What you call deaf people makes a lot of difference. Listen and learn:
• Deaf and dumb. We may not be able to hear, but it does not mean we are stupid or retarded.
• Deaf and mute. Some of us voice, and voice well, but we decide when and with whom we want to voice because we cannot hear how loud or soft, or how high or low our voices are. Sometimes we are ridiculed and we feel terrible. Would you want to be laughed at? Neither do we.
• Pipi. Tagalog version of mute. Not true. Maaring magsalita ang marami sa amin kung nais namin.
• Hearing-impaired. Why focus on the negative? This term was popular in the 70s and 80s, but now, it is used mostly by doctors, audiologists, and other people who are mainly interested in our ears “not working.”
• Deaf. This is okay when talking about people with hearing loss in general.
• Hard-of-hearing. Some of us use the telephone and hear quite a bit. We, hard-of-hearing people, live in both the hearing world and deaf world — we have an identity of our own.
• Deaf-yes! The Big D distinguishes us as a group of people with our own unique language and culture. We have our own identity, and we would like to be respected as such. Many people all over the world call themselves Deaf.