Ken Kesey Quotes

I know what it's like to be growing up, called 'deaf and mute' and 'deaf and dumb.' They're words that are very degrading and demeaning to people who are deaf and hard of hearing. It's almost... it's almost libelous, if you want to say that.

Seriously, I don't find not being able to hear an obstacle or a boundary. For me, and for many of us, it is an advantage, and it's a part of my identity, in fact. It's a huge part of who I am.

People will sometimes put each other in boxes and have biases toward one another because of what they look like or where they come from or who they are. But ultimately, it's up to us to decide who we are.

People don't know. People are ignorant. They feel that if you stutter, then you're slow or whatnot.

Although there exist many thousand subjects for elegant conversation, there are persons who cannot meet a cripple without talking about feet.

The magnitude of discrimination and stigma faced by people with disability in Australia cannot be underestimated. People do not understand disability, and people fear what they don't understand.

One goes on with the blithe belief that who you really are is transparent to everybody. Then you realise, with some horror, that in fact it's not. So all you can do is keep muddying the waters a bit.

People get all up in arms when I describe myself as a crip because what they hear is the word 'cripple,' and they hear a word you're not allowed to say anymore.

I don't think of myself as being disabled, or able-bodied.

If I were offered a cochlear implant today, I would prefer not to have one. But that's not a statement about hearing aids or cochlear implants. It's about who you are.

I often don't feel like the person I look like.

People see me as Andre first. Then they see me as someone who happens to be a Muslim.

I've been labeled all my life.

We all have our own ideas of who we are that may or may not be justified, and you can really find out a heck of a lot more accurately from the people around an individual.

Every human being has an assortment of diverse identities, and it greatly matters which one is triggered by social situations, which hold up different kinds of mirrors. The same is true for nations.

I was never raised as the daughter with vitiligo or the granddaughter with vitiligo or the cousin with vitiligo. I was just Chantelle.

I don't think many people stare at people in wheelchairs because we see it regularly. I suppose if you see more in the media it will take away the curiosity.

I was very shy. I didn't really hang around with hearing people very much. Mostly I had deaf friends.

I think the biggest misconception is that people think deaf people are not able to do things.

People tend to treat people with disabilities sort of like they're aliens from another planet. It doesn't come from a bad place; it comes from a place of, 'I have no idea what this disability entails, and I don't want to offend anyone or make them feel awful.'

If I'd been born into a hearing family and went to a public school, I would have probably felt much more isolated, and being deaf would have become my identity.

You're never going to get beyond other people's preconceptions of what you are and what you're about.

I always let other people describe me because if I describe myself you will not understand.

Realizing that other people have a problem with [homosexuality] was the weirdest thing for me. As a kid it wasn't even something that was mentioned. It was never something that was even explained to me. It was just, "That's Mark and he's gay." Mark was just another friend of my dad's who would talk about his boyfriend instead of his girlfriend. I was 5. I didn't care. It seemed perfectly normal, and still does.

...and yet I am what they think I am.