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I have inquired about the use of AGBAD over at Tayler's post, which I assume you picked up.
I did some checking -- google and live search, there are plenty of dictionaries and articles that state AGBAD is AG Bell.
Acronym Finder
The Free Dictionary
Theres more but your HaloScan comments prevents me from putting more links..
search for agbad at
www.all-acronyms.com
dictionary.com
Need we find more?
I, too, had my eyebrows raised. Especially with the University Letterhead and to some degree, AGBAD acronym. Being a former secretary in my past profession, using a company or university letterhead does clearly indicate the letter is backed by said company or University.
As for AGBAD, someone mentioned in Schwartz's blog comment section that even AGB's grandson uses that in his blog.
I'm more "surprised" with the letterhead, but then, Perhaps I shouldn't be...we all know how lawyers can be.
Jay, it'd be a bit disengenious to say such a thing in a time when people are using it now as a derogatory term. It's not like 5 or 10 years ago. This "AGBAD" thing has been going on well over a year. Unless Schwartz has been clueless all those months/years and dooes not read Deaf blogs (very unlikely given the letter) and assumed AGBAD is "okay" to put down in his letter. The thing is, you don't see AGBAD mentioned in any of the current AGBell.org website now. Even NAD knows this but not to a simple law professor who ought to know that anyway?
The context of that letter is sprinkled with negative connotations. It'd be disingenious for a person to even try and deny that.
Candy,
The person who mentioned AGBell's grandson is Brian Riley, so take everything he says with more than a grain of salt. He is also "Deep Ears" and writes stuff for Eggbert on agbellinfo.com
How can you say "take it with a grain of salt" if I proved it? It's proven that that's exactly what Bell's great-grandson did. Go look for yourself.
http://tinyurl(dot)com/2uwds2
Try this one:
http://tinyurl.com/2uwds2
And where does it say his grandson had anything at all to do with the organization? And how old is the link?
There's a difference between a grandson saying "AGBAD" versus an organization that say "AGBell" whose website use of the word (www.agbell.org) goes back more than 11 years.
http://web.archive.org/web/*/htt.../
www.agbell.org
Perhaps Mr. Schwartz, Esq. felt that he could lend legal weight to the AGBell's protest by the Deaf community in order to "legitimize" it. As we all know, lawyers are known for the hyperbole in their closing arguments to the jury.
Ummm....what's the big deal here?
Schwartz must have felt passionate about the subject matter...
The only thing I find a bit excessive is using a Syracuse University letterhead...but most professors have tenure...so I guess he felt comfortable doing so because of his tenure?
I 100% agree with your letter analysis, while well-written and intelligent, too many negativisms. I can't take a letter seriously that calls the organization AgBAD, at that point the letter becomes radical. The first couple of paragraphs really pulled me in, then the tone changed. That nazi shit has got to go and is irresponsible for a lawyer to address. McConnell...getting better and better - LOVE reading your blog! Stimulating good morning wake up call, thank you, Jodi
Hi Mike
The references to Nazi Germany were over the top. I'm not sure why he even thought that was a relevant point. Everyone knows Nazis killed Deaf people. Is there a proven link to AGBELL here? I agree with you about the AGBAD acronym as well. I've only been reading DeafRead a few short months and already picked up that AGBAD was inappropriate. He should have known better. I'm not sure what to think of his use of the letterhead. Surely he's not representing Syracuse. HMMM. You've made some good points here.
Kim
Mike, please remove the above comment. That was not written by me. I don't appreciate people impersonating me.
On second thought, don't remove it. I'll need it as evidence.
Do you have any criticism for Paotie's "GoNad"? What's the difference?
DP, please email me so I know it's really you. Thanks. And I can remove it per your request if need be.
Do you see Paotie use an official letter head? Any Nazi references? Is he using his professional title to attack anyone or organization? Is Paotie making personal statement on his behalf or his university? Is his an official letter to begin with? Or just a personal commentary, freely made over the internet on his own personal blog? Yes, Bob. There is a difference when professionalism and use of title call into play here.
I'll be curious to know if Syracuse U. has any comment on use of its letterhead. Possibly they may even back their professor's position. Weirder things have happened in university politics and their sense of social responsibility.
However, the letter is a strongly worded wake-up call to the insidiousness of audism as practiced by AGBell and cites its historical background.
Schwartz' letter has an important impact and your comments were frankly picky and attempts to weaken its message. That did no favors to the segment of the Deaf community that it refers to...as a spokesperson for the oral deaf and hard of hearing, perhaps you should confine your remarks to your area of expertise.
Dianrez, if you hadn't noticed, this is called the internet. This is my blog and vlog. I have opinions. Professional opinions. Experiences, understandings and knowledge on many subject matters. Please do not advise me on what area I should or should not comment on.
Still, what Schwartz did was to use Godwin's Law in the guise of "history" because the content and context of that letter over a specific subject matter frames it that way. Guilt by association so to speak as if AGBell was solely responsible for the murders of millions of people during Hitler's regime. It'd be disingenuous to feign innocence while practicing Godwin's Law using Nazi history used in a letter as part of the argument.
Schwartz didn't laugh after mentioning AGBAD, compared to Paotie's hysterical laughs with "GoNad". I think that's the huge difference.
Everyone knows Nazis killed Deaf people. Is there a proven link to AGBELL here?
Kim, Schwartz implied a connection between AGB's eugenicist beliefs and the Nazis' program of eugenics. In 1912, Alexander Graham Bell attended the first International Congress of Eugenics in London, England, which he was representing as the chairman of a board of scientific advisers for the Eugenics Record Office in Cold Spring Harbor Lab in New York. In 1921, he was the honorary president of the 2nd International Congress of Eugenics, among the attendees was Ernst Rüdin, the Swiss eugenicist whose works and ideas later became the basis for the Nazi racial policy and was personally awarded by Hitler himself. Bell died the next year.
Eugenicists from all over get together every few years, exchanged and discussed ideas and scientific papers about what to do with the unfit and the fit. They maintained communication via letters or phones over the years when they were not together in order to keep the alive the idea and the necessity of eugenics.
I won't be surprised if the AGBell organization would try to erase any mention or connection between AGB himself and the eugenic movement of the early 20th century as to protect his reputation and legacy. Such an effort would be futile.
The reference of Nazi's is a great comparison because Hitler was an Eugenist and so was AGB. Both men were nothing but pure evil so to compare these two is perfectly said
Kind of like saying that Planned Parenthood (an organization that favors abortion) is equally evil, Jacqueline? Since they, too, were part of that same eugenicist movements where Margaret Sanger, the founder of what later became Planned Parenthood, was also a very vocal eugenicist. After all, you are making that correlation using guilt by association. I should, too!
***************
At a March 1925 international birth control gathering in New York City, a speaker warned of the menace posed by the "black" and "yellow" peril. The man was not a Nazi or Klansman; he was Dr. S. Adolphus Knopf, a member of Margaret Sanger's American Birth Control League (ABCL), which along with other groups eventually became known as Planned Parenthood.
Sanger's other colleagues included avowed and sophisticated racists. One, Lothrop Stoddard, was a Harvard graduate and the author of The Rising Tide of Color against White Supremacy. Stoddard was something of a Nazi enthusiast who described the eugenic practices of the Third Reich as "scientific" and "humanitarian." And Dr. Harry Laughlin, another Sanger associate and board member for her group, spoke of purifying America's human "breeding stock" and purging America's "bad strains." These "strains" included the "shiftless, ignorant, and worthless class of antisocial whites of the South."
**********
http://www.blackgenocide.org/sanger.html
And can I say that today's Planned Parenthood practices the same/similar idea of eugenic to that of Nazi Germany that the founder, Sanger, deeply believed in? Same as Bell? Or am I really raising Godwin's Law just to make a disingenious argument here?
Good analysis, Mike.
If Schwartz is representing Syracuse University, why did he not cc'ed the Chancellor?
Just wondering, Mike.
Bob Rourke, it's called word play because putting "Go" with "NAD" (e.g. Go NAD!) is nothing more than a play with words thinking it's funny. It's called a "double entredre." Having two meanings. English speakers love word play. I do that all the time. Even visually (e.g. my recent vid with the coke can).
I, too, played with a similar word with my own organization (now defunct) called "North America Deaf Strongman" games. Or NADS. And at the bottom I put down "Go NADS Games! Only those with enough balls can compete!"
http://www.deafstrongman.com
Scroll down at the very bottom to see it.
Your argument, Robert, is, at best, very weak.
To me "AGBAD" is a bit extreme but over-all letter was good and to the point. In my professional opinion, I believed that a professional professor should have used better wording in the "official letter".
One think I will know that this letter is "provoking" people's thoughts as AG Bell's did. Maybe there will be some good out of this letter.
Jim
I think the letter was poorly written with negative connoations and the use of guilt by association with Hitler. Professionalism does come into call here, too. It could've been worded much better to make a strongly worded point in a personal letter. NAD did well in their approach with their letter (though I may disagree on some points there). Invoking Godwin's Law is clearly an attempt at desperation.
So, don't use it.
Mike, please check your email regarding my request for the IP address of that comment regarding Brian Riley.
Please use more exact language. It would have been better if you had written: "the IP address of that comment about Brian Riley."----"about" instead of "regarding," because "regarding" is ambiguous in that context.
Thank you.
Rob,
Thank you for explaining AGB's involvement with Hitler in more detail. Putting it in perspective, many Americans were enamoured with Hitler early on, including Charles Lindbergh. I don't believe any of them realized he had plans to kill people in cold blood. Hindsight is always 20/20.
As for eugenics, I guess you could say the world is still dabbling in that if you consider where we're headed with modern medicine-- identifying genes that cause "abnormalities," disability, disease. . .?
Murdering people already alive is evil. Striving to produce healthier people is not. Who of us would not prefer to produce a healthy child over one with disabilities given the choice? Leave deafness out of it.
Kim, no problem but one thing... AGB was never involved with Hitler personally. Neither of them have ever met and the Nazi party have yet to form when AGB died in 1922. Eugenicists came from all over, including German and Swiss eugenicists and could have interacted with AGB in the 1st and 2nd International Congress meetings.
Yes, the world of modern medicine have made rapid advancements in term of learning and understanding new ways of diagnosing "old ills" in new light, thanks to the power of the computer, the Internet and improved knowledge in the last few decades. The science of eugenics is somehow mixed up in all these medicinal improvements and advancements.
The question of deafness is up to the parents when they're having a child, not up to the scientists nor the government. Personal decisions and consideration of future consequences rest with the parents and their ability to raise their child as they see fit.
Exactly Rob-- I had to go back and check to see when AGB died after you told me this. When I saw it was 1922, I realized how very misleading Schwarz's statements were. Now you're telling me Hitler and AGB never even met!! Look-- I understand AGB has done a lot of harm in the past. Making false accusations against AGB only weakens and discredits an otherwise valid complaint. If I were the representative from Pepsi reading Schwartz's letter, I'd probably throw it in the shredder.
I am seething mad- you're calling it "nazi s--t?"
If AGbell was founded with the American eugenics movement ideals, and Hitler borrowed ideas, the AGBell is indirectly responsible!
For example, if AGBell found a way to prevent Deafness, such as heriditary Deafness, they would try to lobby for a law that allowed for such a way in preventing future Deafness.
It's the eugenics movement that gives AGBell that kind of mentality, and I am mad as hell. Why?
Because, if AGBell succeeded on such ideals, such as eradicating Deafness, in the 1960s, I would have never been born!!!!!!!!
That's why I am upset that people think we are crazy or concocting Nazi stories about AGBell. AGBell were NOT Nazi sympathizers but their ideas, Hitler did derive from and act on those ideas literally.
It's like people denying there was ever a holocaust. Some people do deny the fact that there was ever a holocaust, that people made up the fact that 6 million Jews died. White supremacists do deny the holocaust.
WE cannot deny that based on the eugenics movement, that it had influence in the world with disastrous results, because leaders like Hitler looking for ways to unleash evil will study different philosophies. And the eugenics movement was a philosophy, given Hitler's evil nature, that stood to push the envelope.
Back to Michael Schwartz, on the letterhead with Syracuse University's Logo. He was a Deaf law professor, right? He can't use the letterhead if he works there? He's not entitled to type anything on a University letterhead even if he works there? Why not? Why can the hearing do that and not Deaf people, Mike McConnell?
It seems that you always question Deaf people and if Mike was hearing, you probably wouldn't have brought up the letterhead issue.
I Believe Mike Schwartz, Esq is credible.
And more credible than you Mike, because you're not a lawyer. You just happen to have a different last name. And you can't use a letterhead because you don't work for a University, sorry. Unless you do?
Is there an unwritten code of ethics about writing letters using letterheads? If so, tell me.
I am sorry, but AGBell opened a can of worms by writing to Pepsi Co, and the next thing we know is, that AGBell supported the ideals of the American eugenic movement, and Hitler did borrow ideas from that theology. Now there are a bunch of Deaf people who are totally disgusted with AGBell, that organization is exposed completely by now. It's an organization stark naked by now, like deer staring at a car's headlights.
Especially when an organization such as AGBell whose ideals was similar to Hitler's, that is something that we need to address. I believe in interracial marriage, AGBell didn't. They didn't want Deaf people marrying Deaf people back in those days. I never want to support an organization that had those ideals.
If you can't figure that out...
Well, I can't speak for you. Only you can speak for yourself.
John, to say "indirectly responsible" about AGB to the murder of millions of people during Hitler's regime would be the same thing if a person donated money to Planned Parenthood would be "indirectly responsible" for the murder of millions of unborn babies because they favor and give advice on abortion. Despite the history, equivocating it to a Nazi regime where millions were murder is nothing more than evoking Godwin's Law. Just as you are doing it now.
It was a different era. A different time. A different (lack of) technology. A different set of beliefs borne out of fear and "no control."
As for the letterhead thing, it's a grey area to me which is why I've asked about these things (did you not see where I asked that?). Having a letterhead does not necessarily make a person "more credible." It can, instead, raise more questions than not but again this falls in a grey area to me.
As for you not wanting to support an organizations who "had those ideals" say one thing. It was an organization at one time who had those ideas (ie. in reference to your interracial marriage) and do not support those ideals. Just as Henry Ford (the automaker of Ford cars) was a key devotee of eugenics. I suppose we shouldn't support Ford company because Ford once had those ideals then?
And for those who absolutely do not want nothing to do with the inventor, AG Bell, because of his support of eugenic ideas of the past would mean you'd need to give up your phone since it was AGBell invention and inspiration of the telephone that formed the first telephone company in the United States in 1877 that started all this telephone business and competition. AG Bell was the single one influence on the telephone development. Just as Ford had a huge influence on the techniques of using the assembly line to make his cars cheaply and quickly for quick mass adoption and mass marketing.
I guess I'll just give up my Sidekick because it all ties back to bell initial development of the telephone and Bell Telephone company. Probably need to sell my Ford pickup truck since Henry Ford believed in on the eugenic movements of the time.
Good blog, Mike. Valid points. And also good comments from Mike in regards to the commenters' whining about AGBell's dabbling in the philosophy of eugenics.
We need to broaden our minds to include the sides of the topics instead of harping on the AGBell's past. I mean, past is past. Focus on present and future, look for positive outcomes. Like Jay said, come up with a 5-year plan... be proactive.
In other words... stop dwelling on past.
A side note here, I don't own a Sidekick or a Ford truck, just making an example here.
We must be mindful of the fact that AGBell still holds the same eugenic values because of the encouragement to fully integrate into the hearing world, and because of the Cochlear Implant movement which is of course, the next step to a more superior and advanced type of technology that far supersedes the CI tech. One day fewer Deaf people will want or need to learn ASL, because of AGBell's activism and support into technology that makes it possible for Deaf people to walk away from Deaf culture.
When things evolve into a more advanced society in terms of technology it is really easy to evolve back into the original eugenics movement that influenced governments such as Nazi Germany to eradicate the disabled. AGBell is a perfect candidate to revert back to the more stout eugenics movement that Hitler admired so much, I cannot say how far back they'll revert back to the original movement.
Our case is that we very much cherish the ASL language. What CI implantees, oralists, and AGBell members are saying is, "We are perfectly happy to be in the hearing world, we have no need to use ASL, we prefer to speak and to read lips, to listen as much as possible."
When we hear that, and see the way technology is always upgrading becoming more advanced, we know that more people will say, "Why do we need ASL if we have the tech, the tools, and since everybody is getting CI implanted?"
Because of the negative response of these people, we want to continue to promote ASL as a wonderful and beautiful language, and to nurture the Deaf culture, to keep the camaraderie going. Hearing people are always trying to find ways to reverse the medical condition of Deafness, forgetting about the Deaf cultural roots that are permanently engrafted into our hearts. We have to object to the hearie mentality because that mentality has no place in our world.
If AGBell has a past history of fostering the eugenics movement, in influencing Hitler indirectly that caused untold hundreds of thousands of Deaf people to be killed in the European countries, we must not forget that history. We must not support an organization that operated from the mindset of such an eugenics movement, even if things have changed today.
Let me give an example. Please read this example carefully. I will use Russia as an example. Putin, the leader of Russia is a former top KGB official. The KGB were ruthless enforcers as a secret service for the former Soviet Union, resulting in many deaths of untold thousands, if not millions. Now Putin is the current President of Russia. Would you trust him, given his past with the KGB?
Same here, AGBell has a past we cannot trust, given their possible true ulterior motives in trying to fix the Deafness condition as they term it medically. It is compromised mostly of hearing leadership, how can we believe that they are in partnership with the values of Deaf culture?
Have we met a non-coda hearing leader of AGBell that goes "YES, we must cherish AS
SL as a bilingual language to be used along with speech and listening skills?"
Not one.
Again, you are blaming AGB for the deaths of deaf people during Hitler's regime by attempting to make a direct connection using words like as "indirectly responsible" is nothing more than trying to put blame where none exist. It was Hitler's doing...not AGB. It's even worse than Godwin's Law.
Perhaps you need to find all the people who were involved in the eugenics movements of the early 1900s that have helped spawned and created organizations and companies that we see today and start your own self-proclaimed boycott because the existing companies or orgnizations presumptiously hold to the same beliefs as did their previous founders during the 1900s. Be my guest!
Pure bunkem, John. What's your doing is committing a Red Herring that has nothing to do with the current AGBell organization and their philsophy. It's a huge disconnect you're attempting to tie together...rather unsuccessfully I might add.
I don't blame AGbell for the deaths of many, but their ideas didn't help any, either. When we contribute to society in such a way, we have to make sure our ideas won't be the kind that dictators love to hear about.
Sometimes people, even organizations are not thinking of possible consequences.
Simple, John. There was no need to bring Hitler into this discussion when it came to the AG Bell's organization of today. What you have done was purely a knee jerk response using Godwin's Law as an argument of yours. You were trying to attempt at connecting between AGBell and Hitler as being responsible one way or another for the deaths of millions of people during WWII all in the name of discussing some philosophical differences that AGBell.org has today with that of the Deaf community's.
Let's not deny that you have attempted at emotional appeal using Godwin's Law by dragging the Holocaust into the picture!
Enough said, John!
Yes I have said enough in your blog, sir. You and I have philosophical differences, clearly.
But please don't twist my words. There is NO direct connection between AGBell and Hitler, just the IDEAS that were borrowed. That is strong enough to be indirectly a connection, in my opinion. That's all I will say. I will not comment about this any further in your blog. I used the word "indirectly."
While AGbell do not wish the deaths of the disabled, Hitler took the ideas to the very extreme.
Enough said about this. I rather discuss it with those that agreed with Schwartz's letter to Pepsi Co.
Uh, John, in my perspective, you are attempting to connect Hitler's Halocaust onto the lap of AGB and extending that several decades to the present into the lap of AGBell organization of today as somehow are guilty of such horrible ideas using guilt by association of the past. Red Herrings do not work in any arguments, John. If you want to discuss current problems of today, fine. But to drag Hitler, Nazism, Holocaust, guilt by association and all that? Not gonna fly, dude.
It does fly, Mike. John is right.
I have to stand up for Mike. I have noticed lately that John C. took it upon himself as the representative for all deaf people and sees himself a kind of Jesus for deaf people.
He knows squat nothing.
Godwin's Law do not have wings in an argument.
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