Jul. 25th, 2020 08:49 pm
The ADA turns 30
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nightengaleskndThe American’s with Disabilities Act turns 30 this week. Pittsburgh had been planning a celebration which I would have attended. Instead, our local community is keeping in touch through Zoom and Discord. I think about how much the internet has done for the disability community. Our ability to connect has long been a strength.
In 1973, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act prohibited discrimination based on disability by any program receiving federal funding. It sounded great in theory but the agency of Health, Education and Welfare had to sign regulations outlining specifics. The secretary did not. In 1977, a group of activists held the federal building in San Francisco for 26 days. The FBI shut off the phones. A Deaf person signed the news of the day out the window to others who then contacted the news. Another form of connection.
The protest was successful. I was born in 1976 so this sit-in happened in my lifetime. I didn’t learn about it for over a decade.
The ADA was signed in 1990 giving similar protections to people with disabilities for employment and public accommodations. I was 14. I probably read some newspaper articles about it at the time. I wasn’t much for news, but I was pretty interested in disability even though I didn’t have any diagnoses and no one thought of me as a disabled person.
In 1994, I started thinking of myself as a disabled person due to my inability to handwrite more than a few sentences. A laptop was life changing, except when the thing was broken again. I joined a disability group at college. They accepted me even though I didn’t have a diagnosis. We found a pile of pamphlets somewhere about disability rights.
My senior year, I had the opportunity to take a class in disability law at our sibling school, taught by a practicing disability law attorney. Students at the sibling school were required to take a class in “social justice.” The disability law class was full of students meeting their social justice requirement and then every student with a visible, and possibly invisible disability in both campuses.
That year, 1998, was the year the first ADA case reached the supreme court, which was Casey Martin’s request to use a golf cart when competing in the PGA. We discussed this case in class at length. We had a large hardcover textbook, which I don’t think I’ve opened since 1998, and a paperback copy of the ADA.
The internet really blossomed over the next few years. I discovered instant message, message boards, then blogs. I found disability community. In 2003 I entered medical school and encountered discrimination. For about a year, I walked around with my copy of the ADA conspicuously sticking out of my tote bag. Sometimes I would read it while waiting for another meeting where someone was going to tell me that my need to type could not be accommodated.
In 2008, the ADA Amendments Act was passed, broadening the definition of disability after court cases had interpreted disability very narrowly.
In 2017, the US House passed the ADA Education and Reform Act, requiring people who encounter access barriers to notify the business in writing. The business would then have 60 days to respond and 120 days to show some progress towards providing accessibility. Tammy Duckworth managed to block the law from passing in the senate. Apparently, 20 years notice wasn’t enough.
In 2019, I started work at a major health system in a reasonably sized city. I can’t really use a web page I need to access reference material, because the picture on the screen changes every few seconds. I can get through, but it takes several minutes and a lot of effort, multiple times a day. I brought this up in October and had a series of e-mail exchanges with someone who said they would look into it. In January I received an automatic e-mail closing the ticket. The problem still persists. More recently, we were told we would need to use a smartphone ap for authentication to log onto remote servers. I sent in questions about how this would work for someone who can’t use a smartphone. Two weeks passed without a response. Finally I was told to call someone, who said my ticket had been sent to the wrong team but he would send it to the right one. Two more weeks passed. I spoke with a supervisor in IT and asked if IT had someone in charge of accessibility. Someone to look at proposals and say things like
How will this work for blind users?
Where are the captions?
What if someone can’t use a smartphone?
Apparently the IT department of a major health system in a reasonably sized city does not. I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised. Neither does Twitter. The internet has long been a place for people with disabilities to connect, but it can also be a site of ongoing inaccessibility.
The ADA turns 30. We have our rights. I’m thankful we also have each other for support as we continue to fight for them.
In 1973, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act prohibited discrimination based on disability by any program receiving federal funding. It sounded great in theory but the agency of Health, Education and Welfare had to sign regulations outlining specifics. The secretary did not. In 1977, a group of activists held the federal building in San Francisco for 26 days. The FBI shut off the phones. A Deaf person signed the news of the day out the window to others who then contacted the news. Another form of connection.
The protest was successful. I was born in 1976 so this sit-in happened in my lifetime. I didn’t learn about it for over a decade.
The ADA was signed in 1990 giving similar protections to people with disabilities for employment and public accommodations. I was 14. I probably read some newspaper articles about it at the time. I wasn’t much for news, but I was pretty interested in disability even though I didn’t have any diagnoses and no one thought of me as a disabled person.
In 1994, I started thinking of myself as a disabled person due to my inability to handwrite more than a few sentences. A laptop was life changing, except when the thing was broken again. I joined a disability group at college. They accepted me even though I didn’t have a diagnosis. We found a pile of pamphlets somewhere about disability rights.
My senior year, I had the opportunity to take a class in disability law at our sibling school, taught by a practicing disability law attorney. Students at the sibling school were required to take a class in “social justice.” The disability law class was full of students meeting their social justice requirement and then every student with a visible, and possibly invisible disability in both campuses.
That year, 1998, was the year the first ADA case reached the supreme court, which was Casey Martin’s request to use a golf cart when competing in the PGA. We discussed this case in class at length. We had a large hardcover textbook, which I don’t think I’ve opened since 1998, and a paperback copy of the ADA.
The internet really blossomed over the next few years. I discovered instant message, message boards, then blogs. I found disability community. In 2003 I entered medical school and encountered discrimination. For about a year, I walked around with my copy of the ADA conspicuously sticking out of my tote bag. Sometimes I would read it while waiting for another meeting where someone was going to tell me that my need to type could not be accommodated.
In 2008, the ADA Amendments Act was passed, broadening the definition of disability after court cases had interpreted disability very narrowly.
In 2017, the US House passed the ADA Education and Reform Act, requiring people who encounter access barriers to notify the business in writing. The business would then have 60 days to respond and 120 days to show some progress towards providing accessibility. Tammy Duckworth managed to block the law from passing in the senate. Apparently, 20 years notice wasn’t enough.
In 2019, I started work at a major health system in a reasonably sized city. I can’t really use a web page I need to access reference material, because the picture on the screen changes every few seconds. I can get through, but it takes several minutes and a lot of effort, multiple times a day. I brought this up in October and had a series of e-mail exchanges with someone who said they would look into it. In January I received an automatic e-mail closing the ticket. The problem still persists. More recently, we were told we would need to use a smartphone ap for authentication to log onto remote servers. I sent in questions about how this would work for someone who can’t use a smartphone. Two weeks passed without a response. Finally I was told to call someone, who said my ticket had been sent to the wrong team but he would send it to the right one. Two more weeks passed. I spoke with a supervisor in IT and asked if IT had someone in charge of accessibility. Someone to look at proposals and say things like
How will this work for blind users?
Where are the captions?
What if someone can’t use a smartphone?
Apparently the IT department of a major health system in a reasonably sized city does not. I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised. Neither does Twitter. The internet has long been a place for people with disabilities to connect, but it can also be a site of ongoing inaccessibility.
The ADA turns 30. We have our rights. I’m thankful we also have each other for support as we continue to fight for them.
no subject
no subject
We are switching to microsoft authenticator. I assumed it would have an online option or hardware token, and sent my request to IT explaining the problem and asking about other options.
The fact that they don't seem to recognize that there are other options, and that some people with disabilities might need some of these other options, and can't figure out who in IT might know anything about these other options, in 2020, is pretty much exactly the point.