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Faking Blindness / Deafness

Human_84

Human_84

Somewhat human
Joined
Mar 30, 2005
Messages
1,330
I've heard stories about people who have pretended to be deaf all their lives. On one occasion I heard of someone faking blindness their whole lives. But I can find nothing on google search for it. Any leads?
 
everything is, elffriend :D

This isn't very useful, but someone fakes blindness almost all the way through that film the house of the flying daggers. I thought it was a very clever made-up device, but maybe it has precedent.
 
True, true, I know one woman who did sign language so she could pull a deaf man as she thought deaf men would be desperate for a woman :shock:
 
Until you find out she's faking, I'd thought it was an oriental tradition for that kind of tale - along the lines of Zatoichi, the blind swordsman. Who in the recent film adaptation, is implied to be faking, though in fact is not (or is faking faking not being blind!)
 
Elffriend said:
Apparently it is also a fetish :shock:
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Thereby reinforcing my belief that, given enough time, people will derive sexual satisfaction from anything, no matter how bizarre.
 
Oh my word, some people truly WANT to be deaf and not just pretend to be!!!?

"I was wondering what I could do to destroy the auditory nerve without having surgery. Could I take hazardous drugs? Could I light my eardrum with a match? Could I pour poisonous chemicals in my ears? If no, what should I do? I want to be totally deaf. I have tried exposing them to really high intensity sound to damage them, but the hearing keeps coming back."
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There's an episode of 'Bonanza' where a woman is blinded in an accident and is about to marry the man who accidentally caused it when her sight returns unexpectedly. She carries on pretending to be blind and is rumbled by the prospective father-in-law.

I also personally know someone whose girlfriend was legally blind, or partially sighted at least, and she played on it like mad to get him to run round after her. :lol:
 
Thanks for this one guys - I'm going to have to research this one now :D
 
I read/heard somewhere (probably on this forum) that a lot of deaf people would not want to get their hearing back if they could because it is part of their culture. In which case, it makes sense to me that there would be some people that want to be a part of the deaf culture, but feel like they can't truly be a part of it unless they are deaf.
 
There was a guy in Australia who pretended to have been blinded in an accident while incarcerated, and used it to get early release and compensation. Can't remember how he was rumbled, but he kept it up for some time afterwards, in case the police caught him.

There was a film about it, called Hoodwinked or something similar, I think.

RainyOcean: There is a growing movement to have deafness seen as a culture rather than a disease. It raises some ethical issues with regard to cochlear implants and other treatments.

In this week's New Scientist there's an article on a similar movement amongs "Aspies" (people with Asperger's Syndrome) to be seen the same way. Looks like there's a growing tendency for this kind of thing.
 
anome said:
RainyOcean: There is a growing movement to have deafness seen as a culture rather than a disease. It raises some ethical issues with regard to cochlear implants and other treatments.
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Just because deaf people have a culture doesn't mean that deafness IS a culture, surely? And it's not like anyone's forcing them to get cochlear implants.
 
I'm sure I've heard of some deaf people who specifically wanted to have deaf children so they'd be part of the same culture, poss. within the context of 'designer' babies.

That does start to get ethically challenging.
 
This does sound like in-group/outgroup posturing. While it is understandable that deaf people should not want to be seen ( :oops:) as weak etc; I find it strange that one would want to wish a disability onto a new life in order to vindicate one's own life. However, I really don't think that we should abort just because of deafness - though I support the right of parents who would.
I agree - ethical dilemmas
 
fluffle said:
anome said:
RainyOcean: There is a growing movement to have deafness seen as a culture rather than a disease. It raises some ethical issues with regard to cochlear implants and other treatments.
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Just because deaf people have a culture doesn't mean that deafness IS a culture, surely? And it's not like anyone's forcing them to get cochlear implants.
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Well, that's part of the debate. And deaf children of hearing parents (or parents that don't share that view of deafness) may be considered to be "forcing" them to have the implants. In the same way (although not really) that some see male circumcision as barbaric. (Please, let's not go there, the current discussion is interesting enough.)
 
I think we should (if people agree) try and stick to social psychological explanations rather than going down the egregious route of sociology (and its many, many errors in thinking, application etc etc)
 
One of the pivotal parts of the Cold Case episode "The Woods" (season 2 episode 23):

http://coldcase.de/modules.php?name=Recap2x23

is that the mother of the serial killer (the usually ncie chappie from Enterprise and The Others) wasn't actually blind but suffering from hysterical blindness.*

So if you throw something like that into the mix where does one draw the line on being faking being blind?

* Oddly the episode was rather chuckles free
 
We used to have a woman come in to work who insisted that all her food was cut up into little pieces because she was blind (Sandwiches had to be cut into eight for instance.) and I always maintained that she wanted her food cut up for other reasons. She used to come in on her own and even on her first visit she could easily manouver around the tables in a cramped and dingy space. Plus, she never had any problems locating her cutlery or salt and pepper.

My father on the other hand used to have to be led because he wasn't familiar with the layout (He has retinitispigmentosa and has been blind since his early twenties). He can walk around the village no problems because he has lived there all his life, but new places take some time to get used to. I believe that some people just exaggerate their deficiencies for attention, but I can't fathom why a person with sight would pretend otherwise. For one thing it would just be far too stressful- it must be so easy to make a mistake.
 
Think of all the things that people do for attention. How many dull introverted girls do you know that are psychic or sensitive. How many people have you met that are 'sooo stressed and depressed' that they must have prozac, and then go on at length about their problems. Though I am aware that there are non-dull people who claim to be psychic and real cases of depression ('cured' by prozac), I passionately believe that when people don't have much in their life to give them self-esteem/worth (or make them stand out), they opt for lifestyles/choices whereby they can become instant experts or the focus of attention. Thus they are not alone and get self validation. Ofcourse, knowing you are faking blindness/deafness does always contain the seed of worry about being found out! Further, I don't believe that hysterical blindness/deafness counts as faking it - cognitive overload can do strange things :shock:
 
Gadaffi_Duck said:
I think we should (if people agree) try and stick to social psychological explanations rather than going down the egregious route of sociology (and its many, many errors in thinking, application etc etc)
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LOL - the thread will go where it will go ;)

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There is also the issue that a lot of peope who are registered blind have some kind of sight so someone you may assume couldn't see may be able to perform some tasks that might lead someone to think they are faking it.

Also as Eric D says blind people can often function very well when they know the layout of a place. I do think the cuttng up of food seems a little faddy - I'm sure blind people can cope with Big Food although removing fish bones might be a wise precaution.

We should bear in mind that people will fake just about anything for a whole rnage of reasons - see the Victimhood thread for more discussion:

www.forteantimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14866

but we should try to avoid being too cynical ;)
 
It would really be depressing to be totally deaf, and totally blind.

I wonder if theres ever been a person who lacked all 5 senses. Or even 4 out of 5. Emperor probably has a link at the top of his head, hehe. Emps?
 
Human_84 said:
It would really be depressing to be totally deaf, and totally blind.

I wonder if theres ever been a person who lacked all 5 senses. Or even 4 out of 5. Emperor probably has a link at the top of his head, hehe. Emps?
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LOL - well I suspect once quite a few went it would make it difficult to assess the loss of the other senses. I'm sure that although rare it has happened. Johhny Got His Gun is the closest thing I can think to it and explores the horror of being trapped in your own head: deaf, blind and crippled (grim but imprptant):

www.imdb.com/title/tt0067277/

It has only just been released on DVD (and apparently not yet in the States?):

www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0002 ... ntmagaz-21
www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000A0I ... enantmc-20

and there was a review of it FT pos. last year.
 
Just to skip back to the issue of deaf culture...

There is a growing movement to have deafness seen as a culture rather than a disease. It raises some ethical issues with regard to cochlear implants and other treatments.
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... i was just reading about Sign Language and I know there's a thread about it somewhere - sign language of course being a full language with grammar, mother-tongue speakers, regional dialects etc. The bit that particularly struck me is that SL doesn't really have an effective written language, so BSL users will generally write in English which is their second language

In that context the idea of Deaf culture has more resonance, n'est-ce pas?
 
I've read stories in the newspapers about deaf people who get their hearing back after a surgical operation loses a lot of friends among the deaf because they are no longer deaf.

Same goes for blind people
 
lemonpie said:
... i was just reading about Sign Language and I know there's a thread about it somewhere - sign language of course being a full language with grammar, mother-tongue speakers, regional dialects etc. The bit that particularly struck me is that SL doesn't really have an effective written language, so BSL users will generally write in English which is their second language
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I was told that not all deaf people use Sign Language, though. So we could be talking about several deaf cultures - those who use SL, those who lipread, etc.
 
Gadaffi_Duck said:
Think of all the things that people do for attention. How many dull introverted girls do you know that are psychic or sensitive. How many people have you met that are 'sooo stressed and depressed' that they must have prozac, and then go on at length about their problems.
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Hey as a dull introverted person with pychic powers I find that offensive - now I need some prozac in order to calm down
 
Sorry I meant to say that this thread reminds me of a busker in my locality who suddenly went blind overnight - how strange (and I don't think he was really playing the keyboard either). In some parts of the world the beggars do deform themselves deliberately in order to get more money
 
I don't know if all deaf people use sign language or not. :? I do know that there are different types of sign language and that in some remote areas the deaf have even invented their own form of it.
 
zoe said:
In some parts of the world the beggars do deform themselves deliberately in order to get more money
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Zoe thats horrible!!!! :(

Any more details???? :)
 
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