(♪ Say Yeah ♪)
[Jenna] Hello, hope you are all
doing good.
I wanted to talk about this topic because I noticed recently
that within the Deaf community there has been some tension,
or some complaning about Deaf role models who have become
famous like obviously for example, there's Nyle DiMarco.
He's doing great and a lot of people
are looking to him as a model, as a dancer, on Dancing with The Stars.
But some people have complained, saying "What is he famous for?
Why? All he does is dance. So what! Ugh!"
So that's just one example and there's others as well,
different people complaining about Marlee Matlin,
which has been happening for a while. So I wanted to kind of
give you my opinion, a few general comments about it.
The Deaf community
is so diverse! There's Deaf, Hard of Hearing, Deaf Blind,
so many others. That's just a small example,
but we're actually a small community. If you think in the big picture,
we're pretty small and a lot of people end up overlooking us. We're considered
invisible and that's fine.
But Deaf children tend to be
isolated because 90, or over 90% are born into hearing families.
A lot of time growing up they don't know anything about Deaf cutlure,
the Deaf community often until they get into school
or even sometimes as an adult, or until they actually finally
see something. For some people it never happens! So there's a
variety of perspectives and that means that we need
more Deaf role models. Growing up, including myself,
you don't really see many Deaf role models. There was maybe
a few. I think... there was Marlee Matlin.
She was the common actress many people knew about and
Heather Whitestone who was Miss America. But other than that, back in my time
there really weren't many Deaf role models.
But now I'm starting to notice
more people and that's great!
But the one thing that I really want
to impress upon you is, as a soceity, the way
that you can be most visible is media. That's the most visible thing, whether you
like it or not, it's true. Media is the most visible thing.
The most visible technology I'd say
within society and throughout the world.
So of course if a Deaf person become famous in the eye of the media
automatically everyone is looking up to them, such
as Nyle! People see him in America's Next Top Model and they get interested.
Oh he's on Dancing With the Stars. He's on tv a lot, or for example
Sean Forbes. He's involved in music which is related to media,
or the music entertainment business.
So he becomes more visual and again Marlee Matlin. She's an actress, so
right there, a lot of people are seeing her and watching her.
But then some people complain. "Well what they do is isn't important!
What about other people like athletes, or lawyers, or whoever,
people that are less visible. Why do these
people [media famous] get attention, but we dont'?" I agree, there should be
more attention with those type of people, but that doesn't mean you should demean
or lessen the importance of these Deaf role models because
they are visible. They have a better chance for Deaf children or
youth, who maybe don't have any idea of what Deaf culture or communtiy is,
to be able to see them on tv or the internet.
Be like "wow that's cool!" It's one of the fatest ways to get noticed.
Then that pulls them in, those children, and then they can get involved
in the Deaf community. But in some of the fields
like athletics, or being a lawyer, unless you're already interested in that field,
you're not really gonna go and find and notice those people. So we need to be
respectful to the Deaf role models that are visible
whatever they're doing! It's still important to have that.
So we should be respectful and commend them. You know maybe you're not interested
in what they do. Like I'm not interested in dancing, I don't watch the show.
Not really interested in modeling, but still I applaud Nyle.
He's bringing exposure, plus also he's giving back to
the Deaf community and that's the most important thing. He's giving a lot of exposure
to Deaf people about ASL. He has his Nyle DiMarco Foundation
helping children and talking about language and education.
So that's really important. I don't care
about the modeling, but I care about what he's doing
with his fame. That's the most important part and that's what we should commend and respect.
That goes for anybody out there. Again we're a small
community and we need all the role models we can get.
It's great! What's important is that we have the role models because
honestly there's just not enough. So that's something we should
consider before we start criticizing or demeaning those poeple.
So just my opinion, but you guys should leave a
comment. What's your opinion? If you agree, you disagree; just leave a comment
that's respectful. You know, don't be rude.
So hopefully I can read your comments. I'm looking forward to it.
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[Jill] ... Snapchat, and Twitter, and lots of 'em. There's lots of new things
so I'm always trying to learn these new things. That's important
because....