Does White Supremacy consciously thinking they are superior to other people? The systemic racism is deeply rooted in the Gallaudet University system and nowhere is more evident than every fabric of “forgotten” restorative justice and continues to dehumanize BIPOC Deaf community by the so-called “commitment” that would create a safe space: bias nor hate-free.
Attention: Councilmember Charles Allen
Council of the District of Columbia
1350 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Suite 110
Washington, DC 20004
December 30, 2018
Bill B22-0957: Open Movie Captioning Requirement Act of 2018:
Sir, and the Council members for the Council of the District of Columbia:
As a member of DC Deaf community, the understanding of social, political, and sociological fields, what is justice, and the human rights, and the public eye is becoming a common means for what a life in District of Columbia to make sure Deaf citizens receive fair accessibility for communication, information, and knowledge.
Open captioning is a fundamental right even in the constitutional document itself; The First Amendment: the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances;
The Ninth Amendment: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
The rights for open captioning cannot be violation of Deaf people. Neglecting Deaf people’s public spaces for years and years have been enabled and promoted are counterproductive, Un-American, anti-factual, and diversionary. The First Amendment—freedom of speech, peaceably to assemble, and petition the Government for a redress of grievances, protects Deaf people. Why?
“Government of the District of Columbia. The Government of the District of Columbia operates under Article One of the United States Constitution and the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, which devolves certain powers of the United States Congress to the Major and thirteen-member Council.”
However, Deaf community shows the true hope and human society within cultural changes in District of Columbia, and the greatest mission of open captioning for Deaf community requires our resistance to the frustration of being denied for a full theatrical experience at any cost.
Open captioning would rekindle ourselves as the Deaf community to claim literacy rights in higher learning. Open captioning becomes highly sophisticated in our language and culture in the same manner as our hearing counterparts in their own language, English.
Happy New Year!
-JT
Copyright © 2019 Jason Tozier
This text may be freely copied in its entirely only, including this copyright message.
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_of_the_District_of_Columbia
When I was reading Beyond Hate written by Jon Meacham, Nancy Gibbs, Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., Katie Couric, and Deborah Lipstadt in TIME magazine issue November 2018, the quote caught my eye by Gibbs:
“Hate, among all our base instincts, is the most distinctly human. In animals, violence and venom are tools of survival; in humans, of supremacy, small, scared people hate, self-hating people hate, bullied and betrayed people hate as though hate will make large and safe and strong.”
Can we accept the fact that Deaf community is being built on hate crime as well, too?
Out of all people knows that hate crime comes with self-hating, in the language documentations that practice hate speech, which can supposedly hide from the society how Deaf people dealt with. How does it help to say that hate crime is the inerrant language of the Deaf, if in fact, the society does not require statistics of the Deaf in the eyes of law?
Isn’t that also the mirror of beyond hate? Nancy Gibbs writes, “you can’t be fooled, you won’t be puppets, you know better, you know the truth.”
Deaf people are no longer serve as puppets to please the hearing supremacy, the truth is coming out.
By the way, my English and synatx may be poor, but I make mistakes. I am not perfect. I am Deaf and I try my best to improve my written English skills every day. It may be poor, it’s a form of bullying and I’ve dealt with shit before even in English classes when I was an undergraduate student. I am not perfect.
Image below–once you read this book “Globish: How English Became the World’s Language” wrote by Robert McCrum, it will open your eyes and mind why English is supremacy and powerful.
-JT
Copyright © 2018 Jason Tozier
This text may be freely copied in its entirely only, including this copyright message.
130 years ago, on October 9, 1888—the Washington Monument finally built after 40 years of battles. It was also a battle for Deaf people during that time from 1848-1888.
Imagine in 1848, Deaf people would have struggle with learning enhancements in higher education and hungry for Deaf education, and it was a battle for sure. National Deaf-Mute College (now Gallaudet University) did not built until 1864. Between 1848 and 1865, the politics were heavy invested, standing up for America’s values while dealing with Civil War must have been mind-boggling on Deaf non-students and Deaf students.
The Washington Monument was built in honor of first American president; it was also world’s tallest stone structure and tallest obelisk, it stands 555 feet high. Imagine Deaf students from Columbia Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb went down there and took the courage to walk all the way to the top and see the view of Washington, D.C. including the sighting of world’s first college for Deaf students. What were their thoughts when they grabbed the opportunity to see the beacon of higher education?
At the same time, think about pain and struggles what Deaf people had gone through. One year before the Washington Monument was opened to the public, Alexander Graham Bell founded Volta Bureau, the center to teach Deaf to erase their identity by controlling their lives for profits. Eight years before the Monument, Oralism spread the fires and banned sign languages around the world, and what would it look like when it happened during the days of Columbia Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb in 1880.
Picture this. The Oralism Monument: 555 feet high—the dominance of Deaf people’s lives. College Hall: The elevation is 75 feet. 75 feet x 7.4=555 feet.
It would take 7.4 ‘College Halls’ to overcome the power and influence over Deaf people to make Alexander Graham Bell happy. During that time, president of the college, Edward Miner Gallaudet stood fiercely strong against Alexander Graham Bell’s push for Oralism.
The Edward Miner Gallaudet Residence, which now as House One where Gallaudet University presidents live there, imagine what EMG was sitting there on a chair thinking how to make now Gallaudet University an ASL-centered more than ever. The biggest question, did EMG ever visit the Washington Monument and grabbed the view at the top of 555 feet and understood the higher education and protect ASL for Deaf students today and tomorrow? Which place would be first thing for EMG to look for on the top of world’s tallest building? Or was Washington, DC filled with trees that cannot see the view of now Gallaudet University?
It must have been high road for Deaf students to walk all the way to the top of Washington Monument to defy odds and show the world that Deaf people can do anything. It was all about unleashing the hidden power of language bigotry and hegemony.
One more thing, the reason behind Washington Monument came together in our neighborhoods, universities, workplaces, and communities to keep the dreams open for Deaf students of understanding, personal interactions that will make them better educators and share their life experiences to build higher education and human connections in any shape.
The tallest university obelisk goes to Laurent Clerc who inspired Deaf America today and tomorrow. Can it ever be funded?
-JT
Copyright © 2018 Jason Tozier
This text may be freely copied in its entirely only, including this copyright message.
For the last 21 years as a Deaf returning citizen, I have been dealing with hate. Ten years ago when I signed up Hate Crime and Bias for a university Sociology elective course, and discovered that hate is a social disease. I made an ultimate goal: Ph.D; I’ve faced couple of death threats, and once gun-pointed at my face in year 2000. Haters attempting to set my life into pieces and kill my success down—facing rumor-mongers about me on websites, and I understood how to deal with hate every day. It is not easy.
I’ve had haters post pictures of me and post my home address along with detailed information. There is a hate group against me—hate has never seemed more like a real possibility in my lifetime at this hour. The followers in the hate group are very much like other hate group counterparts, and I deal with hate for very long time and I had dealt with much worse situations than that.
Hate is a cancer of the human mind, which results in the production of excess numbers of stigmatization. Each day, a Deaf returning citizen has been subjected to hate, and hate destroys the balance. Dealing with haters has created problem to prevent a healthy perspective on life. The learning process is important. Watching other Deaf people suffering hate, they would consider it a human struggle.
I am absolutely convinced that no Deaf returning citizen should experience of hate. Sometimes, our thinking runs against the wall. Often, the hardest part in society is to do nothing; to write this Deaf returning citizen who dealt with hate and is not going to stand up. That way, the society continues to be ignorant, and if by chance, the Deaf community continues to stand up, and then everyone is happy. The problem is, too often negative thinking becomes an ego-bruising task for the society when it comes to deal with Deaf returning citizens.
-JT
Copyright © 2017 Jason Tozier
This text may be freely copied in its entirely only, including this copyright message.
...And the Truth Shall Set You Free. 
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