One communications phrase that makes me grumble is, “Even though she is deaf, she is still on the swim team.”
At least we are no longer ending that phrase with “…just like normal people!” Now we might say, “…just like people with typical hearing.”
This new language is better, but let’s go back to the beginning. Why not: “She is on the swim team.”
So simple! But my job is to get people to give money to our deaf-serving organization.* We need to appeal to donors’ desire to identify and empathize. But only about 3 percent of us are deaf. How should I connect to the 97 percent who are not?
Well, everyone wants to fit in, to do things that everyone else does. We can create empathy by appealing to these types of universal needs.
Yet I would argue that a more universal need is to discover that we are fine just the way we are, and that the world needs our unique gifts. The “just because…they are still…” construction immediately “others” someone with a disability or condition, when in fact they are just themselves. The reason you are likely asking for money is not because deafness, or cancer, or poverty, makes someone needy.
They are needy, but not because of something inherent to them, but because our systems are set up to devote only a tiny amount of resources to the majority of the population. This tiny amount is spun as finite, and the more care-based the need, the more justification is needed for spending. “Health care for everyone??” we hear all the time. “How are we supposed to pay for that?”
This fact is why your charitable or service organization needs donations! But to serve your clients, you don’t have to use language that stresses the individual, as if their disease, condition, or situation was somehow due to something they did (or didn’t do — failed to become billionaires, for example).
Deafness, cancer, and poverty are not the main problems. Lack of resources to deal with these conditions are the main problems. If you work for a charity or service organization, you have likely have had the “If only everyone we serve got $5,000, we’d have so much less work to do” moment. The moment you realize how little money is needed to fix or make a difference with big problems. We just need to do it consistenly and fairly. And we probably never will.
Do not let that moment go. Stay mad about it.
For now, my thoughts here are not meant to discourage telling stories of client successes to raise money. But substitute the “just because…they are still…” phrasing with “Just X amount of money…made Y difference.”
And yes, deaf people can be on the swim team. Those who wear hearing aids or cochlear implants have special headgear. It’s not cheap and can be a real pain to use, but it allows people with devices on their heads to jump in the pool, too. Bless the researchers, the medical professionals, deaf kids, and deaf parents!
*Just want to say here that my organization teaches young children with hearing loss how to listen and talk with their hearing aids or cochlear implants. This is called a Listening and Spoken Language approach, and is one sometimes chosen by families who have no experience with deafness in their family. I support every person’s right (and their family’s right, if the person is a child) to make the best decision for that child with hearing loss.
Carol Morency 