Hearing People Resent Relay Services?

If 2006 was the year of the Unity for Gallaudet movement, 2007 could be the year of SORS - Save Our Relay Services. I am concerned about the possible effect on the hearing world of all the media coverage of the criminal abuse of the internet relay services (the latest being that article on MSNBC.com).

Up until now, the response from the average hearing consumer has been minimal. What if awareness continues to grow because of all the media coverage? It could lead hearing people to take a real look at their phone bills and become upset, because they are paying for this abuse of the relay services. According to MSNBC.com, "The IP Relay system is funded by little-noticed charges on our monthly phone bills, charges described in terms like 'Disability Access Fee' or 'Carrier Cost Recovery Fee.' "

That now-small fee could really start to go up not only as a result of increasing abuse, but also because more hearing people are ditching their landline phone service for cell phones. Do cell phone users also pay this fee? I don't know. I looked at my T-mobile bill and it lists two things that I thought might cover it: "Federal Universal Service Fund" and "Regulatory Programs Fee." Checking the FCC site, I was able to rule out the Federal Universal Service Fund. The Regulatory Programs Fee is an all-purpose fee for federal programs, and I don't know if that includes the relay services.

What can be done about the abuse of relay services? Some people have proposed an authentication system that would require deaf people to register. I have some problems with this concept! One, it is an invasion of privacy. Two, it would be vulnerable to fraud and easy to defeat! Unless deaf people were required to show up in person and provide audiograms as proof that they needed internet relay services, it would be very easy for the criminally-minded to register online and claim they are deaf.

I have another solution in mind - which I expect will arouse a storm of controversy. The keyword here is "free." Other than the fact that it is easy to hide behind a relay service, the criminally-minded abuse relay services because the relay calls are free. What happens if you take away the free? What if people had to actually PAY to use the relay services? What I have in mind is a minimal charge - perhaps pennies per relay call, with the rest heavily subsidized by the government. My thinking is that if the criminally-minded knew they would have to pay a fee - no matter how small the fee is - it would reduce their use of the relay service.

My Son, a New Deaf Rights Activist

Today my proud son told me how he and two other friends had stood up for their rights as deaf students at school. What follows are his words, translated from ASL:

"During lunch, my friends and I found out that our English teacher wasn't here.. "B" told me we will have a subsitute teacher who doesn't sign..."F" and I thought it not comfortable for us, and thought we should complain now.. "J" got a idea. He told us we should go to see the interpreter office as a group. We decided to go there. We complained to the interpreter coordinator at the interpreting office."

Their point was that if they were going to have a non-signing substitute teacher, they should have an interpreter!

"We complained to the interpreter coordinator. She said she will figure out if an interpreter is available. She then told us that four interpeters were out and four more had gone to lunch. She said we must go back to class and wait.

The interpreter coordinator went into an office. The three of us would not go back to class. We stood in the hallway and waited to see if interpreter would be available.

After waiting about 20 minutes, we decided this was not acceptable and went into the office where we saw the interpreter coordinator talking to an interpreter. "J" told them firmly that we must have an interpreter or we refused go back to class.

Then the interpreter coordinator said 'Fine. I'll get you an interpreter now.'

We left and waited in the hallway to see if an interpreter would come. Finally, an interpreter came out of the office and went with us to class.

We had waited in the hallway about 30 minutes total."

When I heard the tale, I said to my son, "I'm proud of you. Better get used to it...as a deaf adult, you are going to be protesting for your (deaf) rights a lot more!"

Some Punishment is Appropriate

Although the protestors had legitimate complaints, and eventually the protest succeeded, there is now complaining in the deaf blog community about the "reprisals." I believe that some form of punishment is appropriate as long as the punishment is not too severe. Why? A message needs to be sent that there are limits to what protestors can do in the future.

Remember the consequences of student protestors' behavior? Three days of school missed. A cancelled job fair, depriving alumni of a chance to get jobs and inconveniencing agencies and businesses that had planned to have representatives there. Buildings locked down. Damage to a sign on the student academic center.

There are ways to protest without hurting others. The Tent City was one of the best and most creative ways. Websites and blogs are another.

College students are largely still teenagers or barely out of their teens. This youth makes them prone to all sorts of negative behavior - unless they know there will be real consequences. Awareness of those consequences helps to keep that negative behavior in check.

Otherwise..what will happen in the future when there is another protest at Gallaudet? Next time, will students burn buildings? During the protests, I actually had people ask me if they would be burning buildings next.

That's Not Entertainment

I don't watch much television, but I made a point of watching CSI NY last night so I could catch the performances of the deaf actors in last night's storyline. I went to bed disappointed..not in the quality of the acting, but in the quality of the writing!

The writers seemed to feel it was not enough to just have the characters be deaf. They had to bring in the cochlear implant "debate" too. The entertainment media still thinks that there is a cochlear implant "controversy" despite the fact that cochlear implants are now pretty much accepted by deaf people.

The killer was a deaf youth with a cochlear implant who allegedly got an implant because he was "ashamed" of being deaf and under pressure from a hearing family to "be normal." He did not want his deaf baby to grow up "deaf" and tried to kidnap the baby so he could get the deaf baby an implant (this was implied).

As part of a kidnap attempt, the killer forces "Gina" to drive the car. When a police chase ensues, "Gina" grabs and throws out the killer's cochlear implant external transmitter. This was about the only thing the writers got right about cochlear implants - the character was then clearly deaf without his implant, pleading for help from "Gina."

I don't remember the dialogue, but there was some commentary thrown in about implants by "Gina." A hearing person watching the program would have left with the impression that implants were an issue, not a personal choice. The show probably angered many implantees (or their parents).

I'd like to see a show where deaf characters with implants interact with deaf characters who do not have implants, with no conflict between them for the sake of "entertainment."

Meeting Robert Davila

I met Robert Davila in the early '90s, when after leaving the Department of Education he had a short stint working at the National Captioning Institute, where I was an employee at the time. I do not remember what work he did, and it is not on his extensive resume. It was understood by NCI employees that Dr. Davila's job there was meant to be temporary, a means for him to pay his bills while he searched for his next opportunity.

I do remember that when I met him, I was impressed by his friendliness and willingness to talk to me even though I was not a highly ranked employee. I also observed how professional he was. I knew even then, that he would go farther than he had as a government administrator. It did not surprise me in the least when I heard he got a job running the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.

Over the years, whenever I ran into him at public deaf events, he always greeted me warmly. It is just his nature to do that with people.

(His gentle demeanor was a marked contrast to John Ball, who was president (hearing) of NCI at the time. Mr. Ball had had quite a temper. His yelling could be heard from outside his office. I once witnessed Mr. Ball cursing, which stunned me as I was still a young employee at the time. That was when I learned that managers are human too.)

Thoughts on Doug Bahl Case

I don't know what concerns me more about the Doug Bahl case, the fact he had no interpreter for days or the fact he was beaten. Ok, maybe he should not have put his hand in his pocket as was reported. But, that does not justify the denial of an interpreter for days (did they ever hear of video remote interpreting?) or the beating (unless he was being physically threatening). We don't have all the facts yet, as has already been noted by others.

As a parent of two deaf youth who do not use their voices, I am wondering what I should tell them about how to deal with police. I had to deal with police once before when driving, many years ago when I was speeding on a beautiful day and got caught. However, at that time I could hear with a hearing aid and could talk. I could voice the words "sorry, I don't hear you." What would have happened if I could not hear or talk?

Some people have said that pointing to the ears or otherwise gesturing to indicate deafness should be enough to get the message across to police. Given how jittery police can be - any movement can be misinterpreted as threatening - is that enough to prevent a bad situation from happening? Can anyone share their actual experiences with the police and how they safely made police aware that they are deaf?

Section 508? What Section 508??

Anyone who is familiar with Section 508 knows that that is the law that requires captioning on Federal web video material. Can someone explain to me why the Library of Congress webcasts do not have any captioning?

Tonight I was checking out the Library of Congress website and came across their webcasts page: http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/index.php. I wanted to watch the webcast "Cartoon America Exhibition Opens" (under Culture, Performing Arts) and there were no captions. I even chose to view it in RealPlayer instead of the web page so I could double-check to make sure that RealPlayer had the captioning option enabled. Still no captions.

According to www.section508.gov under "508 law:" — "agencies must give disabled employees and members of the public access to information that is comparable to the access available to others." So, is the Library of Congress - a Federal agency - violating section 508 by not captioning its webcasts?