice Dept. will, sooner or later, start doing its job again in putting the corrupt in federal prisons.
Hey! I got it! We should require deaf people, and people who have had strokes and can't communicate, to wear special badges on their clothes, indicating their condition so cops won't beat the crap out of them! Maybe something along this line:
Or we could arrest, sue and sentence any and all government employees who think this is acceptable behavior.
I want to start with the point that I was posting to alleviate a tragedy. It was meant in charity, as a way to alleviate suffering that I regarded as needless. I well understand the militarization of police in the United States and the consequences. I don't need instruction in that regard. I have been posting at FR for 14 years. Anyone who held such beliefs as those of which I was accused would not last here long. Any FReeper replying to one of my posts should have the wherewithal to consider how long I've been here. All you had to do was hover your mouse over my handle and the sign-up date would be there.
When I spoke of a “sign” I was not speaking of a batch or placard or tattoo. You see, deaf people “speak” in what is called American Sign Language. The people who communicate with American Sign Language call it “signing,” the gestures they employ are called “signs.” That's why I called it a “sign.”
I was recommending that the hearing-impaired, through their organizations of which there are several, get together and work out a set of gestures, "signs," not just for themselves, but for anyone who cannot speak or hear at the moment. Unfortunately, if one examines the American nature of American Sign Language, one easily recognizes that it is meant to be for conversation purposes, not for emergency purposes. To be able to communicate with gestures at the speed of speech requires fine motor skills. In emergencies, fine motor skills are unavailable. Gestures used in emergencies involve large muscle skills, not fine motor skills, such as American Sign Language requires. Hence, the finger to the mouth for example, is too detailed and too easily missed in emergency circumstances in which it will police officer is legitimately concerned for (and illegitimately obsessed with) their own health and safety. As an example of what I mean, consider the international symbol for choking, something every nurse knows. It's two hands to the throat. That is a large muscle skill, not a fine motor skill. That is the sort of symbol we need to communicate the inability to speak or to hear, such as anyone might experience after an explosion. It needs to be a single gesture, not a series of ASL “words,” such as Red Badger suggested. I suggest no more than four or five such symbols in total, because that is all the public can be reasonably expected to learn.
Over the years, I have noted how the deaf expect others to learn their language. Red Badger offered a sentence equivalent to “I am deaf,” as if such should be considered sufficient. It is absurd. Expecting the public to learn more than a few signs is not going to happen sufficiently to alleviate this kind of emergency misunderstanding.
Accordingly, the value that the deaf could contribute to the rest of society is their sensitivity to the difficulty of designing sign language that works under ALL circumstances including emergencies. I even suggested a means of public education which both exists and would take up such a task: public service advertising. TV stations are required to air PSAs. The air time would be free. There is no excuse for not doing this and I said so, for which I was pilloried.
You the supposed champions of the deaf, completely ignored that possibility, presuming I was on some sort of power trip and attempting to excuse the thugs who perpetrated this assault. You did not seek clarification prior to accusing me. You chose to assume that I was speaking of a badge or symbol. In the absence of evidence, you chose to presume that I was excusing said thugs. You whipped out accusations that I would force deaf people to wear insignia equivalent to Jews in World War II.
Dear God. Two of my family died in that war in concentration camps. How dare you make such an assumption of another FReeper without incontrovertible evidence you did not possess. None of the posters considered that maybe they misunderstood my intent.
We are not going to undo the degree to which police officers are conditioned to defend themselves at the expense of public safety, at least not in the near future. It is an enormous task to get a unionized government agency consisting of at least 2 million law enforcement officers to change anything. That is but one reason I would prefer to dispense with police entirely. I know that officers are conditioned to go off at hair-trigger, and because of that they need for such a SIGN becomes even more urgent.
I'll bet some of you consider yourselves Christians. How was your posting to me an example of Christian love? Once I told you that it was voluntary, how many of you sought reconciliation for your hair-trigger error in judgment? How many apologized for such thoughtless and cruel comments? How did you behave in such a way that your light would shine before men? Here I was, doing what I thought was a charitable thing, integrating all of the aspects of the story, and the understanding that the police are immediately fixable, as a way to alleviate suffering of people deserving kindness and protection. I suggested that the death do it themselves in the tradition of American self-help. And you turned that into an evil and thoughtless power trip.
I thought long and hard about whether I wanted to bother with this post at all. Your posting betrayed an attitude that seeks to shame with superior righteousness. yet it looks to me that the goal is to feel righteous, not to solve the problem. Hence, I will therefore not reply unless there is an apology. Please reconsider your propensities, especially on a forum of conservative fellowship, many who have been here a long time. You should know better.