#because i thought deaf meant you can't hear at all - not even with hearing aids or anything

[ranticore]

how Sirenians deal with disability?

Depends on the culture, and there are hundreds if not thousands of cultures in Siren. To give specific examples -

I've drawn a "shortstrider" harpy wearing assistive devices on his feet - this type is relatively widespread in the coastal regions of the East continent, flightless but without the thick plantar padding that lets them walk easily for long periods on the ground. On earth we call those assistive devices "shoes". While technically a disability anywhere else in the continent, it's common enough in these coastal fishing village regions that it is not remarked upon and getting the right footwear is a simple process. The same harpy in the Spire would be pretty disadvantaged as the place is set up to privilege flight and perching, and a shortstrider's feet are not setup to perch either. In this case the disability is completely relative in the extent to which it disables.

Qedivar can't fly. In the Spire it's not much of a locomotive issue as there are rope ladders everywhere and he can perch (like I said the infrastructure is designed for perching and flying). There aren't any assistive devices he could use to make him fly, and once it becomes clear that his reluctance to fly isn't just because he doesn't like exercise (which was his original cover story), the others treated him with at best pity and at worst contempt. The culture of extreme open emotions & communication in the Spire meant that if people thought less of him, they would tell him right out. Nothing is swept under the rug at the Spire and often times people find it refreshing and freeing, even if what's 'refreshing' is people saying to your face that you suck and not whispering it behind your back (neurodivergent people with trouble reading social situations loooove the communication culture here). He also wears glasses, which, like the shoes in coastal regions, are nbd. Bad eyesight is common among scholars anyway (all that reading)

In pelagic villages south of the Western continent (Huarva's home), the culture of communication is the extreme opposite. It is indirect to the point where you should simply assume that every word out of someone's mouth has at least ten different hidden meanings. Nobody ever says what they mean (and it is considered crass to do so), which is a nightmare for anyone who struggles to read social cues. Life in this region is harsh and risky, and villages might struggle to survive year on year if the currents don't bring enough food or seeds for their crops. A physical disability that limits one's ability to contribute (whether by hunting, farming, fishing, etc) will be punished. Your daily contributions measure how much food you can eat from their big eternal stew pot, so sub-par contributions have the effect of slowly starving out people who don't work. Due to the communication culture, there's never anything as dramatic as a "we don't want you here, leave". You're just supposed to get it. You're supposed to infer that you should leave, that you're not wanted. And if you can't, tough lol.

Finally I guess i should talk about the longwing visors. These make wonderful assistive tools, particularly for harpies who are hard of hearing or visually impaired (it's why Terwyef wears one, he can't see well without it due to his albinism. for deaf harpies the automatic transcription feature is a great help). Any longwing harpy can interview at the hall of faces to get a chance to claim a visor. Whether or not it's being used to aid a disability is not considered during the interview process; you get a visor if you can match a character. But there have been occasions where the guardian of the hall of faces intentionally tipped the scales in favour of a disabled candidate, recognising that a visor would be a significant improvement to their quality of life.

[sock-ness-monster]

The following post is about Hawkeye and the way that people write his lip reading in fanfictions that I've read recently

Listen,,, the last thing I wanna do here is be mean, I know for sure that no harm was intended in any of this, I just wanna share my point of view on something real quick, kay? Love that you're acknowledging his deafness, love it. I just thought I'd share some things from my perspective that you may not have thought about. No worries tho if youve done this! No hard feelings! So, I am not fully deaf, I can't justify the cost of a hearing aid just yet. But part of that is because I'm really good at lip reading, I've had to be. Between that and sitting in the front row of class, I do all right. But about 75% of what I can get is from lip reading.

Now, a huge part of lip reading is using context clues as well, which is mainly what I wanted to talk about here. Something I see a lot that irks me a little every time is a sentence like this;

"What were you [ewe?] thinking?"

I see this ALL. THE. TIME. WHY.Assuming that I got all those other words, which the phrasing implies, why on EARTH would I think you're trying to talk to me about a female sheep right now? Yes, those are homonyms. Yes, they do look the same when you're mouthing them. But keep the context in mind. We were not and have not ever talked about sheep. There's no reason for that to cross my mind when I'm reading your lips. I see the word 'you' all the time and I know where it appears in common sentences. Unless we are actively around sheep the word 'ewe' isn't going to cross my mind!

For me, at least, it would go something closer to this;

"Water you thinking?" [Oh, what were]

People run their words together, accents make it tough, if they're chewing gum while talking it's nearly impossible. Letters that are made in the back of your mouth are the ones I miss, I can't see that, so like g and h. S and t are hard to tell apart, and n and l sometimes. Things like that. If it's a word I've never heard before I'll ask for them to spell it, it's generally faster than repeating it a few times and me still not getting it. And I almost never figure out the words in the middle of the sentence they're saying, I'm still focusing on getting the next few words so I can use context to help figure it out, so there's generally a delayed reaction where I put it all together after you speak, so the corrections would be at the end. And, sometimes, I get something absolutely off-the-wall bonkers not even close no idea how I got that from what you're saying. Put something like that in your fic, if you'd like. Often I'll just nod my head and agree and then realize hours later what it was meant to be.

Anywho. That's my personal experience anyway. Do with this information what you will.

[despair-to-future-arcs]

Let’s check it out!

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*After that Nagi show the CCTV footage to Mahiru and Hajime which the 2 watch*

And there you go, this what I saw in the footage and why I took an issue with it.

Natsumi bullied a deaf mute girl very badly and even destory her hearing aids which I'll say this much, are very expensive and Katsuo getting crippled meant he had to change his whole life to accommodate for that.

So sure I twisted your words but you now see why I took an issue with Natsumi, she gave no shits what she did and hurt people; all because she was Yakuza thus she can do whatever she wanted and seeing that knife I can't blame Hatomi's reaction since Natsumi was a geninue threat.

O-Oh...oh my god, that's... good god that's awful...

No kidding, I knew Natsumi was trouble but she really hurt a lot of people, didn't she?

But yeah, Hajime - this was the type of bullying Natsumi did to me and threaten me as much as she did.

I really thought she going to kill me so I kept quiet; I...I was scared what people would think of me... that's why I didn't say anything..

Ye-Yeah... I can see why you didn't, this is so mess up...

Now do you get it Hajime? I know you may think I'm being harsh here but they need to realize this or they won't get better.

...It's still hard to watch.

Yeah... it is and Nagi, I'm sorry that I say all that; Natsumi did hurt a lot of people and no one deserve what happen.

But I don't think Natsumi or Hatomi deserve to die, no one does and I wish there were other ways to solve this.

I know, honestly I did think sending Natsumi to boarding school was the better option.

But Mahiru, given you saw this - I'm really sorry this happen to you; you didn't deserve to get bullied for it or killed for what happen but hopefully now things will get better.

Yeah and seeing all this, I... can see what you meant when it came to me enabling Hiyoko and seeing how Natsumi acted; I did remember her saying that bullying Mikan was just 'harmless fun' but I know Mikan didn't seem to like it...Hiyoko really is no different from Natsumi in some bits except for threatening others with a knife...

[happy-xy]

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