Showing posts with label tayler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tayler. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Incestuous Relationships in the YouTube Deaf community?

And so I sat and observed what some people have said about the recent brouhaha in DVTV land where vloggers went so far as to issue threats and/or violated the rules in DVTV earning them a quick ban. Issuing threats are not cool. Throwing a temper tantrum while on the floor isn't cool, either.  This is like witnessing another round of "Deaf Identity Gone Wild" but only this time people are aiming their badly focused sight on Tayler instead, the owner of DVTV. 
The role of bloodlines and pedigree in defining Deafness, along with the relatively small number of deaf people in the United States to begin with, helps explain the unusually active and even incestuous part that Gallaudet alumni, deaf parents, and even supposedly neutral organizations such as the National Association of the Deaf played in the battle against Fernandes.
Except this battle isn't about Fernandes but about Tayler who is at the helm of his own DVTV ship but he's no Captain Bligh. He's fair and makes sure that DVTV is "more safe" than YouTube because blocking against individual vloggers has never been easier.  It's not a right to vlog on DVTV but a privilege and must follow DVTV's R-List of rules. Maybe Tayler isn't quite "Deaf enough" to some of the culturally deaf people's taste because he isn't "radical" enough? Hence, the continuing protestations?

Deaf people have increasingly used YouTube to the point where their actions have morphed into this mutant, politically incestuous, illegitimate entity, ad hoc type of group that has increasingly become more "clannish" and even "cultish" in some ways. In other words, they've increasingly become the epitome of what online bullying looks like in order to get what they want as a group that matches their agenda.  It has even gotten to the point where people have condoned (e.g. keeping silent about it) making online threats to other people as long as they think if it benefits their agenda.

Not cool, and pretty sick, too. But you won't hear that condemnation from some leaders when it comes to online threats.  It can be done directly by making email/online threats or indirectly as in the case of the "neo-nazi" tattoo lie hoping it will stick and cause the person to lose his job which pretty much defines a "hate speech" in its own right. And the leaders were once again, silent.

So we ask these questions.

How bad is this particular incestuous lot in the YouTube Deaf community? Is it real or imagined? What is the connection? How many are we talking about? How deep does it go? Or is this a case of a massive misunderstanding taking place? Has "Deaf power" run amok amongst the leaders and people of that community? Is the wearing of hoods a manifestation of what hatred looks like?  The people who sent threatening emails to Tayler, do they represent the Deaf community at large?