The deaf blogosphere has been a rather busy place lately, with all the fuss over DBC, Deafhood, Barry Sewell, and flamers hurling insults and emotional garbage at people.

I’ve already said quite a bit, and I think there’s only so much I or anyone else can say. At some point, as Aidan Mack pointed out last week, people are going to have to just agree to disagree.

I’d like to move on: life (at least for me!) isn’t all about being deaf, or deaf issues; there’s a lot more to life than just ASL, deafness, etc. So I’m going to discuss a few final thoughts I have, then move on for now. Since humans (ALL humans) seem to have an unfortunate tendency to repeat their mistakes, I have no doubt we’ll be revisiting some of these issues again before long.

First, most of you have by now read J.J. Puorro’s post at his blog site, It Is What It Is. In “Rachel, Ella, Deafread, and Me…”, J.J. echoes some of what I’ve said, such as

Just take a look at the front page of Deafread and the number of hits for each v/blog…those numbers are VERY telling. A post entitled, “Deafread SUCKS” will always get more hits than, “Deafread is the greatest thing since sliced bread”.

He’s right. If you REALLY want to “elevate” the level of conversation, as several bloggers/vloggers like to say, then don’t frequent those bloggers/vloggers that do nothing to contribute anything of value. As J.J. put it,

If you really wanted to hurt a v/blogger…the best way to do it is to not visit their v/blog. I have seen some v/bloggers die a slow death after “shooting themselves in the foot” with their audience because their audience stopped coming back.

People have complained lately of “not feeling safe,” or express feelings that the deaf blogosphere has lost control. I disagree- the blogosphere at large, both deaf and hearing, has never been “safe.” Public forums in this country aren’t “safe.” The same freedoms that grant us the right to speak out are the same freedoms that allow peddlers of hate to speak out. There’s a reason why the ACLU defends both anarchists and the Ku Klux Klan; we all have the right to speak out and to be heard.

This isn’t to say that we should welcome or tolerate bullies or flamers. One solution, as J.J. said, is to avoid places where things are out of control. But this is just ignoring the problem. One of my readers, DT, came up with an interesting solution:

Starting yesterday and whenever I can, I ask bloggers and vloggers to remove comments at their sites when the comments are destructive and I shall keep doing this because I believe this is where it all begins and ends.

I think DT’s right. People claim that it’s not “safe,” that they don’t feel “welcome” and then insist Deaf Read fix the problems. As I pointed out, and Tayler has pointed out, Deaf Read has no control over the comments. Individual bloggers/vloggers have control over their domains. Some bloggers have very strict guidelines for their sites; others simply moderate each and every comment. Deaf DC has a filter for bad language. A few of us don’t moderate at all, such as myself, but that isn’t to say I haven’t considered it, or that I won’t ever begin moderation of comments. I’m just lucky my commenters are on the whole an educated, considerate group of people.

But that doesn’t mean that the citizens of Deaf Read don’t have any power at all; on the contrary, they can visit whichever blogs/vlogs they feel comfortable with. They can speak up. They can complain to the host/owner/moderator. So if you feel someone’s gone way out of bounds, talk to the blog/vlog owner, as DT suggests. Post your own comment, and point out the offender/offending comment. Don’t wring your hands; instead, call them on it.

In fact, this is where I think Deaf Read has actually been rather responsive to the community: it began as a simple aggregator, but now has evolved into so much more. There’s an “Extra” section, where blogs are rated by the community at large. There’s an option to edit which blogs the reader wishes to be exposed to. Hearing bloggers/vloggers are identified by a different color. Honestly, what more can one ask for? The editorial team has actually been supportive of the deaf blogosphere. As J.J. put it, “In short, Deafread has already bent over backwards to accommodate everyone’s needs and the tools are already there to make it all to work for each one of you.”

Additionally, Tayler has opened up not one, but two posts for a conversation between Deaf Read and its readers. The first post only has five comments total, which bothers me; if people are so demanding that a dialogue be established, then they need to take advantage of that (and yes, I’m aware it was heavily moderated and required registration). A second, follow-up post has garnered 26 comments, which actually is less when you realize some of the same people came back to follow up on their original comments/suggestions/questions. Considering the thousands who visit Deaf Read, I’d think more people would be concerned enough to speak out. Guess not…

Now, don’t think I’m an apologist for Deaf Read. I’ve told Tayler publicly and privately some changes are going to need to be made, and I think the compromise he’s come up with needs to be given time to work. But at the same time, all of us are going to need to take responsibility as well, which is where speaking up when people misbehave is important. I’m not calling for censorship, but self-policing.

Back to J.J. for a moment– he really came up with a very thoughtful post, and I want to highlight another issue he pointed out.

The great thing about the Internet is that anyone can express their opinion and it is also the worst thing. This is the reason many v/bloggers feel unprotected, but it is my opinion that you are solely responsible for everything you sign, say, or write on the Internet…

In the end, even if Deaf Read were to collapse, the deaf blogosphere would still have the same problems it does now. That’s because J.J.’s right– in the end, we are all individually responsible for what we say, both on-line and off. That’s why it’s important to speak up when something wrong is happening. It’s why I blog a lot about politics: it’s my way of speaking up when I see something that needs to be changed, or brought to people’s attention. It’s why a lot of us expressed displeasure with quite a few of Ridor’s comments and posts. It’s why there was such a ruckus over Ben Vess’ vlog on Ella Lentz.

When you think about it, we don’t need to be pointing fingers; we’re already self-policing. Ben Vess removed his vlog, and apologized. Ridor has vanished for the time being. What we’re doing is actually working, and trying to force Deaf Read to be something it’s not is not the answer: the answer is within ourselves.

Back to individual responsibility. It’s the main reason I don’t bother moderating. Moderating means I’m intentionally stopping the flow of a natural conversation. I can’t be here 24/7, and neither can most bloggers/vloggers (although I suspect quite a few do a lot more than they should be doing on their computers at work. It’s uncanny how certain bloggers always seem to have the time to respond immediately…). Additionally, if someone wants to say something on this blog and make a fool of themselves, I’m all for it. Its their words, not mine. That doesn’t mean I won’t yank a comment, it just means I don’t need to contribute rope when someone’s already doing a great job of hanging themselves.

One final thought for now: some people have been calling for Mishka Zena and Amy Cohen-Efron to step down, based on the fact that they have blogs/vlogs in addition to their roles as “Human Editors” at Deaf Read. I think Ben Vess put it best in his comment on Tayler’s post on the official Deaf Read blog:

Nobody seems to remember that MZ had her blog LONG before DR started.

Mishka Zena’s posts were attracting attention and comments way before Tayler and Jared conceived Deaf Read. All the editors had their own blogs/vlogs before they joined the Deaf Read team. Are they supposed to suddenly stop having opinions once they join the team? Are they to be silent, to forbid themselves from sharing their knowledge and expertise? I think it’s unfair to give them an either/or choice. This is a very small community of vloggers/bloggers. If new editors were to be chosen, they’d come from among us, those who are already vloggers/bloggers/commenters. I don’t think placing limits on people like that is healthy.

I do agree that when an “editor” writes an independent post, they shouldn’t be the ones to determine where it is placed on Deaf Read. I’m not sure how or if the Deaf Read team could make that transparent, but I hope that they have internal guidelines to prevent this.

I know this is as usual a rather long post. But I have thought about this long and carefully the last couple of days. Even now, with charges and countercharges, I still think a certain level of civility is possible. But it will require effort from all of you, and a willingness to speak up.