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Mirage_GSM wrote:

While it is conceivable that Shizune would think this way, it would likely imply a sense of significant shame about her deafness.

I don't really see why this should be.
Most KS characters think of their disability as some sort of "condition", and with the exception of Hisao and Hanako they are not ashamed of it.
I don't see why deafness should be different.
It may be that there are a lot of deaf people who do think so, but Shizune has never been known to mince words.

Actually ProfAllister does make a good point. Most deaf people wouldn't think of them there deafness as a quote condition unquote. I was going to go back and change it but then I realized an interesting storyline that could explore this so I won't.

EDIT 11-17-13: rereading the comments and the first part of this story, I'm realizing I have no compelling reason to have Shizune refer to her deafness as a "condition" after all, so I've gone ahead and changed it per the suggestions of the other people in this thread.

Mirage_GSM wrote:It may be that there are a lot of deaf people who do think so, but Shizune has never been known to mince words.

I guess I wasn't really clear there.

What you're saying is exactly the point. They don't dance around the subject. Deaf people are known to cut to the chase, leading to the term "deaf bluntness."

It's not "My condition"; It's "My deafness." The deaf person referring to it as a "condition" is the one mincing words. Ergo, calling it a "condition" rather than "deafness" implies that she's deeply ashamed of it.

It's possible that Shizune is ashamed of her deafness, so themocaw may want to keep it as "condition." The important thing is realising that the word choice there has significance.

Adding to the discussion about 'condition': I'm Deaf myself, I don't really live in the Deaf world/community but I never consider or mention my Deafness as a handicap/condition. It is simply my lifestyle.
Now what might influence it is whether you were deaf since you were born (or since you were just a toddler), it really shapes the way you live.. But if you become deaf at a later stage in your life, like your teenager years, do you view it the same way? In that sense you might actually consider it a handicap or condition.

However, since Shizune is practically the embodiment of Deaf bluntness, I would doubt that she became Deaf only a couple years before Hisao joined Yamaku. Especially if you have to consider her character and the process to accept the loss of hearing. Because if it was only recent, then her current character is based on her hearing character. That would likely mean that she would have been stubborn enough to keep trying to learn to hear again, one way or another, probably for a prolonged period and all together would only recently have become who she currently is. And that would conflict with canon, since she and Lily were friends before and in the same student council, at least a year before, Misha already being Shizune's interpreter etcetera. This would imply that Shizune would become Deaf at least a couple years before Yamaku. So that leaves two options: Either Shizune has been Deaf since birth or became Deaf on a later stage but significantly before Yamaku.
Now I have to point out that Jigoro or Shizune talked once about how they communicated and it was pointed out that Jigoro even hired interpreters at some points, while Shizune kept refusing to communicate him. That seems to imply that there was some event that triggered this scene, which likely would be Shizune becoming Deaf. This scene also implies that the event happened at some point after Shizune has learnt to talk, so somewhere after she was three, so she wasn't Deaf at birth or close after birth, more likely being at/after such an age that you can have meaningful communication with your parents (five-ish).

So to summarize, she probably became Deaf somewhere between the age of five to thirteen... Meaning she had several years to develop her Deaf identity. And getting accustomed to it. However, she does not care so much about people's opinions as about her own net result, what she actually adds to the community. And she achieves her goals, one way or another. Would that imply her considering her Deafness as a condition? I doubt it, I think she considers it mostly an obstacle at some points and in general she likely sees it as part of her identity. She also very rarely seems uncomfortable with her Deafness, further reinforcing that feeling.

TL;DR: I doubt that Shizune would consider her Deafness as a condition.

Taking a third road on the "condition" thing:

When I read the term in the context in which is was presented, I was struck with a sense of sarcasm about the whole matter. To be more specific, she was using her father's terminology for her deafness, not her own, as a way to throw his words back into his face -- even if it's just in her own internal monologue.

ProfAllister wrote:

Mirage_GSM wrote:It may be that there are a lot of deaf people who do think so, but Shizune has never been known to mince words.

I guess I wasn't really clear there.

What you're saying is exactly the point. They don't dance around the subject. Deaf people are known to cut to the chase, leading to the term "deaf bluntness."

It's not "My condition"; It's "My deafness." The deaf person referring to it as a "condition" is the one mincing words. Ergo, calling it a "condition" rather than "deafness" implies that she's deeply ashamed of it.

Ah, then it was a misunderstanding. I thought you meant to imply that Shizune would not consider her deafness a condition as in "she wouldn't admit that it is a condition at all."
Shizune is too much a realist to do that, thus she wouldn't call it a "lifestyle" to quote Kutagh.
It may well be that people who are deaf from birth do not consider themselves handicapped in any way, but Shizune has had problems communicating to others too often to not acknowledge that. That's what I meant by her "not mincing words."

As for when she became deaf, I think it's pretty much established that she's been deaf since birth.
The line in the novel is:

Jigoro wrote:For twelve years, Shizune did not even talk to me, even though I hired multiple tutors and interpreters of all sorts for her to try and get her to become normal.

The phrasing is a bit unusual, but this is Jigoro, so...
Anway, I assume the twelve years he is talking about are those from age 3 when you'd usually expect a child to be able to talk to 15 when he sent her away to Yamaku.
I think her being deaf since birth has also been confirmed by the devs at some point, but I can't find any relevant quote at the moment.

A followup to one of my favorite KS fanfics ever? Good, good...I'm excited for more!

Mirage_GSM wrote:As for when she became deaf, I think it's pretty much established that she's been deaf since birth.
The line in the novel is:

Jigoro wrote:For twelve years, Shizune did not even talk to me, even though I hired multiple tutors and interpreters of all sorts for her to try and get her to become normal.

The phrasing is a bit unusual, but this is Jigoro, so...
Anway, I assume the twelve years he is talking about are those from age 3 when you'd usually expect a child to be able to talk to 15 when he sent her away to Yamaku.
I think her being deaf since birth has also been confirmed by the devs at some point, but I can't find any relevant quote at the moment.

Well, I've been going into quite a bit of detail on my thoughts regarding Shizune, Jigoro, et al. over in the "General Discussion" section, so I think I'd be inclined to keep general speculation about Shizune in one of the current threads (or a new thread if you feel that it's appropriate). I brought up this one particular detail because I felt it was relevant to the fan fic.

As far as Jigoro's statement goes, his follow-up seems to imply that the "twelve years" is a running count, so she stopped talking to him around five or six. I'm also inclined to give Jigoro the benefit of the doubt that he's not going full Bell on Shizune, and is distinguishing her ability to vocalise from her willingness to communicate directly with her own father.

On the subject of statements by the devs, various devs have gone on record stating (a) All the girls have been deflowered by gigantic space horse demons with twelve pus-festering dicks spewing poisonous semen. (b) Emi is a lesbian. (And this was stated by Hivemind, the route author) (c) The only canon is what is contained in the VN itself. "Word of God" means nothing.

So I prefer to content myself with statement (c), and consider dev statements to be their personal headcanons.

ProfAllister wrote: various devs have gone on record stating (a) All the girls have been deflowered by gigantic space horse demons with twelve pus-festering dicks spewing poisonous semen

Wtf did I just read?

No seriously, what the actual **** did I just read?

Shail wrote:

ProfAllister wrote: various devs have gone on record stating (a) All the girls have been deflowered by gigantic space horse demons with twelve pus-festering dicks spewing poisonous semen

Wtf did I just read?

No seriously, what the actual **** did I just read?

http://i40.tinypic.com/11wev89.gif

There was a thread where the OP (in very badly written English) asked which girls are virgins (The thread was "Katawa Shoujo Virgin Heroine") and one Dev (I believe Aura) responded with that.

... I will never look at aura the same again, I'd assume hanako lilly and rin were, probably shizune too, not sure about emi though

I'd assume hanako lilly and rin were, probably shizune too, not sure about emi though

What? Raped by gigantic space horse demons?

Noooo ;-;.. virgins!

I love the perspective. There's too few fanfics from hers! (Except the Reunion-oneshot, and awesome as that is, it's also really sad)

I don't like sad endings to good characters ;-;

*reads Allister's post*

*remembers this is the Internet*

*sighs*

...Okay, that notwithstanding, I just wanted to say how excited I am that Weekend at Hisao's is getting a sequel. I've been invisible around here for quite a while now and it was definitely one of my favorite KS fics. Shizune just never gets enough love. I'm really eager to see this continue!