Last night, at what was supposed to be a charming overnight stay, I found myself in a a heated discussion that very quickly escalated to a rather angry argument and a very annoying two-hour drive home from the Blue Mountains.
A reading group I’m a member of was discussing our latest book, People of the Book, by Geraldine Brooks. As usual, I hadn’t finished reading it and was surprised to hear that there was reference to a deaf character. Having studied and worked within the deaf community for ten years, I was interested in what the other readers thought about the character.
However, within just a few minutes, the discussion had denigrated to a disagreement as to whether or not deaf, Deaf and Deaf-blind people are, by definition, psychologically impaired. Being in such disbelief at what I was hearing, I tried to clarify what was being said. Surely there wasn’t a 30-something psycho-analyst beside me saying that Deafness and blindness naturally affect the psychology of a person merely by virtue of the fact that the eyes and ears are connected to the brain!
Of course there are deaf and blind people who have psychological illnesses, but to say that it is because they are deaf or blind is ridiculous.
Sixteen hours later I sit here writing this post, trying to understand how I might have misunderstood what was being said. But its offensiveness is unabated and continues to anger me. It is opinions such as these that continue to disable people of these communities. Misinformed ‘professionals’ who have no real knowledge of what they speak, who have never met nor worked with the people they describe, who make such ludicrous statements, are of course entitled to their opinion. But such ignorance! Such ignorance!
Ignorance such as this will never be considered bliss in my world.
Hi Lisa,
I see it as an extension to the Dunning-Kruger Effect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning_kruger_effect) – and I’ve seen it in medical professionals several times over the space of the last 10 years or so.
In my experience, it usually manifests itself as “I have a medical degree therefore I am a user experience designer”. Your story, while saddening, is not unusual. Sadly.
Best regards, Andrew
I’m with andrew on this one. To often I have found highly trained professional that well from options and assume that they are correct based on the fact that they have a basic or supplementary understanding of the subject.
One does wonder if they are not associating people that become sensory deprived later in life and the subsequent period of depression with a generalisation in these communities.
Also fix the font sizing in the text box for comments on this blog.. (in safari) is about 4-5px in height..:( Would have DMed you.. but… I can’t …
Thanks for the link Andrew, The Dunning Kruger Effect… how do you know stuff like that? :)
Gary, I’m not quite sure what you mean in your second paragraph, can you clarify? also thanks for the Safari tip!
We would all do well to assume less. Off-topic a little, but some of Dan Ariely’s talk at TED (http://tinyurl.com/cfyu2e) raises some issues along the same line; the danger of accepted wisdom.
@lisa
If an event is thrust upon a person in later life they have a hard time coping… To often medicos only see these people as the represented pool of the community. These people will often have an adverse psychological reaction to that event. Only natural.
I have few friends that have become blind later in life (from early 40s to 50s). They did undergo a period of chronic depression. Understandable. Some of the medical establishment just shunted it of as an expected element that the blindness caused. Even those that should have know better.
They didn’t really stop to consider that the chronic depression was not from a direct effect of the disability but the life changing event that the disability caused. Some considered fix the blindness, fix the issue.
To often in medicine the cause and effect is taken the wrong way and too directly. Symptom A must equal Diagnosis B and hence treatment C. No consideration is given in relation to other holistic examples of the condition. Like the loss of young child this often triggers chronic depression. So does that mean that having children leads to chronic depression. Of course it doesn’t …
Its just totally one eyed professional prejudice of this type that is promoting disabled people as being only half a person…. this makes me so angry at times.
It’s always shocking to hear such blatant ignorance, which is why I’m glad someone such as yourself was there to argue some logic!
It’s like pub politics I guess.
Well done!
Simon
I only wish they could meet my UK mate: deaf/blind (from birth, Gary, so your point remains) and as grounded a person as you could want to meet.
Took him ten years to get a degree as an industrial chemist, worked with perfumes for a while and is now in demand for his wine expertise based on ultra-superior smell and taste skills.
On the other hand, he would have walked out long before you did, Lisa.
His only psychological problems are those of other people.
Gary thanks for your comments and explanation above. It’s really interesting discussion.
Perhaps the good doctor might deign to actually ask some deaf or blind or both people what they actually think instead of presuming. Their able-bodied privilege is showing.
I think one could also say that the very fact of having to live as a disabled person or someone with a chronic illness, etc, in this society and deal with all the inaccessibility, prejudice and ignorance is pretty damn stressful — and this state of affairs and chronic stress is known to be a major cause of depression, anxiety, other mental health problems, as well as physical health problems.
This is a nicely expressed blog post on the topic:
http://threeriversblog.com/2008/11/second-shift-for-the-sick.html
Ignorance is an equal opportunity employer.
Hi Lisa,
I know about that stuff because I have lived it, and spoken about it, and people wiser than I have said “funny, that almost sounds like this other thing I’ve heard of”.
It’s one of those things (like ethnic cleansing, for example) that I wished I knew nothing about. But it is part of my professional life.
Best regards, Andrew
Wow! This is the sort of post that keeps me reading blogs. It took me into another world. I get so used to my own point of view that I forget that there are people out there that think like this.
By the way, I’m now thinking of changing my name to Dunning Kruger.
Jonathan
Hi Lisa
Interesting post.
I have had a very small bit of exposure to the Deaf community through a friend who is an interpreter. We started studying Auslan together a few years ago. I did one semester – you can guess how much further she got!
I also have some tertiary education in psychology paired with a (relatively) moderate amount post-university reading and learning.
So, certainly no expert on the subject but one who feels they might have some ideas worth contributing…
As I see it, being (or becoming) deaf (or blind) could have two different types of psychological impact:
- changing the neurological processes/human biology; and/or
- changing emotional/effective/mental state.
An example of the former would be how people with the loss of one sense have much sharper skills in one or more of the remaining senses. I believe this is well documented and it seems quite logical and reasonable.
An example of the latter would be Gary’s comment about people suffering from depression after losing a sense later in life. Also probably well documented as well as both logical and reasonable.
Do you think that the people at your book club meeting were talking about either of these impacts? Or were they actually suggesting a third type of impact which is something along the lines of: “people who do not have full use of a sense have some kind of learning/cognitive impairment”? I get the impression from your reaction that they were suggesting this third type, which, I would agree with you, is ludicrous. But is there any chance that they really just meant the first and/or the second?
Yours in piqued curiosity,
Jessica
Lisa,
I feel your pain. Nothing more frustrating than to be in conversation with ‘an expert’ who although uninformed about an issue relies on their formal credentials to justify their views.
Very poor form. In fact if I were you I’d be tempted to judge your therapist friend’s professionalism based on this incident. Psycho-analysis anyone?
Apologies to those of you who I’ve yet to respond to. We recently upgraded to a new version of wordpress and I wasn’t getting alerts of your posts to my email. So sorry about that. I will definitely respond to your comments asap, they’re very interesting.
Jessica, I need to sit down with yours for a while and think about it :)
Lisa
Hi Jessica,
Thanks so much for your comment and sorry it’s taken me this long to respond to you (see my comment just above).
Sadly, I’m quite certain they were referring to your third example:
.
Actually, the words used were “psychological impairment”, i.e. by virtue of the fact that a person is deaf or blind, they must be psychologically impaired.
Well if that’s the case I think I too would have struggled to contain my frustration!