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I was walking on the street the other day when I heard a man mocking someone, making funny grimaces into his face and laughing hard before telling the poor lad to piss off. The man seemed clearly scared and lost and he was frantically moving his hands while making strange noises. After that specimen of a human had left, I approached the guy slowly and asked if he needed any help. His face immediately lit up and a while later I managed to tell him how to get where he wanted to go.

He wasn’t sick, he wasn’t offensive; he was just deaf.

Situations like the one I described above can occur every day all over the world. We want to call ourselves humans, we are the only living creatures able to feel all sorts of emotions- love, compassion, understanding – and yet we make fun of anything or anyone that is different in any way.

Deaf people fall in one of these groups that are worth laughing at and bullying according to so many wise asses out there. What these macho guys are unaware of is that deaf people have their own language of communication and it is as complex as any other language in the world; maybe even more so as it combines both hand movements and facial expressions. And even though these people do have their own language of communication, they still learn written English or any other language.

You would be surprised to find out that just like with spoken languages, there are a number of foreign sign languages. Contrary to common belief, sign language is not universal. So, an English deaf man would need to learn the Greek sign language if he wanted to communicate in Greek. Impressive, I know.

So, imagine how frustrated these people would feel if you choose to ignore or even worse make fun of them. I’m not saying you should be able to understand their language, but you could find ways to help them the way you would help any other person asking you for help or guidance. A piece of paper and a pen would be a good start.

It’s like you visiting another country and asking for help, but you face suspicious or laughing faces instead. Well, now imagine facing that attitude in your own country. That’s what deaf people have to deal with every single day. They are eternal outcasts in their own country just because they are “imperfect”.

It doesn’t matter if they are brilliant at what they do, it doesn’t matter if they graduated first in their class or if they have found the cure for cancer. They will still be the guys that make weird faces and speak with their hands to most people.

You forget that before you could utter a word all you did was use your hands to show your parents what you wanted. It was the hands and the funny grimaces that let them know what you needed every time. Wait. That sounds so much like sign language, right? It’s what you do every time your mouth is full with a bite of a delicious dessert and you want to let your friends know how yummy it is. You give them a thumbs-up and roll your eyes in satisfaction. Sign language again!

You, subconsciously, use your hands and intuition to figure things out so many times you don’t even realize.

If you observe two deaf people talking to each other, you will understand more than you could ever imagine. There’s a logic behind every gesture and every facial expression they make.

Deaf people aren’t just that. They, too, have abilities and preferences. They might not be able to listen to music the way we do, but they can still watch a movie and cry or freak out. They might be afraid of the dark just like so many of us are and they do break down more often than you know. They fall in love and they enjoy all the little pleasures you do.

They are not incapable; they just have a minor disability, an imperfection.

Who’s perfect anyway?

Author: Georgia Efstratiou

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