Here's an interesting story about how some Deaf are demand the right to genetically engineer deaf children.

And this is a topic in which I feel as if I have a little bit of insight. A shred at least. Perhaps. The current Deaf / deaf culture war is pretty fascinating. Here's the low-down: Organic deafness is constant--stemming from any number of genetic or functional abnormalities. However, functional deafness is on the steep decline, as over 50% of all deaf kids are getting cochlear implants. (And that statistic is old--circa 2003--and is on a steep rise.) So in essence, deaf culture is dying. And many of the culturally elite deaf are afraid of such an outcome. As it stands now, they have created their own culture in which they have equal chances in life. Their culture minimizes (if not eliminates) any social benefits from hearing--to the point where it's actually frowned upon. But it takes a critical mass of people to believe and participate in this system for it to work. And with infant cochlear implant becoming standardized, this critical number will be lost. And when this critical number is lost, and when Deafness ceases to be it's own functional culture, the deaf population (i.e., those who cannot use implantation) will (again) be societally marginalized like once before. (Seriously--think about it. There's handicap accessibility all over the place; there's even morbidly obese accessibility now. But the deaf really do get left out of much of society--a reality that I wouldn't have fully understood had I not been in a deaf environment.)

This is exactly why the older elite Deaf faculty instigated the student uprising at Gallaudet a few years ago. And while they achieved their short term gains, they have killed their golden goose. Gallaudet is redundant, as deaf can get free translating services at any public university. Congress simply kept them in their budget--until they acted like embarassing whiny brats on an international stage. So their budget has been cut by about 50%, and they are about to lose their accredation--which means that no federal grants can be used. (Which is 100% of all deaf people, pretty much.) So generations of entitlement led to low standards, which only increased the sense of entitlement--which is now in stark contrast to a dying Deaf culture.

So when you hear about Deaf couples wanting to produce a Deaf baby--it's about preservation of a culture. Almost like native americans wanting little native american babies, so on, and so forth. But either way, deafness (0r Deafness, rather)--as we know it, will end in our lifetimes.