3 year old's sign-name banned for looking like a weapon

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As most of you know, I have a hearing problem.

Ironically, my hearing went in to decline as I was part way through my training to become a British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter.

In BSL there aren't signs for each individual name and finger spelling* names can take a long time. As a result, many people choose a 'sign name'. It's basically a word that describes you. My sign name at work is the sign for 'fall over' because when I first started learning to sign I was always so busy concentrating on signing that I would end up tripping over everything when talking to my tutor.

I know very little about ASL (American Sign Language) as it's a lot different to BSL but something's are the same and sign names are one of those things.

Anyway here is a story about a 3 year old boy who uses a sign name at school and has been told that his finger movements violate the schools weapons policy as they look like guns

http://en.webfail.com/47b98e25f0f

I don't know how true or accurate this story is (I dearly wish that it's just made up to be honest!), but if it is true then the school seriously needs to take a good hard look at themselves!

WARNING: There's a little cartoon at the bottom that employs the F word


*Using the sign language alphabet to spell out the name. It'd be like saying to someone "Hi my name is R-A-C-H-E-L" rather than just saying Rachel.

 

There have been dozens of stories like this since Feinstein and Bloomberg tried to ban guns a few months ago. It's pathetic that the gungrabbers feel the need to take out their insecurities on innocent children.

 

It pains me to agree with you () but you're right

 

At work, this woman who is deaf has sign names for everybody in the office. The sign for me is a combination of the letter "M" (for my first name) coupled with the sign for "drunk" because I drink alot.
She's a really nice lady but everybody's sign names in the office seem mean spirited or vulgar.

 

People are people all over regardless of ability/disability. Maybe she's just a cow-bag!

 

Sounds like a story introduced to convince people that those who want to ban guns are unreasonable.

From reading the very opinionated article, it all seems about inciting emotion in readers. No details at all - what was the boy's name exactly? I don't believe it for a second. Maybe you should avoid the website for this reason.

 

Because they post things that might not be true? In that case we should all abandon the internet, TV, radio and newspapers too!

 

No need: You just need to use good judgement as to which stories can and can't be trusted and taken seriously. This one definitely had the political take-home message made first, and the rest of the story constructed around that predetermined conclusion later. And constructed badly, I might add. What's the boy's name in spoken English again? I think that if they added that he goes by his chosen nickname "Double-barrel shotgun", the story would have lost a lot of its take-home message. That's assuming it was even based on a real story.

 

How, precisely? School boards are not exactly known for the judicious use of common sense in enforcing their policy. When I was in high school, they suspended a kid for bringing Binaca. It sounds to me like this is an article about a school making a stupid decision. It happens a lot, since common sense isn't really as common as most of us would like.

 

It actually looks quite real, though it was reported in August of last year.

NBC News

Huff Post

There was even a petition to let the kid keep his sign name: http://www.change.org/hunter.

His name is Hunter Spanjer; location is the Grand Island, Nebraska school district.

And the outcome? It looks like the school district quickly relented, though this info is much harder to come by: http://www.examiner.com/article/school-district-reverses-decision-on-deaf-student-signing-name.

So now it's a non-story. Shame on you, Silvery!

 

Thanks for making that post, Gaear. Last night, I almost posted something and then realized that someone on here would probably actually go to the trouble to find out how legitimate the article was, so I didn't post it. I'm glad I didn't, because it would have sounded really stupid!

On the other hand, I know that even though I don't like to look stupid, I probably wouldn't have tracked down the information, because although I like to share my opinions about just about everything (except politics and religion), this particular story didn't interest me enough to go looking.

So thanks for doing the work for me!

 

You're welcome, V - I did it all for you!

 

What we have here is a case of people missing the forest for the trees. It happens all the time with "zero tolerance" policies and other "get tough on crime" initiatives. These people should be ashamed of themselves for being so utterly ridiculous.

However, I was talking to a friend from the US the other night, and he was telling me about some of the things that people sue each other for down there and I was just floored. Maybe some paranoia on the part of an otherwise level headed person who fears being reailroaded in court by a psycho?

 

Perhaps it was PC overdrive with the intention to protect from any legal issues. Schools get sued by angry parents often. But although it seems to have been well documented in the media (as well as related public campaigns), it was nothing but talk in reality. The school backed down, and probably a lot more easily than the media dares report (otherwise they'd look bad for milking the story in the first place).
Apparently the difficulties came from the H in his name, "Hunter". Still, the first article was wise not to include the name in its opinionated piece. Might've caused confusion and weakened the message.

 

Coin, I really don't think the first linked article had a political message. It was too messy, even for that. When I read it, I didn't have any "Oh no, they're trying to make people who want gun control look stupid" reaction. I agree that it didn't sound like an authoritative report AND you were right to point out that there were no factual details, but the message I got was "Look how stupid school districts are." It also read more to me like an angry blog post than a political propaganda post.