JKF's "Open Letter" to Gallaudetians

I got email from a friend with an attachment containing a video clip of Dr. Jane K. Fernandes, Gallaudet's president designate. Instead of a letter in paper form, she "ASLed" to her Gallaudet community.

Personally, I've never met JKF or heard of her until the uprising about her appointment to be Gallaudet's 9th presidential last spring. However, from what I've been told by others who had personal interaction with the woman, none of them were in her favor. From several brief clips of her at forums that I viewed on Joey Baer's News section with Mike O. Reynolds (I love the way he elaborated on his "O" initial when he introduced himself before beginning his news deliverances), I could see that her ASL is not the best - so isn't IKJ's, either, actually. Is that the only complaint? No.

It seems the main complaint is her people skills. It is her way or the highway. It seems she is not a team player. She is a solo act. It also appears that the two other candidates, Ron Stern and Steve Weiner, were asked to be interviewed before JKF and both live long way from Gallaudet and were given little time to prepare - that is if Ridor's source is accurate. Neither could bring assistive devices to deliver their interviews more impactively while JKF had all accesses to those said assistive devices available to her at Gallaudet and had more opportune time to prepare for her interview. If all this is true, I must agree the interview process is indeed flawed. Ridor brought up religion - that BOT conducted interviews for the 2 male candidates during Jewish Passover knowing both are practicing Jews. THAT I don't buy. Leave religion out of it.

Anyway, in her "Open ASL Letter" to Gallaudet community, I patiently sat and watched MOST of the clip. She was long-winding in her address and signed word for word according to what I've seen in the captions. I can see her ASL is not her strength, but that has little to do with her job as future president of Gallaudet. Her job do not require her to work directly with students. That is Provost job. That is Dean of .......(whichever department that may be), etc. So, her ASL skills aside, it seems to me she is trying to cross the bridge and meet halfway. She acknowledged that many don't agree with BOT's appointment for her to succeed IKJ. However, I don't see in her demeanor that stepping down is an option at all. She is determined to proceed and be throned as 9th president, the Gallaudet community be damned.

SO, here I am pondering upon how can Gallaudet community dethrone JKF? BOT already made it crystal clear they are not going to call for a new interview pool or request JKF to step down. What bothered me the most about BOT is not everyone voted. Why is that? I realize some are not active members, but if they are not active, why bother remaining as a member?? I'd expect everyone to vote. Therefore I don't consider JKF's appointment unanimous - that would mean everyone voted. In itself it is already flawed. That may get JKF dethroned. How? Since Gallaudet is under financial control of the U.S. Congress, I would think a congressional hearing is called for to dethrone JKF. The FSSA need to lobby and find interested congressmen to get on the congressional floor. I think FSSA has been marching on the wrong path. They need to redirect to a new path. The congressional path. That may help in declaring BOT's interview procedures flawed and redesigning the BOT's interview process and voting procedures, preferably requiring everyone to show up for interviews and voting.

Why don't you view JKF's "Open ASL Letter" and put out your feelers to intercept what you get from her via her video.

http://www.9thprez.com/openlettervideo.php

It is long - I did not watch the whole clip, but enough to get a "feeling."

Ella Mae Lentz's Narrative on Crab Theory

I viewed Ella Mae's narration upon revisiting the ever-popular saying "crab theory" on Joey Baer's vblog, and I must say her narration was thought-provoking! I never quite thought of crab theory in that way. I am very well familiar with crab theory having grown up in deaf community, being a child of parents who were active in deaf clubs and had a parent who was deaf club president for several terms. I had witnessed this phenomena a lot, and not just during my childhood, but also at Gallaudet and as an Deaf adult in a social gathering in a deaf community. I also see it at the school where I sub teach presently. I taught at 2 different schools for the deaf and I also observed this at play as well. I am well-schooled in the philosophy of Crab Theory, but Ella Mae unscrambled all that. At the end of her narration, I thought to myself, "So, it is up to US to tip over the pail."

As it MAY be, it was not exactly our fault we were tossed in the pail. We all do what come to us naturally - wanting to get out of the pail FIRST. All of us want liberation. All of us want full access. All of us want equality. All of us want to be part of the society. Within the confinement of the pail, we had to fight others to achieve these, just like the crabs in real life do. We are doing what come naturally. Survival of the fittest. Whoever get out will survive. For the Deaf, getting out means surviving the larger world of the Hearing.

That is a natural thing to do, but it was not a natural thing to be tossed in the pail. It is not a natural thing to live in a confined environment. It is not a natural thing to feel trapped. It is not a natural thing to feel loss of freedom. What did they expect? They ought to have expected backlash. They should have expected us to fight for our freedom. Freedom to be a full member of the society.

Crab Theory is somewhat similar to Ella Mae's another narration on Colonization. Colonization is about controlling a group of people or a country to the full extent where the natives become dependent upon them. That was what happened to us. Crabs in the pail depend on their captors to feed them and keep them alive. They are at mercy of their captors just as the colonized victims are.

What surprised me is many of us don't even see it. Where have we been?? We have been pulling legs off other crabs - too busy to step back and think. Too busy working towards that rim of freedom. Too busy trying to survive. Hey - we don't need to work at any of that. All we need to do is work TOGETHER and tip over that damn pail. That's all we all need to do. Everything else will come together once we free ourselves.

To view Ella Mae Lentz's Crab Theory Revisited, log on at:

joeybaer.com

Please visit! You will be amazed when you view the clip! I was and I brought it up at a birthday party and we all got deep into it! And I brought it up again at my Think Tank monthly meeting and we had a good discussion on this topic!