(I bet your in Australia. They really push CIs there.)
"you're"
And Australia doesn't push CI's more than any other country. Yes, they happen to be a centre for the most research, much of the underlying tech was developed there, and the largest CI manufacturer is based there. But from a clinical point of view, nobody is forced to get CI's. They are given information and allowed to make a choice.
I'd let them make the decision to have such an unnecessary invasive surgery at 18
Unfortunately this isn't like circumcision or choosing a religion where waiting until 18 is perfectly fine. Language development has diminishing returns, and plenty of scientific studies have shown that the rule of thumb is that the best language outcomes occur with bilateral implantation before the age of 2.
So the "wait until they're 18 and let them choose for themselves!" argument is just plain wrong. Next...
If you could get over your selfishness
If you could not be such an ignorant cunt...
maybe you'd learn sign and not try to force them to be something they're not,
The problem that the militant Deaf people have is they seem to think it's black and white: Deaf or not. Fact of the matter is, you can have CI's AND sign AND still be involved in the Deaf community and Deaf culture.
As someone from a minefield of a mixed heritage/cultural background, I'm intimately aware that you can indeed belong to more than one group. It's not black and white, there are shades of grey in the middle, and you - and the militant Deaftards - should grow the fuck up and accept that.
they will never hear like you or I. It's not a miracle procedure that completely restores hearing.
Maybe not never. CI technology has come along in leaps and bounds in the last 30 years, and each new generation is another leap. Very soon, the sound processor component will be able to be implanted in the middle ear. Looking forward, notch inhibition gene therapy is showing immense promise.
Either way, CI's are not promoted as providing natural hearing, and they're not promoted as a silver bullet. Clinicians do actively talk that down and readjust your expectations.
It wipes out any residual hearing that they may have
Yeah, this hasn't been true for a few years now. This is now one of those stupid FUD myths that the militant Deaf keep spreading around. All implant electrodes on the market today, (apart from possibly the Chinese one because they're a few generations behind) are atraumatic. They retain residual hearing, and are designed to reduce/eliminate any damage to the cochlea should they need to be removed. They're also coupled with new surgical techniques, called "soft surgery" or "minimally traumatic surgery".
Cochlear's Nucleus 6 can actually function as both a CI and an HA. In other words, it can use any residual hearing.
Stop spreading this myth. Stop it.
and they'll undergo endless hours of speech therapy to still be labeled as an outsider by their hearing classmates.
Well, I do know kids with CI's and they're engaged and involved in their classes and openly accepted by their peers. And I am taking an implanted child - my daughter - through speech therapy. The amount of hours invested is not that much. For me it's an hour a fortnight, for her it's around three hours a week, and then we have simple routines and strategies for targeted language development in our everyday lives.
As I said earlier, studies have shown the best language outcomes occur if implantation is done before the age of two. We have a reasonable expectation that she'll have completed her speech therapy by the time she goes to school. She won't need a special needs teacher or a deaf teacher with her at school. That frees up a special needs teacher for a kid who actually needs it, and ultimately we're a reduced cost to the state. Other parents I know have reported that their implanted children are actually testing as superior to their hearing peers in terms of language development.
Then stop posting on the Internet
Take your own advice, moron.