Texting the Deaf

I assume that I'm a late-comer to this party, but something rather profound occurred to me recently: The onset of text messaging must have been an absolute God-send for the deaf community.
Seriously, texting (or SMS messaging) has to be, literally, the best thing since sliced bread for the hearing impaired.

Not long ago if a deaf or severely hard-of-hearing individual wanted to receive a phone call they had to have thousands of dollars of specialty equipment commonly known as TDD (Telecommunication Device for the Deaf) which converted the spoken word into closed-caption-like text on a monitor or TV screen. This technology was, and still is, amazing and life-altering for members of the deaf community, but limits them to using only certain phones in limited environments.

Now with nearly every mobile phone carrier offering text messaging as either standard with their calling plans or as an add-on package the deaf can communicate both with each other and with those of us who are blessed enough to have our hearing.

Couple the texting capabilities of most phones with the vibrating ringer-alert that all cell phones offer and those who are deaf or hard of hearing can now communicate at a level they probably never dreamed would be available to them.

So, the next time you flip open your phone to casually send some mundane text, or to forward a joke take a moment to realize that this convenient little novelty is also helping the handicapped live their lives as close to normal as their bodies will allow.