[nfbcs] Inaccessible Training - again

[Mike Freeman]

Gary:

I agree with you completely. But the rub is that most folks don't expect
blind kids to amount to a hill of beans anyway so see no reason to spend
money on them. It's that simple. If you're going to be on welfare anyway,
why force businesses to spend money on you that could go to the bottom line?

This sort of parsimonious reasoning doesn't just affect us: a Republican
just introduced a bill into the Oregon state legislature that would force
colleges to disclose how much money people could expect to make and how long
it would take to pay off their loans depending upon their career choices. To
me, this is nothing less than a poorly-disguised attack on any profession
other than business -- it's anti-liberal arts. That's not much different
than many of the low expectations of the blind.

We have no alternative but to fight, however.

Mike


-----Original Message-----
From: nfbcs [mailto:nfbcs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Gary Wunder
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 9:59 AM
To: 'NFB in Computer Science Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [nfbcs] Inaccessible Training - again

2. I strongly believe if we can show companies how they can make a larger
profit by making their product accessible this will work better than laws.

I think this is a most interesting observation.  I can't figure out how to
tell the companies that they will make larger profits based on the number of
people who will buy their product.  For me this means that the law is
central.  Somebody, perhaps government and the taxpayers, have to step up
and say that we are not willing to train blind people with technical
education, college education, and perhaps graduate degrees, only to find
that they are incapable of doing jobs because someone didn't increase the
price of a product by $5 to make it accessible.  I would like it to happen
through persuasion, but if it takes a law to create a washing machine, a
close dryer, a stove, an oven, and a dishwasher that I can use to keep me
out of the nursing home, I'm going to go to Congress and press for a law,
and I think every taxpayer should join me in that

I once had the pleasure of dining with a gentleman whose expertise was in
Social Security disability law.  At the time I was rather naïve and asked
him whether it bothered him to continually be at odds with the Social
Security Administration in suing for people to be proclaimed disabled.  he
was very civil and kind to me.  He said that it didn't bother him one little
bit to sue the Social Security Administration to get a number of people
proclaimed disabled if the same federal government that complained about the
Social Security it was giving out would turn a blind eye to the kind of
working conditions we have in the poultry processing plants and other
facilities where little if any thought is given to the ergonomic arrangement
in the workplace.  If it is legitimate to argue for anti-smoking regulations
based on the idea that smoking costs all of us in terms of healthcare for
smokers and for those of us who breathe secondhand smoke, then don't we have
to factor in the extra cost to government and letting things be
inaccessible?  If we let children go to school where inaccessible technology
is widely used, how do we tell them at 18 or 21 or 25 that they are supposed
to magically move from the sidelines to the playing field?

I think that changing the law should always be the choice of last resort,
but if we truly have the right to live in the world, not just occupy a
chair, eat a bit of food, and enjoy a few tracks from iTunes, I think we
have to work hard, be all that we can be individually, and realize that
there are times when we must pool our talents and work collectively to
achieve a social goal which may look selfish in the short term but is good
for everyone long-term.




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