Recently, I was doing research on a website that provided instructional videos to explain how their service worked. The videos were narrated while instructional diagrams scrolled across the screen along with the voice over. After watching a few of the videos I realized that there are many people who are hard of hearing who would struggle understanding the voice over. What compounded this was that the website completely failed to provide text versions of their service information. It is unfortunate that this company completely missed the boat on making their website accessible to those who are hard of hearing or deaf. It is my hope that one day there will be requirements that will enforce captioning for videos online. Having mandatory captioning not only allows hard of hearing and deaf individuals a fair online experience but it also potentially provides more clients for an online business.
I am very lucky that my hearing loss is not so severe that I miss out on these things. It does however, remind me of all of the individuals I have met with hearing loss who struggle every day to interact with a world that is not designed to help them. Every day we are making progress by continuing to build awareness and advocating for the needs of those who are hard of hearing or deaf.
Showing posts with label deaf. Show all posts
Showing posts with label deaf. Show all posts
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
A Question of Culture?
It has been a couple weeks now since Sarah Churman's cochlear implant activation video went viral and there has been a wide spectrum of reactions. For those who have not seen it please click this link.
There are number of individuals in the deaf community who object to these implants on the basis that there is nothing wrong with being deaf and therefore, there is no need for this procedure. I think it's important for the hearing world to understand that the deaf community is a culture. Much like any culture they naturally want to retain their family ties by their common language and thus, they find it difficult to accept something that would take their entire culture into question. In a way, it appears like these procedures are an attack from the hearing majority on the deaf minority. I empathize with their feeling of the importance of community. If it were not for other hard of hearing individuals and the support that I received from them and their community I would probably still feel like a bit of an outsider. However, I do feel that an important factor in a community is respecting and supporting the individuals within it. I don't think that anyone can argue that Sarah is experiencing pure joy with her ability to hear her own voice, the voice of her husband and children all for the first time. It's vitally important to respect the wishes of an individual when it comes to making any large decision because I am sure that there is never any ill-intent towards any group when these decisions are made.
There are number of individuals in the deaf community who object to these implants on the basis that there is nothing wrong with being deaf and therefore, there is no need for this procedure. I think it's important for the hearing world to understand that the deaf community is a culture. Much like any culture they naturally want to retain their family ties by their common language and thus, they find it difficult to accept something that would take their entire culture into question. In a way, it appears like these procedures are an attack from the hearing majority on the deaf minority. I empathize with their feeling of the importance of community. If it were not for other hard of hearing individuals and the support that I received from them and their community I would probably still feel like a bit of an outsider. However, I do feel that an important factor in a community is respecting and supporting the individuals within it. I don't think that anyone can argue that Sarah is experiencing pure joy with her ability to hear her own voice, the voice of her husband and children all for the first time. It's vitally important to respect the wishes of an individual when it comes to making any large decision because I am sure that there is never any ill-intent towards any group when these decisions are made.
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