..pause for though..

I was having a discussion with someone today regarding a girl a went out with for a while in my younger days. In describing her, and I used the phrase 'girl who happened to be deaf', and the person I was talking to went on a tirade about it, saying (paraphrasing and concatenating here) that they have deaf pride and insisted that 'they' prefer to be called 'deaf people'. "You seem to have trouble with that," she said.

This sort of attitude gets my feckless up, mostly because I have to deal with it daily. It angers me to no end when people try to force those who are different than themselves into some sort of predetermined mould, and when those who are different try to stray from what these people want to think they are, they are attacked. And let us not forget the point that she specifically requested I don't say she is a "deaf girl". The first time I met her she herself used the words "I am an All-American girl who just happens to be deaf."

Why can't you just let people try to be themselves? Why do you have to say they have to be a certain way? So they fit your preconceived notions and don't require you to leave your warm, comfy Oprah-Utopia?

Here is a note to live by, for everyone -- unless you're either a part of said group or very close to it, please please please don't go off and make unwarranted assumptions. It doesn't matter how sure you think you are, chances are you're not one-hundred percent right. I'm not trying to be mean, but please take a moment and think about it.

I don't daylog but I'm daylogging