Jen Dodds: Should Access to Work’s treatment of Deaf people be seen as ‘epistemic injustice’? (BSL)

You’re going to need a sign for that!

I do agree that hearing people tend to treat us as if we know nothing. I dislike boasting but I have had a very wide range of experience and I’m pretty bright. Why then, do hearing people treat me like an idiot and ignore most of what I say?

This used to regularly happen at work where some other staff behaved as if I were an invisible idiot. I always retaliated by treating them like a nasty smell. But it doesn’t solve the problem. Hearing people DON’T listen to us and that is why we keep ending up with these undesirable outcomes.

In the case of hearing people these Government organisations are pretty difficult to deal with. In the case of people with communication problems it is nearly impossible. As my mother would have said…. it’s like talking to a brick wall.

I don’t think your post is negative. It’s a list of all the things we need to deal with. That seems positive to me. I would just mention that I have been a beneficiary of AtW in the past. They supplied a special telephone so that I could work as a warehouse storeman. The result was that I held down the job for years and enjoyed a good income. I’m grateful.

But now, with this extreme Right wing Government, their attitude seems to have filtered downward through the Civil Service. It seems to me that the Government services are now doing their best to stop us (and other more seriously disabled people) from getting the services they were set up for. Only a few weeks ago someone grumbled that they felt that you need to have no arms and legs before you get any help. Things have just closed down.

Well one thing is to be very firm about the fact that we are experts on deafness and all its complicated effects. The Government must understand that when we tell them we have a problem that we’re not making it up! We have to build credibility so that people will listen to us. We must think about things like our public image, how the public see deaf people. We need to make them see the truth and stop jumping to conclusions.

Despite our internal disagreements I think the deaf world can co-operate over this. We all suffer from the same thing and in cases like AtW it can affect anyone at any time. You never know when you might need it. I’d like to see us all unite over this issue. We have shown that we can campaign together over things like the N.Staffs hearing aid issue, let’s try and do that again with this important principle.
We need to make them listen. Deaf people are the experts on deafness.
We need to get the rules clarified so they can’t keep sidestepping things. It must be crystal clear in future who gets paid for what and when.
We need to ensure a fair deal for those who work for us. Otherwise they won’t want to do it!

Excellent phrase, EPISTEMIC INJUSTICE.
Nevertheless, everyone who acted the way he / she did as civil servant, MP, minister, anyone who is paid comfortably by us taxpayers (especially Deaf & Disabled taxpayers), failed the regard and respect expected by the Equality Act, and contradict Employment Law.

The whole process is an insult to all who enabled us Deaf & Disabled people to attain our career roles – parents, carers, Teachers of the Deaf, CSWs, Sign Language Interpreters, note takers, etc…..

I don’t think this post is negative, but pointing out potential and current problems is positive. We are indeed the experts on deafness, but the problem is not actually our disability to them, but the cost of paying out for support.

Nobody has control over cost except the Government, we are controlled “top-down” and this is a problem for the whole country, in all walks of life, not just those of us doing battle with ATW.

I do feel, however that it is a little unfair to call ATW: epistemic injustice because they are only doing their job and following Government recommendations and guidelines, so I do not feel it is justified to label this company, but to label the Government!

No doubt, the employees of ATW have been told to ask if a disability is still ongoing, which I know is a very stupid question when its applied to deafness! It is not quite as stupid to ask what one is doing all day though. They are only trying to justify the amount to be paid out and we are all well aware of the high cost of interpreters. In light of such cost it does not seem out of place to ask if you need one for 8 hours a day!!

At the top end of the scale the Government should actually be asking themselves: what do our constituents need to run their daily lives? What kind of support is required and for how long? Of course the prats in Government never ask these questions about anyone in Britain, let alone those who are vulnerable. No, instead they chuck billions at the EU, billions in Foreign aid then turn to us and say, “services have to be cut!” What a damn cheek!!!

How they have the gall to behave in this way, I do not know but they need to change the way they work and operate. They need to think about their own people, the very ones who put a “cross in a box” for them! They MUST COME FIRST! They appear to have forgotten that charity begins at home. Taxpayers money should be spent in Britain to meet all disabled people’s needs, then the rest of the population, THEN they can spend abroad!

It is absolutely frightening to think that these prats are planning to enshrine foreign aid in law, so that any party in power MUST spend 0.7 of our GDP on foreigners and leave us with 0.3!!! What diabolical thinking especially when they don’t have a CLUE where or what the money is spent on!!!!

Deaf people, disabled people, old people, who are we?! We are nobody, just a cog in a wheel and as far as the prats in power we have “governing us” are concerned: we can all go whistle in the wind!!!!!