Alright, the standard belief is that people who want equal access, rights, etc. are stereotypically people that fall into the group that are being marginalized. I am by no measure blind; my nearsightedness is easily corrected with glasses.
I am an individual with behavioral, learning, and pain disorders that affect my interactions with society. Why not work to improve individuals like myself?
And there’s lots of reasons why I’ve decided I want to help people with severe visual impairment first.
First up, people that are severely visually impaired have it a hell of a lot worse than I do. One of my friends is completely blind with not even light perception (extremely rare despite this being the imagined picture of the typical blind individual); I can’t send him Vimeo videos about research he’d enjoy because it isn’t accessible (there isn’t a textual play). Even something as basic as keep backpacks out of aisles so he won’t trip is difficult for many people to grasp.
As one can conclude from my research, having a severe visual impairment greatly decreases the opportunities a person has. I never had to worry about whether I would be literate, attend college, and be educated enough to have a profession; I assumed that I just needed to work for it. If a child has a severe visual impairment, this isn’t the case and that depresses and disgusts me.
Secondly, helping others with different abilities does help me and many others. I find it very difficult to use a touchscreen because of the amount of attention necessary; staring at computer screens will give me a migraine, but I have limited choice with GUIs.
The drive for multimedia also excludes people with hearing impairments, easily fatigued individuals, and even those that simply are in a hurry.
Thirdly, and probably most importantly, just because I’ve decided to help one marginalized groups doesn’t mean I’m going to say “tough shit” to anyone else. Despite the common belief, I am not required to make an exclusive decision. I want to include as many people as possible; this just happens to be the area that I’m starting from.
Tags: Society
