I thought I'd already said all I had to say about accessible currency. I was wrong.
"We hope that this ruling will not have the unintended consequence of reinforcing society's misconception that blind people are unable to function in the world as it currently is," Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind, said in a statement.
OK. First let me say that I'm an NFB member and have been (at varying levels of involvement) for some 15 years. I don't think this is going to change any time soon, because the basic philosophy behind the organization is so appealing to me.
But, I have to ask: How can anybody possibly think this way? Any time we, as blind people, sit around and ask other blind people what they think about what sighted people think (this is kind of hurting my head), the result is something like Maurer's statement. And while
at least one sighted person agrees with Maurer, I really don't think this is how most people think.
There's a slightly more serious concern: What if people start to resent people with disabilities for asking for too many accommodations? I actually think that when accessible currency is mandated (as I'm sure it will be, at some point), there will be some grumbling. ATM's and other types of machines will have to be modified. And people don't react well to change generally. We'll see a lot of Roy Exums coming out of the woodwork. But within a few years, nobody will care. I'm convinced that accessible currency will result in more job opportunities, not fewer. I used to be a VR counselor, and when I imagine myself saying to some employer (most likely over the phone, where it would never occur to the employer that I'm one of those blind people) that I have this great client who can tell money apart because of this nifty little electronic NoteTeller thingy, I cringe.
Is this the most important issue facing the blind population? I don't think so. But I'm truly sorry that the NFB has issued the statements it has.
But that doesn't mean I'm going to leave the organization--the NFB is stuck with me!
About ten years ago, I had a conversation with Abraham Nemeth, the inventor of the current braille mathematics code. At that time, he was vociferously urging all of us to stay as far away as we could from the Unified English Braille Code, not because of the effect if would have on mathematicians and scientists, but because of how difficult it would make algebra for blind kids. Naturally, lots of people correctly pointed out that he had a reason to be biased, and I don't think people initially took him seriously, since it was *his* code that faced extinction. But when we talked, he told me he would never dream of leaving the organization. That wasn't the way to get anything accomplished, he said. And that made sense to me. Right now, I'm not in a position to go to national convention to vote on anything, but the NFB does mean a great deal to me. My first national convention literally changed my life. So I'm staying, but I have to say I'm really, really disappointed in us right now. And I don't think I'm the only one.
(I was going to put the NY Times article containing Maurer's statement behind a cut here because I don't have a good link for it, but this entry is already too long.)
I realize that you have to take blindness articles with several grains of sault. So I'm not actually reflecting on Paterson, but on the media's portrayal of Paterson. Here's a quote from an older article:
Paterson's disability was not a major factor in the election either. In fact, not everyone is aware he has been legally blind since birth. He almost always
has someone with him, and he doesn't use a cane or seeing-eye dog.
If that's true, it's too bad. But I'm always perplexed by these articles that talk about how "independent" someone is because they don't use a mobility aid. I remember reading an article about one woman who said her doctor suggested a cane, but she wanted to be more independent. Her solution? Make sure a coworker was around to yell to her when she was approaching the top of the stairs.
So, if we want to *look* inependent (as opposed to *being* independent), maybe we're going about it all wrong. Maybe it's like a status symbol if we can have all of these people around to guide us so we don't have to rely on one of those canes or dogs.
I see the same thing in articles about braille--someone is "independent" because they spend hours and hours memorizing stuff rather than reading braille.
Is our cultural fear of blindness so great that it shapes our perceptions of what constitutes independence?
A judge has ruled that the government is violating accessibility standards because all paper currency is the same
color, shape, and size.
There is a link to a pdf version of the judge's ruling, and I found it fascinating--particularly the discussion of "meaningful access." He also talks about how leaving the $1 unchanged could dramatically cut the costs of this project.
There has been much discussion of this on two of the NFB lists I read. This is, IMO, a relativeley minor issue faced by blind people. But I don't think the NFB needs to support an appeal of this suit.
Someone posted the following NFB resolution, passed in 2002, just after the original ACB suit was filed.
( Click here to read the resolution. )
Someone wrote to one list, expressing concerns that tactile markings could make us *more* vulnerable to getting gypped. This is someone I respect, so I wrote a private email to this individual asking for clarification. I'm posting part of that email here, along with some other thoughts on the NFB's resolution.
( Click here to see what I think. )
Addendum: Sadly, the part of the resolution that talks about "harm[ing] current and future efforts to achieve genuinely needed and desirable accommodations for the blind" is more than just talk. When cases like this are lost, it can be decided that the statute requires a narrower interpretation. This has happened in many ADA cases. The concern is that this could result in fewer applications of Section 504 of the Rehab Act, since the Act could be more narrowly construed to prevent a suit like this from coming up in the future. I don't know if it would go that far--too hard to tell with the current Supreme Court.
Also, it has been proposed that issuing money identifiers to every blind person in the country is the preferable alternative. I don't think so. ( Click here to see why. )
Current Music: Beatles, Money (That's What I Want) (internal)
I haven't seen much blogging about this on my flist:
Miden Ruled Vicious
What do you all think? I don't quite know what to think. A lot of people believe this ruling was too harsh, since it's possible that Miden thought he was protecting his owner. I just...don't know. I guess you could argue that even if this is what the dog was doing, this ruling will keep the same thing from happening again if a business owner lets a dog stay unrestrained in their public place of business.
I don't understand the part about "Out" not being a service dog command.
I'd love to know what you guys think.
Quick edit: I also need to comment on this:
ACB opposes national Newsline funding
Aw, guys...come on! This is one of the most revolutionary advancements in print access ever. In addition to the audio content over the phone, Bookshare subscribers can read Newsline papers in braille. And I believe it will soon be possible (if it isn't already) to have your paper emailed to you each morning as a DAISY file, again allowing many people with braille-aware devices to read the paper.
Sure, it would be great for publishers to offer accessible newspapers, but think of the time and money that would be spent convincing every publisher to do this. This relatively small appropriation will guarantee access to newspaper content for millions of individuals. This sounds like arguing for argument's sake.
To prove that I'm not totally coming at this from an organizational perspective, I didn't think the NFB needed to devote so much time and energy to undoing the ACB's work in descriptive video. I did agree with the NFB position that informational description should have been addressed first, but I thought it would have been better to address this issue on its own after the fact.
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/classic/confused.gif)
curious
Current Music: JFW reading blindy web articles