How “Inspiration Porn” can affect deaf people?

If you are not familiar with “inspiration porn”, you are bound to have come across them in your life. But they can be detrimental to d/Deaf and hard of hearing people.

Originally coined by Stella Young at a TEDx talk, “inspiration porn” has become a very common used when disabled people are being used as a source of inspiration for doing everyday tasks like getting of the bed and going on public transport.

And for d/Deaf people, we are not exempt from that either, and below will explain why.

You can watch listen to the audio version…:

…watch the video…:

…or you can read the transcript below, which also includes relevant links, images and videos.

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So let’s talk about porn.

And I’m not talking about that kind of porn. No, no, no, no, that’s not it, I’m talking about “inspiration porn”.

You may not have heard of it, but it’s a very popular phrase that has been coined by Stella Young.

And you’ll have seen it possibly in a TED talk. If you haven’t seen it, you can watch the video below:

What is Inspiration Porn?

But you should check it out, because she talks about a phrase called “inspiration porn” and she defines it as:

“…a way to objectify one group of people for the benefit of another group of people. So in this case, we’re objectifying disabled people for the benefit of non-disabled people.

The purpose of these images is to inspire you, to motivate you, so that we can look at them and think, well however bad my life is, it could be worse. I could be that person.”

Stella Young, 2012

If you use the internet at all, I can guarantee you that would have come across these kinds of situations where it is either an image, or a video or a feel good article, where they objectify disabled people.

They’re doing something simple, something basic. And there could be a text over it, some kind of motivational quote. Or doing something normal, that we would consider normal.

For non-disabled people, they look at and think, “Wow, that’s inspiring!”.

And because of that the problem with inspiration porn is that non-disabled people will look at a disabled person as object and will look at the differences and will think that you know what, if that person has this problem then I should be able to do the same thing as that person.

And in some cases, they might be able to say, “Oh, maybe I can do more than that person, because that person is disabled.” Can you see the problem? Let me get into it more, because obviously I’m going to be talking about deafness in this case.

And a few examples of videos or articles, all these things that are related to disabled people in general, are those pictures where you see a disabled person. Could be using prosthetic limbs, or wheelchair user and there is some kind of quote on top of it like:

“What’s your excuse today?”

“Your excuse is invalid.”

“Don’t give up. Try!”

The Problem with Being Inspiring for the Wrong Reason

And in case of deafness, the most common thing that you would see are babies able to hear their first time. And there are a tonne of them on the internet.

And you might see it as something that is quite nice, you know because a baby is able to hear the mother. Which is obviously important for a lot of parents. And they want to be able to communicate, interact especially if they are hearing parents.

But here comes the problem because at first instant, it makes you feel good, it makes you feel happy, you’re smiling, You might even get emotional, because some of the videos you see the baby crying.

And the perception is that immediately, problem solved. That’s it, we’ve found the solution, happy days, let’s go on with our lives because that baby will be fine for the rest of his life as well.

But the real story is that, nobody sees what goes on behind the scene. And especially for the deaf children themselves, about language deprivation, and language acquisition, and speech therapy and they will have to go through years, if not decades of speech therapy. And be able to acquire languages, just so they are able to connect with the outside world.

Just so they’re able to have a job.

Just so they’re able to have all these things that we all see as normal.

The reason they have to go through that, because there is a lot of perception that, the only way you can get a job or an education is to acquire languages these ways.

If you don’t, you will fall behind, you will miss out. You will get lost and you will not live the life that you want unless you go through that process. Now of course, sometimes it works for some people they go through that phase of years of therapy and years of practice and all these things behind the scene.

It works for some people but it doesn’t work for all. I’ve been through, I absolutely hated it because it just felt pointless to me. But I had to go through it for my own reason.

But I didn’t do it for years and years like other people. And that may be because I can hear certain things and for other people, they are more profoundly deaf. But people don’t see what goes on behind the scene.

People see it as these videos of like, feel-good, I feel better about myself. Also, as an inspiration for saying like, “You know what, at least I can do this because then I’m able to live my life and that baby would not be able to. But you know what, that baby has this, it’s fine we can move forward”.

But you have to look from a bigger picture, you have to look from the outside and look at the whole situation around it. Just don’t look at it on that 30-second video and you can decide everything about that baby and that’s it. It’s just not the way it works.

This also apply to disabled people who are in, have their own disability whether it’s a wheelchair user, anything like that. And we see them as an inspiration because they managed to get on the train or they managed to get off their bed and brush their teeth.

And that’s not how it should be. People see them as an inspiration for doing normal thing and that where the issue lies because we should be seeing them as the norm, as normal people.

And we should be seeing deaf people as the norm as well.

The problem is, it’s not. And that is, the problem is that we have to live our life in a way that we have to make the best use of our body that we’re either born with or in a adjusted state, and we have to just go with that.

On top of that, we have to live with a world that the society around us isn’t built. And what I to mean about that is, if it’s not acceptable, then we have to find a way around that.

Now in my way, the most obvious example is, captions. If I want to go to watch something on the videos in internet, or a cinema or TV, I need caption. But it’s not always available for whatever reason. And that is the issue I face.

What to Remember Before Sharing “Inspiring” Content?

So of course, there are challenges, of course we have to fight for certain things. But being able to get off the bed, or being able to do certain things like having a job is not something that should be seen as an inspiration for anyone and especially for those who are not disabled.

It should be seen as normal thing and it should be seen as part of everyday life. I’ve heard so many ridiculous comments about deafness, whether it’s to myself or to other people and I’ve done a video about this, about things that you should not say, or dumb things that people say to deaf people. And I’ve done that, you can check it out below:

But some of the thing I hear is like:

“Oh, you’re deaf? Well you’re doing well for yourself.”

“Oh, you don’t look deaf.”

And apparently, a lot of women get this:

“You’re too pretty to be deaf.”

…which does not make sense whatsoever. And the only thing I can think of about that statement is deaf people are ugly or I thought deaf people are not good looking or stuff like that.

It’s ridiculous, it’s stupid. Just don’t say that.

Everybody will have to live with their body on, they try to live the best way they can. It doesn’t matter if you’re disabled or not. We are either born with what we have or we have to adjust along the way because of whatever reason.

I grew up with mine, that’s all I know. You grew up with yours and that’s all you know.

And maybe along the line as we get older, as we go through life, our body will change in a way that we’re not expecting it or it is expected like getting older. Doesn’t matter, we have to adjust to what our body gives us and we make the most it.

At the same time, what goes on behind the scene for you, for me, for everyone is very different to what those inspiration porn images and videos, and all these things that you’ve seen. It doesn’t tell the full story.

So you should be very careful when you look at that and see it as an inspiration.

Why is it an inspiration for you?

And that’s something that I would love to know actually. If you have that feeling, let me know in the comment. Because it is not seen as a positive thing for those who are d/Deaf, for those who are disabled all these things, it’s not a positive thing.

And I get there are sometimes no malice intended. It’s meant to be compliment for people when they say “you are an inspiration”. But I can tell you that in the real story, in the real world, it’s not seen as inspiring.

We’re not there for your inspiration, and it’s nothing special if we manage to brush our teeth in morning. Or in my case, I manage to have job or a business or doing the everyday thing that you do as well. That’s not inspiring at all.

If I manage to cure cancer, and create world peace and end world hunger, then okay, you can use that as an inspiration and that would be a good thing, of course.

But, I don’t think I’ve done anything that is inspiring by doing an everyday thing like you are.

Of course, there are nothing wrong with technology. I wear hearing aids to help me (even though I don’t like wearing them), and there are other technologies that can help d/Deaf people to access certain things to advance a bit further. There’s nothing wrong with that, I’m not saying that you shouldn’t be wearing any of these technologies or using them.

The problem is, is when people assume that it cures all. And it doesn’t cure all. It’s just an assistant. The key word in hearing aid is “aid”. It aids me, it doesn’t cure it, it doesn’t make it like a “normal hearing” like everyone else. It’s there to provide assistance.

And it’s very very important that you don’t see it as an end to a mean.

And that is the danger of inspiration porn. And that’s the danger of spreading it so far and people seeing like all you need is a hearing aid and that’s it, problem solved. But that is not the case.

But what I would really like as well is and this is something that I have not grown up with is I want it to be seen as normal. Anything, deafness, disabilities, all these things. I want it to be seen as normal.

So if someone you see is a wheelchair user, that’s normal.

If someone you see has a cochlear implant, that’s normal. That is what it should it be.

But the problem is inspiration porn does not help with that.

I can go on for ages about this, but I would like to make sure that you check out the link in the description and learn more about this topic.

Examples of Bad Inspiration Porn

See some sources of bad examples of inspiration porn that has been used in a negative way and detrimental for a lot of people….

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Example of Good Inspirational Content

…and other source of inspiration where it’s actually more positive and its actually more inspiring to watch.

Every time there’s an inspiration porn video of a deaf baby hearing for the first time, I’m going to share a video of a deaf baby recognizing and acquiring an actual language… that is sign language.

pic.twitter.com/kABwZzLhO1

— Nyle DiMarco (@NyleDiMarco) December 17, 2018

The word inspiration is not a bad word. No, I don’t want to make it a bad word, but how you perceive it is important.

Also, I would love to know what you think.

What is your experience with inspiration porn?

What do you think of it?

What do you think of when you see these images and videos?

Let me know in the comment and I would love to hear from you. Make sure you don’t forget to subscribe and make sure you come back again for more topic around this and of course I will speak to you again soon.

Take care.

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