Death Sentences

The phrase "Are you Deaf?" gets thrown around all the time now and can be really offensive to those who really are deaf. If you really think about it, the phrase "are you deaf" has two different meanings. The idea that someone might not have been listening or preoccupied and that's why they didn't hear you. Also that someone might not have understood what you are meaning no matter how many times you describe and explain to them. If we would stop just flinging it around casually though it could be understood as these meanings rather than just a mean way of saying others really aren't listening.So it’s really up to us to truly decide how we see this phrase and  how to substitute it for something else that might work better and be less of a wrong or rude phrase.