The year was 1881. On July 23rd, three weeks after President James Abram Garfield was shot in the Baltimore & Potomac Railroad Depot, Alexander Graham Bell was summoned to the White House. Why?
Bell had invented an electrical device similar to a modern mine detector, and he was called to probe the wound with it in an unsuccessful attempt to find the bullet. Bell's metal detecting device that was connected to a telephone receiver failed to find the bullet.
In the other words, Bell was a glorified fake. Although he had followed the doctors' directions, he placed his device in the wrong position. Although the bullet had entered the right of Garfield's spine, it travelled downward and to the left. A cyst formed around the bullet rendered it harmless, and with proper medical care, Garfield could have been up and back to work.
Instead, the constant probing and operations under unsterile conditions and with Bell's assistance only introduced more bacteria and infection to Garfield's body, making him weaker and sicker. Garfield's weight dropped from 210 pounds to 130. Garfield suffered infection, blood poisoning, and pneumonia. On September, 1881, James Abram Garfield made his final breath at 10:35 p.m., with his wife and daughter at his side.
Today we are watching in awe some possible risks and harms cochlear implant (CI) operations could cause. Although they are sterilized, they do not restore hearing. People with CI do not hear the way hearing people normally hear, and they still need the ADA (American with Disabilities Act) mandate for language access to allow information, knowledge and communication.
With CIs now in vogue, there exist language plans that deny or inhibit babies from exposing and exploring American Sign Language. Baby signing is okay for Deaf and hearing babies, but it's not okay for babies with CIs, which is discrimination in disguise.
The cochlear implant is the most marvelous hearing remedy in the world. It is also one of the most dangerous. For example, AGB folks would create and appropriate such researches and deceptions that with CIs and speech training, Deaf people can succeed in ways of hearing people. By doing this, they promote indirect and implicit child abuses among Deaf babies and babies with CIs.
The ability to hear a dog making three distinguishing sounds or a cat drinking milk has absolutely nothing to do with language and intelligence. It is so individualistic and insolating.
Although both Alexander Graham Bell and AGB folks entertained the world with their marvels and deceptions, they have always remained dangerous to our society. (Think: How many people got in car accident because of cell phones?)
With aloha always from Kalalau
Sent from my T-Mobile Sidekick®
4 comments:
Interesting. Same as recent post on Clerc.
Hi Carl,
That is very interesting. I sure would like to know more about this and where did you find this information so I can study it deeper.
John
Very intriquing. :)
It never ceases to amaze me how many people have this common misconception of CIs. Most of them view it as a cure which is FAR from it! Pretty sad.
AGB's attempt to save President Garfield was very well-known to many people. AGB's so-called device was simliar to today's sonargram/CT scan.
Thank God, AGB's efforts was a total failure. So America would not worship AGB and his ideals for oralizing the deaf children all over the country.
AGB and the oral proponents usually engaged in deceptive practices all the time to serve their own ideological beliefs, not practical matters.
RLM
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