Deaf Man Stabbed For Using Sign Language

Terrance Daniels, a deaf man, was stabbed several times by Robert Jarell Neal, after mistaking sign language for Gang Signs.

Mister Daniels was signing with another deaf man when Neal allegedly stabbed several times with a kitchen knife. A neighbor saw Daniels get stabbed and called 911. Daniels was taken to UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill, where he is reportedly in stable condition.

Robert Jarell Neal was later seen walking around the neighborhood, and even threaten a Witness's 12 year old granddaughter. Police arrested Neal and charged him with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill, inflicting serious injury, and felony assault on a disabled person, and is being held on $500,000 bond.

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There are plenty of Deaf people who would take great offense to being called disabled. I wouldn't be surprised if that man was very prideful and asked to drop the charge of felony assault on a disabled person.

I major as a sign language interpreter, and Deaf people have a lot of pride. They can function just as well as any human being and can live just as fulfilling a life as a hearing person. To be called disabled would not thrill them.

Oh, and the article that says 'handicapped' is even worse.

 

If this wasn't so sad it would be funny.

 

I agree, I've volunteered at classes in high school for students with special needs. To them and some of them whom had deaf parents, it means they're part of a commmunity. They have their own culture that they do take pride in. Regardless though, I think the idiot should get all the charges they possibly CAN put on him. I know a good bit of ASL and none of it has ever resembled gang signs to me, which unfortunately I've also seen a good bit of. I hope Daniels is okay and got good care. :daisy:

 

In Rochester they mistake gang signs for sign language. Somebody throws up crips and another hearing person weakly signs back "hello, my name is J-A-K-E."

Seriously though that's terrible. That guy who stabbed him is an idiot.

 

that seems kind of weird. i wonder why deaf people are more proud than anyone else. i mean, there's a ton of disabled people out there who have no problem admitting they're disabled, why not deaf people?

nothing against deaf people obviously, but they are limited by a physical impairment, which is the definition of disabled.

 

Pride.

 

its been my experience that the ones who are "proud" to be "labeled "disabled" arent actually disabled at all....

 

Maybe dude was signing something racist.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aR9cs8Ywx4

 

very true. i'm not talking about being proud of being disabled though, i'm just talking about not being in denial about it.

 

Deaf people have a history of being treated like they are less intelligent even though the condition of deafness carries no cognitive impairment. Because Deaf people are fully functional humans with the exception of being unable to hear, they want to be treated like normal people. Deafness is not seen by the Deaf community as a disability any more than people are for not being able to sense magnetic fields. So they get a bit offended when they are given special treatment for their deafness.

 

What people perceive in their minds is their reality. In this case, someone thought it was gang signals.

In NY years ago, police thought a black man sitting on his porch was a suspected rapist in the area. On top of that, when he pulled out his wallet to show his ID as requested, the police thought it was a gun and fired about 40 rounds, killing him.

The Martin and Zimmerman incident in Florida is another example of warped perceptions that led to death. Each person in that incident had a faulty perception of the other.

It's scary to know that there are people out there, gangs or police or whoever, who make such rash decisions based on what they wrongly perceive as factual.

 

I think it is fair to acknowledge past history but not dwell on it. It's fair to acknowledge where we are now.
How are, on the whole, deaf people treated today?

Many d/Deaf people do not see themselves as disabled. However, deafness is considered a disability under the Disability Discrimination Act. Similarly, a mental illness is also considered a disability. The Act defines a disabled person as someone who has "a physical or mental impairment which has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on his ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities". This definition includes many other people who would not consider themselves to be ‘disabled’, but who have rights under the Act. For instance, people with arthritis or a heart condition.


If a deaf person applied for a job where hearing was beneficial, they would wish for their employer to reasonably provide assistance and the tools for them to carry out their job as those who are not deaf. Here that is a legal requirement. Is 'impairment' any better than a 'disability'?

Deafness is nothing like not being able to sense a magnetic field (is that even true?). There is a myriad of things a deaf person can not do, and should not be able to do - especially within the workplace.

If a deaf person is not patronised - such as speaking loudly or, as was the case, treated as if they were a little slow...they do expect 'special treatment' or lets say 'help'. It's much the same as a blind person. Is a blind person disabled? Do they not need help?

 

It's not a thing of the past.
My job does not require hearing to perform well.
The deaf woman that worked for us was treated appallingly by at least half of the staff.
They just couldn't be bothered to put the effort into communicating with her and treated her like a big tard. She really wasn't. She read lips, she knew sign language and she does this in two languages. It was appalling to see.

I have young friend that is loosing her hearing at the age of 21. She's benefited quite a deal from the deaf community and the 'non-disabled' attitude. Sometimes a little semantic like the phrase 'disabled' can have a real big psychological impact on those trying to cope with the world.

 

I didn't say it was a thing of the past. It has undoubtedly changed for the better.
To be fair, I would struggle to communicate with a deaf person - perhaps it's laziness. I don't think they are retarded, though.
I'm not suggesting life is perfect.

Perhaps.
I generally say: 'oh, that person is deaf.'
I would not call a deaf person disabled to their face or behind their backs.
But they are, really.
Perhaps that is a prejudice.
I think there is a difference in acknowledging a difference and making a big deal out of it.
I think most people don't.

 

odon pretty much made all my points for me already.

"disabled" has nothing to do with cognitive impairment. cognitive impairment is a disability, but so are a ton of other things.

if almost everybody was able to sense magnetic fields, and that was used as the primary form of communication, then deafness would not be any more of a disability than not being able to do so.

so much of daily life is based around sound, failing to give some sort of different treatment to deaf people would leave them pretty much completely outside of society.

 

Another example of how quickly the life of an innocent person can come to an end as a result of what another person or group believes in the mind. The London police made a blunder in the Jean Charles de Menezes incident.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Jean_Charles_de_Menezes

A few apologists today still try to make excuses for the blunder.

 

It's not the same with blindness vs. deafness. Humans rely much more on sight than on sound. Deafness doesn't affect your ability to drive a car or read and write, for example.

By the magnetic field thing what I mean is that it's not something they feel like they don't have, the same way we don't feel worse off for not being able to sense magnetic fields or see UV light.

Although Deaf people will accept assistance as it relates to their job, such as an interpreter or a TTY machine, they are very proud of their ability to function in the hearing world and the Deaf community independently of assistance, and it is considered rude in Deaf culture to treat someone with pity or give them special treatment if it does not relate to their deafness. In the same way it would be considered rude to offer to read to a paraplegic.

 

Showing off my friend:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NISaaWpt8k0"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NISaaWpt8k0

 

it is true that humans rely more on sight than sound, but they do rely a lot on sound too, so blindness vs deafness isn't a terrible comparison.

and i'm probably being overly technical here, but while deafness doesn't prevent you from driving, it does affect your ability to drive in some ways. a deaf driver won't hear someone honking at him, or the dinging of the railroad crossing, or the beeping of the truck backing up toward him, or the rattle of the damaged engine that's about to stall out on him.

that's just some serious denial going on there. the reason we don't feel worse off for not being able to sense magnetic fields is because society isn't built around sensing magnetic fields. if deaf people don't notice that most communication is verbal outside of the deaf community, then i don't think deafness is their greatest disability.

besides, there may be some deaf people that feel this way, but i'm sure there's plenty that don't. for example, people that weren't born deaf.

seems like being proud to be able to function in the same world everyone else functions in would require acknowledgment of their disability. otherwise, it's not so much of an accomplishment.

of course it's rude to give them special treatment that doesn't relate to their specific disability. like you said, it would be rude to offer to read to a paraplegic, but that doesn't mean paraplegia is not a disability, and i've never heard of a paraplegic making that claim.