02/03/2026
The recent publication reporting on the defiling of two Deaf learners by a teacher is both devastating and revealing. While the crime itself is abhorrent, what is equally disheartening is the public response that has followed.
The commentaries beneath the story have exposed a troubling depth of ignorance where jokes are made about the children’s Deafness, and their trauma is trivialised through stigma and misplaced ridicule.
This reaction reflects a dangerous societal mindset: the false assumption that hearing individuals are somehow more “privileged” or more deserving of empathy than Deaf learners.
Such thinking not only dehumanises the victims but compounds their trauma. To endure sexual violence is devastating; to then face public mockery rooted in one’s identity and mode of communication is an added cruelty no child should bear.
Deafness is not a deficiency of intellect, worth, or humanity. It is a difference in language and communication. Yet many have wrongly located the “disability” within the language itself, rather than recognising that the true barrier lies in society’s unwillingness to understand, accommodate, and learn.
The absurdity is not in Deafness, it is in the ignorance that stigmatizes it.
We must confront this prejudice with urgency.
Empathy is not selective. Justice is not conditional. These girls are not “different cases”; they are children whose rights, dignity, and safety have been violently violated. The appropriate response is protection, solidarity, and systemic accountability, not ridicule.
Instead of criticising what we do not understand, we must choose to learn. Enrol in sign language. Break communication barriers. Stand with Deaf learners. Advocate for inclusive safeguarding systems within our schools. Walk with the child rather than watching from the sidelines.
Ignorance perpetuates harm. Knowledge builds protection. The choice, as a society, is ours.
43-year-old teacher arrested for allegedly defiling two deaf students at Kerugoya School for the Deaf in Kirinyaga County, authorities say