This nomenclature is
hardly defensible on any ground, and by it the education of the deaf is
not even given its true status.

As a further illustration of the general feeling, though rather of
different order, may perhaps be cited the attitude of the general
insurance companies toward the deaf. Though some of the companies accept
the deaf at their regular rates, a number refuse them altogether, while
others limit their liability or demand an extra premium.[143] This is
largely because of the fear that the deaf are more liable to accidents
than other people; but in point of fact the deaf seem to be a long-lived
people, and it is likely that with greater statistical knowledge
concerning them, most of the discrimination would cease.[144]

NEED OF A CHANGED REGARD FOR THE DEAF

Thus in many ways are the deaf made to suffer from popular
misconceptions, and quite unnecessarily. Too long have designations been
employed regarding them that call up undeserved associations. Too long
have they been set down as a strange and uncertain body of human beings,
removed in their actions, manners and modes of thought from the rest of
society. The interests of the deaf require a different consideration and
treatment. They demand that the deaf be regarded exactly as other
people, only unable to hear. Theirs will be a great boon when they are
looked upon no more as a distinct and different portion of the race, but
entirely as normal creatures, equally capable and human as all other
men.[145]

FOOTNOTES:

[136] Very often in the public mind the deaf and the blind are
associated, the two classes sometimes becoming more or less merged the
one into the other, and the problems of the one are not infrequently
assumed to be those of the other. As a matter of fact, there is but one
point of similarity in the two classes--both are "defective" in that
they are deprived of a most important physical sense. The gulf that
really separates the blind from the deaf is far deeper than that which
lies between either of the two classes and the normal population.

[137] In this connection it may be interesting to note the regard for
the deaf as has been indicated by the deaf characters that have been
created in fiction. Though not a large number are found, there is
displayed towards them an attitude largely of kindly sympathy, in some
cases mingled with wonder. Such characters appear in Lew Wallace's
"Prince of India", where three deaf-mutes are inst