Analyzing and Judging Information

About three weeks ago, discussing DeafRead, a top-level Gallaudet University administrator confessed to me his father had difficulty discerning information. The administrator said he tried to “teach” him how to, but his father just wasn’t capable. I liken discerning information to “not believing everything you read” or being able to judge whether to rely on information. This leads to something else that I believe is largely amiss in the deaf community: critical thinking skills. Without solid critical thinking skills, the less we are able to discern.

To AFA: Who is the Harasser?

kc of AFA,

I beg to differ. Patti is the one who has been harassing me, and the DeafRead team.

Read this excerpt from the post dated Oct 23, 2009:

“…Patti Durr e-mailed me on Thursday when I was in Washington D.C. then three days later, on Sunday, she announces her second boycott. I was in Washington D.C. the entire time! Is there anyone here who wouldn’t be peeved? I was. It was from push to shove.

She KNEW I was out of town. Yet Patti was writing in her blog that I hadn’t replied to her e-mail sent to me last Thursday. She made me look like I was not keeping my word or was not hurrying quickly enough. Did she exploit the fact that I was away from my computer during the trailblazer weekend to tell people I wasn’t replying to her e-mail? She knows I am a trailblazer. She congratulated me. She knew I was out of town. Confusing? Absolutely!

This is Patti’s second boycott against DeafVIDEO.TV and DeafRead. After the first one, she decided to return to DeafRead prematurely saying that we agreed to add tighter protection. I would have preferred to announce it, but I was fine with it – she seemed eager to announce it and get started with blogging on DeafRead. Or was she pressuring me? Making it known to the world so that if I didn’t follow through, I would be made the fool. Maybe it wasn’t simple pressure, but subtly twisting my arm?? Coercion?”

Ever since, I’ve broke dialogue with her. Ever since, she’s been emailing me. I haven’t responded to a single one of them. Yet, she keeps emailing me. It’s not harassment if she emails me, but it slowly turns into harassment if she continues to repeatedly email me without receiving a response. I made it clear I was not interested in dialogue with her by not responding. I can forward you all the emails. Is this harassment? YES IT IS. You better believe it! It’s backed by hard evidence.

In fact, just days before you first emailed me with your complaint, the DeafRead team was discussing whether Patti was harassing us. We had received two emails from her just before that. A team member asked, “Is she harassing us?” Another said “Yes, she is definitely harassing us.” Yet, we chose not to say anything.

Carefully analyze my previous letter I sent you.

“I’ve since taken her words with a grain of salt because she consistently contradicts herself.”

“She’s called people names. It’s OK for her to do it, but not for others?”

“She cries cyberbullying only when the action is against her or her friends, as opposed to whenever it occurs. If someone else is being cyberbullied, she’s silent. This says to me she isn’t attempting to combat cyberbullying, but to use cyberbullying to silence those who oppose or disagree with her or her friends.”

“Now Patti is overusing the word cyberbullying. Anything that is not in her favor is cyberbullying.”

Those are the sentences which mention Patti. Show me. Tell me which one harasses her? I set the record straight. I didn’t call her names. This is the first time I’ve addressed her.

Also from the post, I wrote about the domestic violence letter I received.

“I will have you know that a letter was written to me by a domestic violence agency by her request. After hearing my side of the story, I received the agency’s support and was told something akin to this: “I could do whatever I wanted about Patti”. I am given the green light to address Patti’s ethics and practices.”

Did she use the domestic violence agency to harass me? Definitely likely. As the excerpt explains, the agency reversed their position and supports me and my team. Given the green light to address Patti’s ethics and practices? Green light given by a domestic violence agency?!

The more I paste stuff from my post, the more I think you haven’t read it, at least carefully. You said I didn’t address “the truth of the content of Bgmaron08′s vlog”. To that, I paste this:

“It’s not right for me to judge what the truth is. It’s your word against his.”

Imagine what it would be like if I moderated based on truth. Slippery slope. Just what is the truth? The person who tells me first? The person I know the best? This is ridiculous. You know very well this cannot be done.

Not only has she harassed me by email and in blogs — but Facebook also. As recently as three days ago. She was spewing accusations that I allowed cyberbullying (by not judging Bgmaron08′s story). If her Facebook comments constitutes as the truth to her, then what I say about her, which is my truth, is not harassment.

Patti aligned herself with Ricky Taylor, who is unquestionably a cyberbully. She has responded to Ricky several times in Twitter, showing support and vice versa. Ricky not a cyberbully? The same domestic violence agency called Ricky on his cyberbullying behavior on Twitter! Why is she calling others on cyberbullying, but not Ricky? All the while she is leading the cyberbullying campaign, she befriends one and the worst one. It’s not about cyberbullying or harassing. It’s about using it to control others. Just as your accusation is meant to control me – to shut me up about Patti.

The more you accuse me, the more I am pushed to bring out the truth. Truth backed by concrete evidence. Truth such as the domestic violence agency’s position reversal and calling Ricky out. I refuse to be a sitting duck as you throw accusations at me. It feels like … harassment. Observe that I had not said anything about Patti until you informed me that Patti had made this matter public by posting at her blog. I’d been silent. Silent for too long, as one commenter wrote.

Who is the harasser here? Patti Durr. And she has been doing it to me for almost a year. Magnificent for someone leading a “campaign” on cyberbullying. The irony.

(The Mayer family, by the time you’re reading this, is probably mid-air on our way to Boston for a childhood friend’s wedding. I may be slow in approving comments today, but they will be. If you haven’t yet, read this post about logging in with Facebook in order to leave a comment.)

Update: I publicly said I retracted my commitment to add ‘audism’ into the guidelines.

Last paragraph: http://www.ythree.com/?p=564

On a Mission to Reduce Anonymous Comments

I’ve been wanting and meaning to add something to this blog’s comments section — to prevent or minimize anonymous comments. I can guarantee you there’s a study out there showing that anonymous comments are way more likely to be pointless, snarky, or just downright destructive. I mean, if you cannot show yourself — why bother saying it? If you can’t say it face-to-face, do not say it. You know I’m right, and yet you will continue to do it.

That’s why I’ve added Facebook login. It’s the only way to comment. I figure everyone has Facebook. Sure, there’s OAuth, and there’s Twitter login. But I think virtually everyone has Facebook. Even my mother does. Click on the button “Connect with Facebook” (this is a program provided by Facebook), a new window will pop up allowing you to login. It’s incredibly simple!

A downside to requiring Facebook login is I expect to receive less comments. But I prefer this over receiving silly anonymous ones. Requiring login to show true identities (and color?) should make for concise, more constructive, and I should hope, interesting discussions.

Perhaps a downside it is not? If people see that constructive discussions with real names are taking place, they are more likely to participate? Anything can happen.

Another downside is some people are identified by their nicknames, such as “Dianrez”. The pseudonyms are so familiar it feels not anonymous. In the cases commenters have never revealed themselves, I understand their wish to protect their privacy. To those people I offer this: by requiring Facebook login, no one will “borrow” your nickname. Impersonation is a worse offense than anonymous comments, no matter how destructive.

Although millions and millions of people have a Facebook profile, not everyone does. The irony is these people won’t be able to tell me in the comments. I apologize.

Anyway to close this post, not long ago I read this quote by Winston Churchill:

You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.

To: AFA Re: “extremist” complaint

Hi kc of AFA.

I call some Republicans extremists. Some negatively call our President a Muslim. When Ruthie stood up and fought for an Audism Free America, she made herself into a public figure and disagreements are sure to come. If this cannot be handled, then perhaps it’s not for her. It’s the same for me. I’ve taken a lot of backstabbing criticism – and I don’t try to suppress it because I understand it comes with the job. I allow it on my sites.

As for Patti’s post, thanks for sharing it. I’ve since taken her words with a grain of salt because she consistently contradicts herself. You may share this with her. She’s called people names. It’s OK for her to do it, but not for others? As for the commenters, have they asked me for my side of the story? They have not. Of the few that have, returned to DeafRead and DeafVIDEO.TV. I did not need to put together new words to convince these people. I just needed to present old videos. Frankly, it did not take much.

There is also another reason I take her words with a grain of salt. She cries cyberbullying only when the action is against her or her friends, as opposed to whenever it occurs. If someone else is being cyberbullied, she’s silent. This says to me she isn’t attempting to combat cyberbullying, but to use cyberbullying to silence those who oppose or disagree with her or her friends.

I will have you know that a letter was written to me by a domestic violence agency by her request. After hearing my side of the story, I received the agency’s support and was told something akin to this: “I could do whatever I wanted about Patti”. I am given the greenlight to address Patti’s ethics and practices.

The term “audism” is acknowledged by many to be abused, overused. Which is a sad thing. Because audism is real. It happens to me all the time. Now Patti is overusing the word cyberbullying. Anything that is not in her favor is cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is real. Abuse of the term diminishes the importance and severity of those who are injured by unsafe online activities. This is how I see your complaint.

If you want a pinch of irony, I have some for you. Ruthie, after attempting to get DeafVIDEO.TV to adopt an audism-free policy, boycotted the site. Now through you, she is trying to use DeafVIDEO.TV’s R-List. May I remind you and all, that YouTube does not at all offer this protection. And I said “audism is not allowed at DeafVIDEO.TV” over a year ago on September 9, 2009. I explained why it would be classified as harassment on the R-List. That was not enough. Why? Because it was not enough to declare victory, and most importantly, use it to censor people who opposed or disagreed with them.

If I were AFA, I would be upset with the exploitation of the word “audism”. The exploitation created by the deafhood movement to leverage the powerful word. By allowing them to say that disagreeing with deafhood was audism, AFA allowed the important term to be misunderstood, torn apart and beaten into nothingness. I don’t say it was the deafhood movement who set the term “audism” on a road to self-destruction, but that AFA is solely responsible by allowing it. Recovery of the term’s true definition will be daunting, challenging and — next to impossible.

You, Ruthie or Patti are welcome to come into DeafVIDEO.TV to correct the information either by leaving a video comment for Bgmaron08, or publishing a vlog. It’s not right for me to judge what the truth is. It’s your word against his. Like an esteemed vlogger recently said, I don’t control information. I have my own beliefs, and above these beliefs is the belief that people’s own beliefs should be respected. Just as I respect your belief that you feel Ruthie was called an extremist.

She just needs to decide if she has the thick skin required for the job. Paramount achievements are rarely accomplished easily. And you know very well as many others do, managing the sites isn’t an easy task.

This reply is turning out to be a potential post, and you very well know I will get comments which support it. Just as you possess the right to correct information, publishing this letter would be a way to correct some of the misinformation out there.

“Sad”

A friend told me her husband, after sub-teaching to deaf 4th graders, came to her and said only one word, “Sad”.

The deaf 4th graders could hardly communicate. The husband sub-teacher was taken aback by what he saw in the classroom. This is the sad state of our education – deaf education. The friend, who is a speech pathologist, explained to me that the parents basically neglected them.

“But what about the hospitals? The doctors? Wouldn’t they have intervened?”, I asked. She added, “What the doctors tend to do is tell the parents to wait and see.”

Wait?

Wait as they “skip” their first few years, as we all know are crucial developmental years? Apparently the doctors don’t know this.

Sad.