"I know that, dad.  But remember when mom got that new toaster oven?  She asked Aunt Doris how she liked hers before she bought one for us.  Remember?" 

"Yes, but what does -" 

"It's easy, dad," Tommy interrupted.  "If God likes his cochlear implant, humans like me will probably like it, too." 

"If it's good enough for God, it's good enough for you?" I mused. 

"Yeah," Tommy replied. "Look what I drew!"  He proudly displayed a drawing he had made.  It looked like Casper the Friendly Ghost with wires coming out of his head.  However, it was none other than the Supreme Being with an implant!  Although Tommy put up a fuss every Sunday morning when it was time to go to Church (Southern Baptist), God was an important part of his life.  An endorsement from Aunt Doris would do for toaster ovens, but nothing less than God's endorsement would suffice for important decisions like getting an implant.  Only problem was God's presentation of his endorsement was unclear and was subject to debate.  If only he would use PowerPoint, I thought. 

Tommy had incurred a profound hearing loss shortly after his sixth birthday as a result of a rare kind of auto-immune deficiency.  His parents were devastated.  They were an upper middle class, interracial couple (Leo was African-American, Shirley was White) who worked hard to reap the "American Dream."  Their dream did not include having a deaf child.  After undergoing extensive medical and audiological evaluations, Tommy had recently been approved for cochlear implantation surgery.    

As a well-established University Professor in Sociology, Leo had recruited/coerced his grad students to collect relevant medical and sociological articles from libraries and the Internet.  Shirley, a housewife, visited several clinics and consumer groups and had been reading reams of testimonial reports from implant users.   We scheduled another meeting with just the two of them - "adults only" - as it would not be helpful at this stage for Tommy to hear what I sensed would be his parents' ambivalence or fears.  I had an inkling of what was to come.  

A week later we adults met.  "So who wants to start and where?" came my typical open-ended beginning.

Well, that's just it, I don't know.  As Tommy's dad, I'll answer >Yes, of course!'  But that may be because I'm too involved, too close.  The readings I've done as a Sociologist [he produces a copy of Harlan Lane's Mask of Benevolence] is compelling.  Would I have a better life as a White man?  I don't know.  Would I have a better life as a Latino?  I don't know.  Would I have a better life as a piece of broccoli?  I don't know that either."  Leo became philosophical and humorous, as if he was giving an oration to his students.  I bet he was a good teacher. 

"I'm glad you're not a piece of broccoli, dear, although you should eat it more regularly," Shirley joked.  We all laughed.   

"My mother used to force all that green stuff on me," came my contribution.  But then I realized that I had inadvertently been co-opted to distract Leo from making his point which ran counter to Shirley.  To get him back on track, I asked him to say more.  

He responded immediately: "If I wasn't Black, I wouldn't have to fight discrimination.  I wouldn't have been called a Nigger by other White kids throughout my childhood in an almost all White neighborhood.  I wouldn't have been accused of shoplifting more times than I care to remember.  Part of me wishes I were White.  But I'm Black, and I'm proud of being Black!  I wouldn't know me as White."  He paused, apparently in search of words to describe his White "virtual reality."  

"Do you see any advantages to being Black?" I asked. 

"Yeah, of course I do!" came his immediate response.  "It's made me who I am.  It's given me strength, a backbone, the will to fight; it's given me soul; it's given me compassion; it's given me a deep commitment to help change the world and rid it of evil!"  He ended his oration by quoting W.E.B. DuBois, the famed Black activist in the early 1900's.  "I'll never forget how DuBois described the >spiritual strivings' of Black people as >the dogged determination to survive and subsist, the tenacious will to persevere, persist, and maybe even prevail.'" The words and soul of Leo and DuBois permeated the room. 

Positive strivings, however, are not the full story.  As Leo noted, a host of liabilities and challenges are also part of the collective memory of the Black community.  In the words of Cornel West, a contemporary Black professor and protege of DuBois, "These >strivings' occur within the whirlwind of white supremacy - that is, as responses to the vicious attacks on black beauty, black intelligence, black moral character, black capability, and black possibility.  This unrelenting assault on black humanity produced the fundamental condition of black culture - that of black invisibility and namelessness (Gates & West,1996).

"All I want to do is give him a better chance to get the same benefits as others who have normal hearing," she exclaimed.  "He can be proud of being deaf if he wants, but he doesn't have to be deprived of important opportunities!  He can have the best of both worlds!  That's the difference between you and him!  You can't make yourself white and be proud of being black.  Well Tommy can.  He's never going to be completely hearing, even with a cochlear implant.  But he'll have a better chance to succeed in this racist world of ours.  That's all I want for him.  Once he's an adult, he'll make his own choice!" 

She gave an impressive rebuttal to her husband, even quoting a parent of a child who received an implant at the age of three that she had seen on the CBS television program, "60 minutes": "All we have done is given Caitie a tool and an option.  She's experienced the delights of our culture that are not open to someone who cannot hear.  That's not a small thing, to hear the spoken word and to hear the sounds of the world.  And if Caitie chooses at some time in her life that these gifts are no longer pleasurable, she has the option to turn off the implant." (quoted in Biderman, 1998). 

A good debate in the making, I thought.  Leo became quiet, but I could feel his wheels spinning.  Shirley had eloquently articulated one pole of his own ambivalence.  After a long pause, Leo finally retorted: "You're trying to correct something that God made."  

"You always talk about your black Veil which separates you from the white world," Shirley retorted without missing a beat.  "Don't you think a cochlear implant would remove Tommy's Veil from the hearing world?   Don't you think God would want that?"  Shirley knew that the "Veil" metaphor was one that Leo knew too well: a mask behind which one hides both from the world and from oneself.  Again, in the words of Cornel West,  

"The Negro is a sort of seventh son, born with a veil... which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world."  It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity."   

Again Leo became silent.  Perhaps he secretly agreed with Shirley and was playing devil's advocate.  Shirley, too, seemed to be entrenched in her position in opposition to Leo.  Both of them seemed somewhat one-dimensional and caricatured.

I once came across a cartoon depicting a couple on an airplane.  One spouse asks the other, "Do you want to be scared on this trip or should I?"  Instead of each person acknowledging their own ambivalence, they became extremes - scared/not scared.  They, too, became one-dimensional and caricatured.   

Couples typically use so-called "projective identification" to unconsciously "give" their split-off/unacknowledged doubts/fears, etc. to the other to "hold."  In this manner, they do not consciously experience or portray their ambivalence and doubts.  Accordingly, Shirley did not consciously doubt that the implant could be wrong precisely because Leo took up that role.  He "held" her doubts for her.  Similarly, Shirley "held" Leo's positive views on implants so he would be spared "owning" his own ambivalence.   

I found myself wondering about the part of Leo that, by his own admission, wished he could become white.  Would he take a "veil-removing" pill which would change the color of his skin?  

"Leo, what are you thinking?" I asked. 

"That many of my black brothers try to be white by straightening their hair even though it's an excruciating and painful ordeal.  Tommy can try to be hearing by getting a cochlear implant, but at what cost?.  As Shirley said, he'll never really be hearing.  Instead, he'll show his self-hatred and shame about being deaf to himself and to the world.  I just don't know if it's worth it."  He looked down and sighed. 

"Do you support affirmative action?" Shirley asked somewhat provocatively.  Round two had begun.  

"What does that have to do with anything?" Leo exclaimed with sudden annoyance.  Now the debate was becoming more like a marital fight. 

"Affirmative action gives black people the opportunities they need and that they have been deprived of," Shirley responded.  "It helps equalize the playing field.  An implant will equalize the playing field for our son!"   

"I'm all for equalizing the playing field, but at what risk?  This operation terrifies me!  What if something goes wrong?  It's major surgery, for God's sake!"  

This time, Leo's well articulated fear struck a nerve in Shirley.  "I'm scared for that, too," she admitted, now in a softer, more frail voice.  "But the doctors have assured us that there's only minimal risk.  He's done many of these surgeries, all without any real side effects.  For God's sake, Leo, everything comes with a risk. You know that!  But it's worth whatever risk there is to give our son a better life!"  By the end of her reply, Shirley's voice had regained its potency.  

Unfortunately, we needed to stop, midstream in their impressively delivered debate.  I was tempted to extend our meeting, but I was already late for a treatment team meeting at Westboro State Hospital Deaf Unit where I am a consultant.  We made another appointment for the following week.                                                                           

A half-hour later, I arrived at the Unit.  Leo would have been proud of its bi-lingual, bi-cultural philosophy.  The Deaf and hearing staff have taken great pains to co-exist with each other in a culturally affirmative manner.  No support of cochlear implants was likely to happen on this turf.  

I felt ping of annoyance in the pit of my stomach.  It could be indigestion, I first thought, but why would it start at exactly the same time that Neil corrected his oppressive hearing-based, audist, English idiom faux pas?  At least now the differential diagnosis could now be made: I was impatient; it wasn't something I ate.  

"This is stupid!" I screamed silently in my head. (As a hearing person, I was reluctant to scream that objection publicly).  "After all," I thought, "the Deaf Unit decried that us hearies would use our voices during clinical team meetings while the ASL interpreter signs.  "It's your natural language," they said.   

"Well, if it's my natural language, why can't we use our natural idioms?  There's a skilled ASL interpreter in that meeting who could >de-idiomize' Neil's >splitting hairs' idiom." 

"Mike, stop being so bloody concrete.  As a psychologist, what do you think is really going on?" 

I reflected on the consciousness-raising about how hearing people use language and the impossible expectations put on the interpreters to take care of everything.  The Unit posited an essential cross cultural axiom: namely, that interpreters do not solve the communication barriers that occur when two groups have such unequal power and share such different languages and frames of reference.  

I also recalled several discussions I had with Marie Jean Philip, the noted Deaf community leader and teacher who recently passed away.  I can still see her immediate, erudite responses to complex issues, signed in beautiful ASL.  She would have supported the Unit's policy of going out of their way to equalize the playing field.  

I would examine the reasons for my annoyance later, as I couldn't help but think of Leo and Shirley.  After all, cochlear implants is a high tech way of helping to ensure increased accessibility and also of equalizing the playing field.  However, by virtue of my having been trained by culturally Deaf persons and culturally-sensitive hearing persons, I am uncomfortable with the notion of cochlear implants, except for adults who are able to make their own informed decisions.  I often recall many of my teachers who categorize implantation with the "evils" of oralism, Alexander Graham Bell's proposed sterilization of deaf people, and with other acts of oppression which have been levied by hearing persons on to deaf persons.  

Cornel West, an ENT named Dr. Implant, Shirley and Leo, and a few other people I can't make out. 

Tommy notices me and yells, "Hey, Dr. Harvey.  Come join us for an stimulating cross-cultural discourse on balancing possible ethnocentric factors inherent in cochlear implantation verses the utilitarian benefits of such bio-medical technological advances." 

"Neat," comes my reply.  I sit down near the shrimp tempera. 

Dr. Implant:              "Cochlear implants can help deaf children learn spoken language and overcome the
 educational, occupational and social barriers that they often face." 

DuBois:                      "If only you could understand how that's like white people trying to make black folk white.  It's unethical."  Marie emphatically nods her head. 

Dr. Implant:             "Oh, C'mon, Bill!  Ethics have nothing to do with it.  As a physician, my responsibility is to alleviate human suffering, to improve the lives of the patients who entrust their health to me, to explore new medical vistas, to -" 

DuBois:                         

Dr. Implant:              "Hey, no fair!  You died in 1906.  They didn't even have TVs back then, never mind cochlear implants!"    

DuBois:                     "My point is that doing those surgeries may financially benefit your life, but at whose expense?" 

Dr. Implant:                "What are you talking about?"    

DuBois:                      "You tell him, Cornel." [to Cornel West]  

Cornel:                       "They're your words, not mine."

Alex:                         "Absolutely not, Shirley. [looks sternly at DuBois] Bill, what you don't realize is that there are many deaf and hearing- impaired people who hate deafness with a passion and want more than anything else to be more hearing.  They welcome the cochlear implant not as a Veil or a mask, but as a way to learn to listen, to reap the benefits of the world around them, to learn speech and language.  It's a technological godsend!" 

Aunt Doris:                   "Like toaster ovens." 

Dr. Implant:               "They're much more advanced than even toaster ovens." [proceeds to lecture Aunt Doris about the components of an implant.] 

God:                           "Excuse me for barging in like this, but I'm looking for a new toaster oven cuz mine broke.  I miss it having toast in the morning." 

Aunt Doris:                  "Black and Decker makes the best one with great features.  It has automatic cleaning ..." [proceeds to lecture God about the components of a toaster oven.] 

Alex:                           "I didn't know they had those up there." 

God:                           "In heaven, we get extended warranties on all products.  And Mike, by the way - per your comment earlier in this chapter - I'm the one who helped Bill invent PowerPoint, just FYI." 

Mike:                          "Oh God, I'm sorry.  I'll credit you next time." 

DuBois:                      "What's PowerPoint?" 

Tommy:                      "It's Microsoft windows presentation software which requires at least 8 MG of RAM and preferably a Pentium processor." 

DuBois:                        "I see."

Shirley scowls and makes eye contact with Dr. Implant and Alex who are shaking their heads.  Aunt Doris and God look confused. 

Tommy:                      [to God]  "Do you have a cochlear implant?" 

God:                           "What do you think?" came God's knee-jerk response.  A well-known face-saving device among gods when they don't know the answer. 

Shirley:                     "God doesn't need an implant.  But for deaf people, implants help them become more of who they are or could be!  They're able to learn English better, to write better, to know the meanings of idioms like >splitting hairs,' to be more successful..." 

Cornel:                      "I mean no disrespect to the proponents of cochlear implants and for that matter, toaster ovens (looks at Aunt Doris and God).  Black people, like Deaf people, have been taught that they will not succeed in American society if they are fully and freely themselves.  This suppression of black rage - the reducing "the boiling to a simmer" - tends to reduce the tragic to the pathetic.  After playing the role and wearing the mask in the white world, one may accept the white world's view of one's self.  And as I said before, a cochlear implant is a fancy mask for Deaf people to fit into the hearing world; it prevents them from being fully and freely themselves."   

Harlan:                       "I agree.  Too often, help from hearing people, including the good doctor [looks at Dr. Implant], is given with a mask of benevolence."

Leo:                             "Oh Harlan!  I was hoping you'd come." 

Shirley:                      "Oh, joy!" Shirley sighed.   

Harlan:                         "I would have come sooner, but the traffic from NU [Northeastern University] was terrible." 

Tommy:                        "When the third tunnel is finished, it should ease the traffic congestion by a factor of 28%." 

Harlan:                       "I hope so.  Let me read to you a statement that was issued by the Canadian Deaf Association: >The Deaf community views the use of surgery which prevents a child from developing within the [Deaf] cultural minority to be a form of genocide prohibited by the United Nations Treaty on Genocide.  Cochlear implants on young healthy deaf children is a form of communication, emotional, and mental abuse.'" (Canadian Association of the Deaf, 1994).  

Shirley:                      "Genocide!  Are you nuts!!  I don't know whether to laugh or cry at such a crazy, idiotic and pathetic view.  Giving Tommy a gift of having every possible chance to succeed is genocide?  The Deaf community should get its head examined!" 

Toni:                           You know, the genocide idea isn't as idiotic as you may think. [Toni Morrison looks askance at Shirley, Alex and Dr. Implant]. In one of my books, Beloved, I tell the story of a black mother who kills her daughter because she loved her so!  There's a kind of >dirtying-process' that white people do to black people, and that hearing people do to deaf people.  That mother killing her daughter was her attempt to out-hurt the hurter, to resist the >dirtying" process.'  A cochlear implant isn't only a mask; it's both an existential murder weapon - a principle component of the >dirtying" process' - which is used by hearing people to kill deaf people." 

Shirley:                      "I can't believe all this!  (By this time, Shirley is beside herself).  Dirtying process!  Genocide!  Killing deaf people!  I'm simply trying to help Tommy - " 

Leo:                             "Calm down, dear.  Have some more sushi." 

Shirley:                     "You can take that Sushi and ...  I'm not going to sit here an listen to these idiots accuse me of abusing and killing my son.  I don't have to apologize for being hearing and I certainly don't have to apologize for helping Tommy function in the hearing world!"   

Alex:                            "The Deaf community's view is absurd at best.  I can only understand it one aspect.  Deaf culture represents one possible adaptation to deafness.  Cochlear implants are another possible adaptation.  Deaf people should be able to freely choose the kind of adaptation they want to make, whether it be to get a cochlear implant or join the Deaf culture.  And parents of deaf children have a right, and an obligation, to choose what kind of adaptation they are prepared to support on behalf of their children."

Dr. Implant:              "You're absolutely right, Alex!  The rights of parents are of the utmost importance when the medical profession discusses what's best for their children.  Informed parents know that a cochlear implant will help their child to participate more fully in their family life and their community.  It will enable parents to give more of themselves to their child.  All parents have the right to want their child to be an extension - a reflection - of the good parts of themselves.  After all, that's what being a competent parent is all about!"  

Marie:                           "Wait a minute, doc, do you truly believe that all parents have the right to decide what is best for their child?" 

Dr. Implant:             "Why, of course!  We in the medical profession firmly posit that parents not only have the right but have the obligation to make medical decisions for their children." 

Marie:                        "Okay, extending your logic then, deaf parents of hearing children have the right to come to you and request that you make their children deaf by removing their cochleas. Isn't that correct?  It must be if you propose that parent have the right to decide these matters.  These parents would be fully informed; and, as Deaf parents, they - as you just said - are naturally interested in their children participating more fully in their family life and community.  In your own words, "Okay, extending your logic then, deaf parents of hearing children have the right to come to you and request that you make their children deaf by removing their cochleas. Isn't that correct?  It must be if you propose that parent have the right to decide these matters.  These parents would be fully informed; and, as Deaf parents, they - as you just said - are naturally interested in their children participating more fully in their family life and community.  In your own words, >They have the right to want their child to be an extension - a reflection - of the good parts of themselves.'" 

Dr. Implant:              "That's absurd!  That means I should take out the eyes of sighted children born to blind parents, right?" 

Marie:                          "It depends on your bias.  Eight-year old Tommy over here is bi-racial, having a black father and white mother.  If it were medically possible, would you consent to Leo and Shirley requesting you to make him all white or all Black?" 

Dr. Implant:              [stuttering while his face turns red] "Now, wait a minute young lady.  Deafness is a medical problem that ought to be cured.  It's not like being Black or White!  If a device were invented that could help visually-impaired children see even a little bit more, who wouldn't want one for their child?"

Alex:                            "I agree!" 

Marie:                       "Being Deaf isn't a disability.  Deaf people don't need to be fixed!  Cochlear implants are dangerous and experimental!"  Harlan nods his head in agreement. 

Mike                           "I must say that we hearing people need to accommodate and be mindful of cross-cultural ethics.  They're vital to -" 

Tommy:                       "Don't be so self-righteous, Mike!  Why did you react with acerbity at the hospital clinical meeting when Neil corrected himself for using an English idiom?" 

Mike:                           "What does acerbity mean?"