BBC News and disabled audiences
| 12:50 UK time, Thursday, 19 February 2009
Yesterday, several newspapers picked up on an internal e-mail I sent to BBC News TV presenters asking them to avoid using the phrase "as you can see on your screens" when pointing audiences to the BBC News website. I asked them if they would please spell out URLs, e-mail addresses and phone numbers, pointing out that a significant number of blind people use television news. The phrase "as you can see" excludes people with visual impairments, and means they can't get the information they might want. This is discourteous, and we can do better than that.
Commentators, and one reported "BBC insider", have said: "This is political correctness gone mad." It is not. This issue is not about avoiding causing offence. It's about information and how to access it.
Eleven million adults are considered to have a disability in the UK which affects their everyday life, and this group make up 19% of the working population and an even higher proportion of our audience. For instance 21% of the audience to the BBC News at Six on BBC One is considered to have a disability. Surely it's not political correctness to consider whether the content we're producing is suitably accessible and understandable?
The BBC has a commitment to help people with disabilities use our services. There are various pages on the BBC site which give information about how it addresses this - for instance bbc.co.uk/accessibility which helps arm audiences with tools which enable them to make the most of the web. There's also the Ouch! website - which reflects the lives and experiences of disabled people with articles, blogs, and an active messageboard.
I'd be interested in hearing from you on what more BBC News could do to makes its services more accessible to all and also about the range of stories we cover.
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~33~RS~)
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This is an excellent and sensible decision and I'm very disappointed at the reaction of some of the newspapers - especially the Telegraph who really ought to know better.
Well done Peter !
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Oh dear Mr Horrocks what a mess you guys make. I am deaf so reading the screen is a must even with my amplified sound. Can you not simply say "...and for our visually impaired the URL is....".
Why do you have to devote a blog to it - can you not accept criticism at any price?
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I must say that broadcasters generally missed the trick when moving onto digital TV. I can fully understand the plight of the deaf who undoubtedly benefit by a sign language translator appearing to the right of our screens but why must we who aren't hard of hearing have this distraction. If I want subtitles, I call up that option - it isn't permanently on the screen. How come a sign language expert can't similarly be hidden until called up?
There are so many aspects of broadcasting that could have been made optional: that horrid drum machine that underpins anyone making news announcements on BBC24 as if we really need or want that sort of thing.
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I can't see what's wrong with reading out URLs or phone numbers. It doesn't harm anyone, disabled or otherwise. The only issue is that it takes marginally longer to read out (and I'd guess would have to be repeated too)...
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Also for hard of hearing or deaf people, the subtitles tend to cover up the web addresses so it is helpful to have them read out as well.
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This is frankly ridiculous. Where does the line get drawn and where do we stop?
Welcome to Britain, a PC nation where it appears even those suspected of crimes against the British people can't be got rid of out of the country for reasons of "PC".
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I completely disagree. The disabled being referred to here are presumably the blind/poorly sighted. The BBC provides huge amounts content suitable for them already, with huge subsidy by other TV licence-payers. Plain PC nonsense to try and make all TV suitable for people who cannot see.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
I think it's great that they show give the information verbally rather than the lazy it's on the screen.
My Mum finds it hard to see some info and it's correct to say this is providing info. Yes we are a bit too PC now, but this is not within that grouping
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Yes Mr Horrocks, you made a stupid mistake and trying to back-peddle like this makes you seem even more of an idiot.
Maybe you could let us know exactly how many visually impaired people complained about presenters saying "as you can see?"
I'm guessing at none. I'm also guessing you have nothing better to do than trying to fix problems that don't exist.
I guess you had better stop showing filmed clips and just have someone describing the incident you are reporting on so you don't exclude people who cannot see.
Don't forget to report the news in easy to understand words, don't want the hard of understanding getting excluded by you!
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1 in 5 (19%) of the working population are disabled?
That cannot be right?
It certainly isn't reflected where I work (in an office).
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Erm... if a blind person can't see the URL on the tele then how are they to use a computer.
So while I appreciate your PC crusade and your ridiculous justifications you really could think these things through.
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#3 attrisse, You beat me to it. My point exactly. I'm all for any technology which helps people with disabilities but I object most strongly to having someone gesticulating away in the corner of my screen.
Like subtitles these can simply be turned on for those who need them.
May I also say I object most strongly to being told which channel I am watching. These obtrusions are most annoying and completely unnecessary. If we are too stupid to know what we are watching we can use our remote.
Am I getting old or do I have a point?
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You say; "21% of the audience to the BBC News at Six on BBC One is considered to have a disability."
I dare that's true, but it implies that 21% of the audience would be excluded by the phrase "as you can see."
As far as I can see you've not quoted a figure for that.
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I think it is ridiculous first and foremost that the ignoarance of others has prompted you to write this blog to justify your direction on the reading out of URL's during broadcast.
To me, for the two seconds it would take to read it, would in no way change the course of my day or life.
However, I will add this.
I do have a number of blind and visually impaired family members and friends. And to be frank they dont bother with television news, mainly because the programming and content is aimed towards a viewing audience:
"Viewers my find these pictures disturbing"
"And the Queen, seen here in ......"
"As you can see in Gaza......"
And so on. Radio news is the preference, in my experience, of those with visual disabilities. In fact two that I can think of do not even have television. And this is because television news as a whole is not accessible to all.
So yes, nice thought and for sure a huge dissapointment that people would be negative about it.
Personally speaking though, whether the URL is read or not is not going to make one iota of difference to anyone.
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It is of course politically correct. What is incorrect is the assumption that this is a negative. When I was young I had heard the word "typical" used sarcastically so many times that I was shocked to learn that it could be used in any other way. Does anybody ever consider what the opposite of politically correct might be? Unthinkingly prejudiced perhaps?
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It should be both displayed and read out, after all it's fine to display and read out premium rate voting telephone numbers...
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This is so indicative of our micromangement of everything everywhere. Peter I'm on your side, but I feel it should not need to be said. We seem to need rules and regulations that cushion the blow against everyone.
Please take this as criticism of our 'system', rather than this blog.
Reading out the URL would not assist deaf or hard of hearing viewers, as displaying it on screen doesn't aid those with viewing difficulties.
Maybe you should also mention during phone in shows that people who can't talk should send an email instead, unless they can't write, then ask a friend. How far do you go?
Are we to start commentating on snooker saying that the green ball (or it may be red if you suffer from colour perception problems) blah blah.
A simple change in our state of mind is what is needed here. I agree that all public services should be seen to be accessible to everyone, irrespective of race, colour, creed, sexual preference, gender, physical ability etc., but come on BBC - a bit of common sense please.
Something like 'further information on the story can be found on our website, available at news.bbc.co.uk' whilst displaying the URL on screen would suffice. Say it for those who have visual difficulties, and display it for those who have hearing difficulties, while the rest of us can take our pick. Easy
I realise there are varying degrees of deafness and blindness, but how does a profoundly blind person use the internet. Excuse my ignorance, but how?
It is those who do not have physical impairments that seem to cause the obstacles. We need to stop nit-picking on what is said and concentrate on what is meant.
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I am very tired of this repeated use of ridiculously high figures for those who are "disabled". I believe I am counted twice (being hard of hearing and having asthma) but I don't expect every channel of communication and every activity to adjust to my specific health status.
The deaf use visual interfaces more; the blind use audio interfaces more. People who are actually blind don't make much use of URLs or email. Hearing induction loops; buzzers to indicate when pedestrian lights are green etc make sense, but let's not overdo it.
Richard Sage
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Dear Peter
"Eleven million adults are considered to have a disability" .... your use of statistics (the only point from which your argument seems to stem from) is poor.
1. You have used a large sounding number to give weight to your view, yet this figure dose not represent blind people in the UK. You have instead incorporated a multitude of otherwise unconnected persons into a debate to make it sound more important. You could have just as well said blind people have heads and there are 60m people with heads in the UK so this reaction offends everyone.
2. It would not matter if 100% or 0.00001% of the UK which were blind.... if it was offensive it would still be offensive regardless of the amount of people it offends. Again making the figures pointless
The only argument you make outside of these misguided stats is that "The BBC has a commitment to help people with disabilities use our services" and while the BBC may have a commitment it is not an overriding one that should be perused beyond all reason. If that were so, then surely you must also ask your colleagues to fax a braille copy of the URLs, e-mail addresses and phone numbers to blind members of the audience for easier reference. You wont because that would be silly and impracticable.... I think a little like your original suggestion.
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I completely agree that URLs, phone numbers, addresses etc should be read out. I'm visually impaired and to be honest it annoys me when someone says 'the number's on the screen'. Why should I have to ask someone in the room to read it out for me?
What harm can it do to make these things accessible for all, after all the details are printed on the screen for the hard of hearing, so why shouldn't others be catered for as well?
Kay
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How would a blind person be able to turn on a computer, open up a web browser find the navigation bar and type in bbc.co.uk or some other web address?
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this is going to sound insensitive, but what use is a url to a blind person? they wont be able to see the information anyway and surely the audio will only be of use on certain sites?
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Try reading out the URL for this page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2009/02/bbc_news_and_disabled_audience.html
I'd hazzard a guess it couldn't be read out once, stored, and then typed into a browser without mistakes.
What about other sites like my favourite http://slashdot.org - no one is getting that correct.
Leave things as they are please. URLs should be listed on the bbc.co.uk site, maybe on a page called "URLs shown on the TV today".
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Could there please be a definitive ruling on the difference in usage for 'slash' and 'stroke', so that the awkward Americanisms 'forwardslash' and 'backslash' can be avoided, ie 'slash' is back and 'stroke' is forward.
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I have no problem with reading out web addresses onscreen, but newsreaders shouldn't have to bother with the laborious "www", which triples the time it takes to say the address.
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I find the idea of reading out URLs impractical. Why waste program time detracting from actual program content by reading out potentially long URL’s when any visually impaired person can go to the main BBC website and using reader software follow the links from there? Though Mr Horrocks states the contrary, everyone can clearly get the information they want, BBC online news articles for example have far more links than provided with the onscreen news.
I think the statistics provided by Mr Horrocks are also misleading - the percentage of BBC viewers with a disability is a complete irrelevance. The discussion was about people with visual impairments, why not furnish us with these figures? Did the relevant statistics not suit his point as conveniently?
It needs to be remembered that the URLs are usually for supplemental information only and not for main content, and while accessibility is indeed a noble cause, making things less convenient for the overwhelming majority of people to make things slightly easy for a very small few is not sensible. I echo the point made by ‘atrisse’ earlier that the ultimate example of this is the sign language pop-up for hearing impaired viewers... why is this not optional, why must we all have this distraction, subtitles are optional after all?
Even if URLs being read out does not eat into very much time, it will most likely encourage programs to not present a long URL or to give less of them, thus affecting ALL viewers negatively.
I fear that the things are shaped by those who shout loudest, and that the quiet yet overwhelming majority should make our views heard too. While accessibility is a very good thing, it should not make media less viewable for a far larger portion of the audience. Speak up or the accessibility extremists will have their way – all to the detriment of almost everyone’s viewing experience!
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@atrisse: Spot on! With digital TV so much could have been done to enhance viewers' experiences. Start with the permanently-visible station ident that digital stations have. Why can't this be hidden once the viewer knows what the channel is? Then there's also the way continuity announcers talk over the end credits of programmes, ruining the music that a composer has written especially, and damaging the artistic integrity of the programme (one great thing about the iPlayer is that this doesn't happen). Unfortunately the only purposes of digital TV were (1) to allow most of the airwaves to be sold off to mobile phone companies; and (2) to squeeze in loads more more low-quality channels (I'm mainly referring to commercial ones here). There's no room for innovative features.
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I work in web design and we apply similar principles for accessibility.
For example, we make hyperlinks to other content descriptive, as opposed to hyperlinks that say "click here". This makes the link purpose clear to visually impaired people using screen readers, as well as people who can't use a mouse (we tend to use the word "select" instead of "click" where actions need to be explained).
Similarly, a significant percentage of the population is colour blind, so we don't use green and red colours to denote different meanings as this could lead to confusion.
This isn't political correctness - simply awareness of the difficulties some people face and an attempt to include them. The trick, however, is to be able to do this without damaging the experience for users with no impairment.
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While its is a great addition to have a bulletin signed for the deaf and hard of hearing, does it need to be on the main channel, to the distraction of the non-disabled viewer? Can it be put behind the red button? Those requiring audio description can choose this setting themselves on their Sky digibox.
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After further thought i'd be interested to know where the figure of 21% comes from. What are the demographics for the "BBC News at Six on BBC One" ?
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'Erm... if a blind person can't see the URL on the tele then how are they to use a computer'
VinChainSaw you are showing up some incredible ignorance there my friend. Just go and google your own question for 5 seconds and you will learn plenty of answers - maybe it is you who cannot 'see'?
As for this debate. Nothing wrong with reading out root web addresses, takes no time at all. Don't make it 'law' though - they soon become very long indeed, check out the address bar on the page we are reading right now for instance...
Can I also suggest saying [phonetic] 'treble doubleyou' rather than 'doubleyou doubleyou doubleyou' at the start, scans so much easier for the speaker amd listener.
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Re: VinChainSaw's comment regarding blind people using computers - There is a program called Jaws that a blind colleague of mine uses to interact with her PC. It is connected to a Braille output device which allows her to read whatever is on her screen. She performs the same kind of work on the IT help desk as her colleagues who are not blind.
Please don't assume that just because someone is blind that they cannot use a computer or perform other tasks. Blind people can do anything but see.
With regards to the general issue of reading web site addresses, phone numbers etc out rather than just referring viewers to what is on screen, I believe that this is justified as it allows visually impaired people access to the same information as sighted people. It could be argued that the BBC and other broadcasters are obliged to provide such a service as per their obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act.
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I think that's great. Whilst I do not suffer a visual impairment myself, such a minor change in phrasing and behaviour that costs nothing is a good thing and a smart move. it's quite concerning that people are so worried about being considerate to others that even an internal email will generate this level of media coverage and 'outrage'. Come on people. this will not affect your viewing negatively, costs nothing, and makes the BBC more accessible to all.
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I have a deaf friend who writes rhyming poetry and talks about how words sound. I personally do not "see" images in my head but I talk about my imagination, and when I write I try to paint pictures for others. "As you can see" obviously doesn't apply to blind people but I'll bet you any money you like plenty of blind people use that and similar phrases.
Politically correct should not be an insult but it is because well meaning people go over the top. There is nothing insulting to a blind person in using a phrase that they all know is aimed at the majority of viewers. Now how about you getting your radio programmes better tuned to the needs of the deaf ...
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In answer to , VinChainSaw's comment about blind people not being able to use a computer - have you never heard of screenreaders and accessibility options on a PC?
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BigBigShug - he said 21% of the audience, not 21% of the working population. I am disabled and unable to work even part-time on a regular basis due to the adaptations I have to make - your comment would exclude me even though I watch the news when I can.
Peter - a good idea, but you might have done well to be a little less vague/broad in your definition, particularly that only visually impaired people have trouble reading the TV screen - I know some very intelligent people who still have to make adaptations to be able to read.
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The irony is that it's never the disabled that complain. It's always some do-gooder on their behalf.
If you really want to help people then try asking them what they want instead of using your own discretion and ending up in pickles such as this.
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Just for information, people can use assistive technologies on their computers to have web sites "read" to them or, in some cases, portions of the screen can be magnified to make them 'visible'.
It is wrong to imagine that people with a variety of visual impairments cannot use computers or access the internet. Of course this means having the right technology available and websites themselves being truly accessible - but that is another story.
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Full marks to Peter for thinking about universal access to the information, but 1/10 for his approach. If you are going to enter a URL on a computer you most probably can read it on the BBC screen; you may not be able to hear it read out; perhaps people who have problems seeing the screen are in the BBC radio audience not its TV one; and when all is said and done, it always seems to me that the URLs are never displayed long enough for anyone to find a pen and paper and write them down.
And while I'm at it, can we dispense with the pointless "forward slash" when URLs are read out - if you are sufficiently computer savvy to want to follow up a URL you know it is a forward slash.
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I'm staggered at the comments that blind people don't make much use of the TV, computers or email. What do they imagine they do all day? Weave baskets?
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
For those (#12,#22) who don't think blind people can use the Internet: there are devices and software available for entering text and URLs using voice controls, there are screen magnifiers to zoom in on content, there are screen-readers to read the content of a page for people who can't see it at all.
Plus,there are many people who are 'blind' enough to not be able to read a phone number as it flashes up on a screen across the room, but can see enough to use a monitor and keyboard right in front of them.
Not to mention short sighted people who don't have their glasses on, people who are doing something else with the TV on in the background, and people (most of us) who remember things better when we hear them as well as seeing them.
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Peter, I'm with you completely on this one.
What an indictment on our country that, once again, the majority appear more interested in assuming their roles as victims of PC-gone-mad than in showing some good old fashioned generosity of spirit.
If this counts as political correctness - essentially common courtesy - then who could possibly oppose it other than the brainwashed cretins drip-fed a daily diet of reactionary spite from our country's appalling newspapers.
Unfortunately I fear these selfish, spite-filled people now make up the majority of Britain.
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How would a blind person turn on a computer, open up a web browser, find the navigation bar and type in bbc.co.uk? Easy, by pressing the power button and then using the keyboard - (start+i for the browser, ctrl+l for the navigation bar, www.bbc.co.uk for the URL). It's not rocket science.
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The ignorance of some of these comments astounds me.
If you're visually impaired, you might be able to watch the news but not read text off the screen clearly. It's no trouble to have the URI read out to cater for that minority. As a dogmatic rule, it is perhaps silly, but as a guideline, what does it matter to a fully-sighted person like me?
And the idea that blind people can't work a computer, despite there being special software for them, is very ignorant. There's some excellent screen reader software.
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re: reading out long URLs - how long does it take to say news.bbc.co.uk ? And didn't they always used to read out web addresses (which used to be really long) until fairly recently anyway?
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It is sad that so many people still think that anyone with a sight or hearing problem should be consigned to the back room.
One thing that the television companies MUST do, is to improve the outdated and really awful subtitles for the hard of hearing. Out of synch, incredible mistranslation of the spoken words - (ink readable Miss Tran Slation of the broken Kurds).
I must go now - my hearing aid is whistling - sorry to be a nuisance.
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What a lot of ignorance there is among the comments to this blog entry.
To all those who say, "...as if blind people can use computers" - this is what screen readers are for. I am an RNIB I.T. volunteer and you would be amazed at the speed at which blind and partially-sighted people can navigate a web page. The rest of us wouldn't even be able to understand the reader at the speed it reads out the text!
And to those who say, "The BBC spends enough on partially-sighted people", I would say this:
The BBC's content for blind people comes nowhere near the amount of content for sighted people. Are you saying that because someone has a disability, their life should be made worse, or they should be entitled to less?
Shame on all of you. I would not go so far as to say I wish you would experience blindness or deafness, but...
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For once I surprise myself, for although a fully paid up member of the anti-PC Party, I agree, in this case, it makes every kind of sense for news readers, etc., to spell out website addresses etc.. And, let's face it, hardly any time is wasted by doing it.
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meddc1 @ #29
You have summed up my 'simplify' the way we do things, perfectly.
This could be post #50, if I'm quick enough, but it goes to show how such a simple way of doing things can be blown so many times out of proportion.
In essence, BBC, do the right thing, but there's no need to shout about it.
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ah - I didn't make it to #50 - guess a lot of opinion on this subject then
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Forgive me for my possible ignorance... but I have a question....
How can blind people surf the internet anyway?
If they can't read the URL on the page, how are they supposed to read the page once it had loaded?
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There are two million blind or partially sighted people living in the UK. Most are elderly and feel isolated from a society they once could see and interact with. Television provides many of them with a means of communication with the world and comfort, yet they would be cut off even from this by the small minded and the anti-pc brigade.
Audio Description is one way to make the television accessible again, as it places an optional extra layer of commentary pictures are described and scenes verbalised for the viewer.
Only 10% of a broadcasters total output has to be audio described, and this can include repeats. So anyone who claims the Blind and Partially Sighted have loads of stuff done for them already, have to check their facts first.
I think this is a fantastic policy, and it saddens me that people have a problem with something that will really not affect them in any way but can help thousands.
And for general information to the few unintelligent ones, there are many ways that computers can be made accessible to the blind and partially sighted, from screen resolutions to screen reading software.
Sight loss can affect anyone, yet if people don't lose it they don't even think of how it affects others.
And for the record I am a fully sighted twenty four year old who despairs at some of the outdated and discriminatory comments I read above.
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I agree that this is NOT "PC gone mad", but it IS a reflection that the BBC these days subordinates clear, efficient, intelligent communication of the news to "interactivity", advertising it's website and commercial activities, and other gimmicks.
If the URL was important then it would make sense for the newsreader to labouriously read it out, even if this wastes time and muddles the viewing/listening experience for everybody. But it isn't important, so they shouldn't do it.
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Hello,
Well said! Lots of elderly people, such as my mother, suffer from macular degeneration and can still enjoy the general picture but certainly can't read a subtitle and have no chance at all of any assisstive technology to help with their late-acquired disability. Reading out a url or phone number is therefore a big help!
What would help me, on the other hand, would be if broadcasters could stop drowning out speech with background noise, whether music or anything else. For the under thirties, this is an unimaginable problem, but for those with older ears, the whole lot descends into unidentifiable noise, as frustrating as any other kind of interference. It nearly always happens just when there's a punch-line, joke or particularly tense bit of a programme!
The only other point I'd make is that the frailties and general bits-falling-offness of increasing age are not actually disabilities, just normal states for all people as they get older. There's nothing new or political, correct or otherwise, about showing consideration for older people. It used to be normal!
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#30
good point, but needs a bit more thinking through - not everyone has a sky digibox.
Surely 'subtitle' technology could be used, as someone else suggested, to enable the user to switch on / off the 'signing'.
You see Peter, you've started a blog on a subject which is obviously getting everyone talking. But this is a mountain being generated by the venerable mole.
The more we legislate about what can or cannot be done, the more we have to counter-legislate to fill in the gaps.
This is as bad as the 'we cannot photograph the police' on the CCTV blog.
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For those of you wondering how a blind person might use the internet, they might use:
A screen reader that interprets the contents of the screen and reads it to them.
A refreshable Braille display that interprets the contents of the screen and displays a section of it using moving dynamically raising dots.
A braille keyboard.
Reading a typical URL out loud on the news will only take a very short time. I'm really staggered that some sighted people are so offended by the suggestion.
If simple gestures of consideration like this constitute political correctness then perhaps it is something to celebrate rather than begrudge.
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"Commentators, and one reported "BBC insider", have said: "This is political correctness gone mad." It is not."
-Oh yes it is.
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Bringbackbison, Relaxedsteak, Vinchainsaw and others
You can read all about the way that visually impaired people use the internet here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screen_reader
Most blind people enjoy a full and interactive experience on the web
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I agree with much of what is being said, but I would like to make it clear that blind people can and do use the Internet using special readers. Works well.
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Just to put the 21% figure in perspective it is only one percent short of the vote that earned Blair his third term. Is that minor or not so minor?
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Douglas333
Honestly, you maintain a website but know nothing about web accessibility issues?
That's quite shocking.
You should read this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_accessibility
And it is NOTHING to do with "political correctness". It's about making your web content available to the widest number of users possible.
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PC? What a ridiculous slur - this is purely a practical measure and the BBC should be commended. Do people think they should only make improvements on the back of complaints?
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To all the people claiming that a URL would be useless to blind people; your ignorance is quite astounding. "Screen reader" programs that can read text printed on the screen have existed for decades. You can access the URL bar by typing CTRL+L. There are many ways to launch an application without being able to see.
To the person who claimed that really long URLs would take ages to read: nobody uses really long URLs on TV anyway, they're usually short such as bbc.co.uk/something.
I think spelling out every URL would be excessive, and that only ambiguous, exotic and non-dictionary words should have to be spelled. For example "monkeys.com" is fine just being read; but "quays.com" / "keys.com" would benefit from clarification, as would any foreign words or personal / trademark names that cannot be looked up in a dictionary.
More broadly, I think the BBC would benefit from a "tinyurl" like forwarding system - type in "bbc.to/456" or "bbc.to/keyword" and be forwarded to the longer URL.
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I can't say that I believe visually impaired people really care about this, even if the URL is read out, it is unlikely the website is that friendly to blind people.
Aside from this as a seeing person I would like people to read out URLS and everything, as I am rarely looking at the screen when the tele is on.
I used to love when the subtitles came on for hard of hearing, as they would commentate on what was happening on the screen, like "a steam train slowly pulls into a peaceful village station"
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I can't even comprehend how people can think that this is "political correctness gone mad". It must have been a very slow news day for those media outlets for took umbrage at it.
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When did we become such a nasty country that consideration for our fellow man/woman is now always labelled as 'PC'. Was it Thatcher or Blair - or maybe if the Telegraph tells you so then you believe it.
Why do people exend so much venom on something that helps people? Next thing you will be telling me that someone who does good could have a derogratory term about them such as 'do gooder'.
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Re - low ATMs. Douglas333 you could try bending your knees - it isn't difficult. Much easier than fitting the necessary ramps for someone in a wheelchair to get to the ATM. I guess you disapprove of disabled parking spaces as well - let the b*ggers struggle eh, teach em a lessor for being born like that. Nice attitude.
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21% of the British working population is NOT disabled, as is blatantly obvious to anyone living in Britain, whatever official figures may claim. What counts as a disability? I've had back pain a few times in my life, does that make me disabled? I wear glasses, does that count?
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#7, aburro wrote:
"The disabled being referred to here are presumably the blind/poorly sighted. The BBC provides huge amounts content suitable for them already, with huge subsidy by other TV licence-payers."
Unless there is a good reason for doing otherwise, BBC output should be accessible by ALL of the particular audience.
As someone with good vision and hearing, am I inconvenienced by having a URL read out? No.
Ghetto-ising disabled and/or impaired individuals would be to pile unfairness upon misfortune.
I am 'happy' to pay my licence fee in order to have the BBC provide a universal service; the fact that some is of no interest to me does not mean that I think it should not be produced.
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I cannot believe that basic equality and accessibility is being criticised as political correctness. Even as a non-disabled user I find this sort of attitude infuriating. It is the modern equivalent to eugenics.
The BBC should ensure hat every web address and telephone number is both spoken and written and what would also be good is a bibliography web page with a simple list of mentioned web addresses list by day, channel, program. Currently if I need a reminder of something mentioned on a program I have to trawl the whole site and usually to o avail.
Please BBC ignore the silly PC comments
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News readers have been told to read out URLS when referring to news stories on the web? Have you not seen how long some of the URLs are? Take http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7896418.stm. Must a news reader really read that out?
What's next? Will the news readers have to describe all of the on-screen images that go with each story so that the visually impaired get as much out of each story as those who can see? Has the term "as you can see" also been banned?
I believe BBC Parliament comes under BBC News. Is the BBC considering employing somebody to tell the visually impaired which MP is speaking like they do on the radio in PMQs? How far is this going to go?
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On the whole, it's probably a good idea to read out web addresses. It doesn't take very long, and even those who have perfect sight might have small TVs with fuzzy reception.
But please don't use totally phoney statistics to justify your position. 21% of your audience has a disability? Oh really? And what does that have to do with how many people are blind anyway? No doubt some of those 21% are deaf: how does reading out the web address help them?
I assume you are using a pretty broad definition of disability, and one which has nothing whatever to do specifically with vision. Just to give you an idea of how broadly "disability" is defined, I myself am considered disabled by my credit card issuer. I discovered that the only way to avoid having to use one of those annoying little chip 'n' spin cards was to tell them I have a disability. My disability is nothing more serious than a dislike of excessive PINs to remember, but apparently it still counts as a fully fledged disability in 21st century Britain.
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This is clearly a simple and very sensible suggestion. No debate needed.
I am of the opinion that this is more of a case of "this is people who say "this is political correctness gone mad" gone mad."
Some uninlightened commentors have hinted that visually impaired people would not be able to type the web addresses. I am certain that this is nonesense and clearly there are braille keyboards and programs that read aloud text displayed on a computer.
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"
6. At 2:59pm on 19 Feb 2009, Jordan D wrote:
This is frankly ridiculous. Where does the line get drawn and where do we stop?
Welcome to Britain, a PC nation where it appears even those suspected of crimes against the British people can't be got rid of out of the country for reasons of "PC".
"
Since when was it a crime to be disabled?
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You make a valid point. I totally agree. It's easy for those of us who can see to cause a fuss and complain, but we lost our sight I'm sure our opinion would swiftly change!
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This may be un-PC but given that television is a visual/audio interface and radio is a purely audio interface surely it must be the case that blind/visually impared people will listen to the radio? Television will become unworkable if every visual activity has to described by the narrator. I also agree with those who disagree with the % of disabled people in the country. These numbers must have been produced by the same people who fill-up supermarket car-parks with disabled spaces of which usually 2 or 3 are occupied while everyone else has to further to carry their bags.
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'I have no problem with reading out web addresses onscreen, but newsreaders shouldn't have to bother with the laborious "www", which triples the time it takes to say the address.'
9 syllables is far too many, best replaced with hex-U which is the same as 3 double U's
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Surely, following your logic, the term 'viewer' is offensive also? I hear this all the time on the BBC.
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There is madness here. But its not on the part of the BBC. Its on the part of those who run around shouting "This is political correctness gone mad" whenever they get annoyed by something.
To consider the facts.
1. Reading out a URL is hardly going to annoy anyone? Is there anyone here who would be genuinely upset because a newsreader read out a URL or an on-screen message?
2. Referring to fact one above - since it isn't going to kill anyone if a newsreader reads out an on-screen message then why not? I mean if it only helps two people and a dog in Kilmarnock its still helped someone and at no extra cost to anyone else.
Why do we live in a culture where instead of asking why shouldn't we do something we ask why we should do it? Why not read out a message? Or am I missing something and there are a band of people out there who are now going to be inconvenienced by this measure?
As for "political correctness gone mad". It may not be political correctness but its certainly a world gone mad when newspapers have to resort to this sort of cheap tactic to inflame "furious of Milton Keynes"? Because while we are all sat here debating this there are some really worthwhile issues out there that we should be getting mad about.
And no this shouldn't be a blog. It shouldn't even be a news story in the first place. But in Britain in 2009 no doubt its one item ahead of war and famine on most people's agenda for the day.
A-T
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@#43 "Another example is the huge number of ATMs that have become virtually unusable by anyone over 5'8" because they've been placed at a ridiculously low level for midgets to use."
GOOD!!! Now you know what us "midgets" have been going through since time immemorial! Actually I'm a wheelchair user, but the height is about the same. Oops sorry, I'm guessing from your attitude you'd understand me to be "confined to a wheelchair".
As for reading out URL's etc, all power to you BBC! It's no more political correctness than providing ramps, or induction loops etc. Bravo!
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I'm not visually impaired, but I know enough about to computers to know screen reading software is available to read out documents on screen.
The standards for web page construction even allow this to take place.
Just because a medium is visual doesn't mean it can't be accessed by blind/visually impaired people.
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@ Post #46:
"Easy, by pressing the power button and then using the keyboard ... It's not rocket science."
You've got to be kidding me. More like:
Turn on the PC - Easy enough.
Enter password, login sound happens. Easy enough.
Click icon to launch browser... Agh!
If you know enough about your operating system, you'll know how to assign a shortcut key (when they work). If not... Well you're on your own really, I hear voice recognition can actually understand the words you say now...
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Broadcasters have let the disabled down when moving onto digital TV. I can fully understand the plight of the deaf who undoubtedly benefit by a sign language translator appearing to the right of our screens but why must the majority who aren't hard of hearing have this distraction. If I want subtitles, I call up that option - it isn't permanently on the screen. How come a sign language expert can't similarly be hidden until called up? If this can be done with Audio Description for the Blind why not the signer for the deaf?
Come on BBC be the first PSB to bring this in to fruition!
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Would everyone who's commented please stop getting your knickers in a twist over this, accept that it's a minor change that's going to make a minor improvement to some people's lives and get on with your lives.
Keep Calm and Carry On.
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Hello,
Politically correct or not, does this really warrant such venom in opposition? Does reading out a URL really affect the non-blind/visually impaired so much in their viewing pleasure, that the impaired minority should suffer for it?
Everyone, everyday does things a certain way because it's the best way to do it for the good of the greatest number of people.
Anyone complaining about this needs to look at themselves first. What about this causes detriment to you? I would guess nothing, so your complaints are invalid, pointless and reflect worse on you, than on the BBC or Mr. Horrocks.
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This concern for minorities is all very well, but try being a member of a minority that the BBC disklikes - ie someone who has political views BBC staff disagree with - and suddenly the BBC's duty to be "accessable to all" goes out of the window.
In such cases,the blind amongst the general public are actually treated exactly the same way as everyone else: information about minority views is simply denied them, or even false information supplied.
Equal access to all is laudable, but if the news content itself is wrong, then what's the point?
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I rarely make two posts in the same thread but having read some of the replies which were "approved" following my first post I have to add this.
This thread is supposed to be discussing one particular act. That of asking newsreaders (or presenters) to read out any on-screen messages. It however seems to have become a discussion about percentages and blind people and subtitles and all. Why?
Again - who does it HURT if such messages are read out? Who suffers? Who is inconvenienced. And does it really matter if we are helping one person or one million when there is no counter-balance in terms of how many people we are hurting? So you help only one person. But you inconvenience no-one.
Until someone comes up with a valid reason as to why reading out these messages will cause someone else real and viable inconvenience - all these discussions seem rather moot.
A-T
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Lots of comments on here about blind people who may or maynot be able to use computers are missing the point entirely.
I only just need glasses for seeing stuff at a distance, so I don't always wear them when walking round the house. Quite often I have BBC News on in the background, and I certainly wouldn't be able to read a url from the other side of the lounge as I'm doing something else.
We're not talking long urls here - from memory the BBC has some policy about having no more than two words after the bbc.co.uk anyway.
Would just have thought it was logical to read them out!
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If you dont like it, the BBC also provides a significant number of alternatives at the tax payers expense. They are called radio stations.
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I wish the phrase 'PC gone mad' was banned. It serves no other purpose than to undermine any argument in which it is used.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
#69, PilgrimsProgress:
My sense is that the occasional well-intentioned but foolish instances of political correctness - often blown up or mischaracterised by the press - have brought on a huge backlash that is out of proportion to that which it criticizes. Stoked by the already anti-BBC media, and tapping into people's innate capacity for selfishness and bigotry, and combined with an overall cultural swing towards conservatism more generally - and it's no surprise that we're currently in the 'age of hate' and that the BBC is attacked for something as courteous as this.
Because they're desperate to paint themselves as victims of this great conspiracy of political correctness, and for the liberal BBC to be at the heart of that. They see the minorities receiving encouragement, attention, they see how it's openly acknowledged that they're often victims of actual discrimination, and they resent it and want a piece of the victimhood pie of their own. Hence endless front pages about PC-gone-mad, poor discriminated-against Christians, etc - yet very few about the actual racism, sexism, homophobia, etc that "PC" seeks (however clumsily) to remedy. Newspapers pandering to readers selfish instincts, that's all it is.
Indeed. (see also: 'intellectual' and 'elitist' and their original meaning)
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Hi I'm partially sighted, I have no trouble watching TV usually but when something as detailed as writing comes on the screen I can't focus quick enough to read it, and unless I'm on top of the TV I can't read it at all so I applaud your decision to remind people to read out (any) written information that appears on the screen.
And while we're on the subject of accessibility my mum constantly complains of background noise such as music being played while people are talking, she tells me they even do it on the news. I myself haven't owned a TV for years, I only watch the occasional program when visiting other people.
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You write:
Commentators, and one reported "BBC insider", have said: "This is political correctness gone mad." It is not. This issue is not about avoiding causing offence.
But that's exactly what "political correctness gone mad" is. It is a pejorative term for being aware and considerate of the needs of others. So yes it is "correct" to do what you have reported.
It is also correct to listen to those, as mentioned above, who complain about intrusive music/sound effects making listening to what is said more difficult even for those with hearing is normal.
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In response to earlier comments, of course blind people can use the Internet. There's a vast range of assistive technology, including specialist screen reader software, to enable people to use a computer without looking at the screen. Blind people can even type on a keyboard you know!
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Regarding long URIs, it's easy enough for a member of the BBC web staff to create a shortcut URI to ease the process for all- quicker for the newsreader to say, quicker for the end user to type in to visit. The process of setting up a shortcut URI would take just a few seconds.
Modern web standards are making web content more accessible for people with all kinds of disabilities, so why not make more use of web resources in offline media as a way for people to find out more about a subject they're interested in?
I think a minor change that enhances the experience of many with minimal negative impact on others is an easy decision.
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there's also times when people who can see, can't see a tv, but can hear it, say if they're in a different room - it makes sense to both say and display web addresses etc.
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I think it's pretty annoying when the presenters say "..as you can see on our screens". I usually have the TV on in the background when working & its a lot easier for me to remember a verbal address as opposed to a visual one. I certainly don't think it's PC run amock!
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Peter , your arguments are mostly sound and reasonable and calling them P.C. (though accurate) doesn't detract from their correctness. I agree with most of your arguments ... but it's your conclusion and subsequent actions which defy belief. Your posting makes it clear that a significant percentage of your audience have a disability. You don't state what proportion of your disabled audience you consider is going to benefit from the reading out of URLs/mail addresses/phone numbers. You also state that BBC staff were 'asked'. Is a bit more accuracy needed there too Peter ? How much actual research did you conduct into the problem , the solutions and the efficacy of them before issuing this edict ? Anyway ... no point in singling you out among all the other knee-jerk trench-mentality managers (Bankers and T.V. Execs) ... you wanted suggestions so here they come ... (see my next posting) ...
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The phrase 'It's political correctness gone mad' is generally spouted by people who are either -
a) racist
b) borderline senile
c) both
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Mr Horrocks makes a quite credible explaination for URL's being read out on Television. I believe any reasonable person would not have an issue in this happening. If they do then maybe they should think about turning the television off and doing something more constructive. The real issue here seems to be was the reasoning behind this decision explained at the time. If not then the issue is poor management and communication (ironic considering the industry).
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It must be apparent that television (“far-seeing“) was never aimed at visually-impaired people. Even with today’s technology, anyone who is partially-sighted must have real problems trying to unravel what exactly is on the screen, never mind the tiny text boxes that appear and disappear in an instant. It would therefore follow, even with the screen messages voiced, the problem would represent itself at the computer screen. Even screen-readers don't help deaf people. There is a growing trend in this “don’t upset anyone” country of ours, for all manner of politically-influenced “we know what’s best for you” organisations to seek out toe-curling platitudes on a just-in-case basis.
Of the 11m adults considered to have a disability, Peter Horrocks does not indicate the proportion which has a sight impairment - quite clearly his PC target - or indeed if any complained. Whilst I agree wholeheartedly that broadcasting should be accessible for everyone, all this wailing and hand-wringing is embarrassing.
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I'm pleased to see so many people have pointed out your spurious and pointless use of meaningless statistics to support your argument. Had you quoted the number of blind people I might have been more sympathetic.
Disabled people need to be given OPTIONS like subtitles, which they have already; we don't need the concessions made to them to be imposed on the rest of us. And don't get me started on disabled access to business premises - my employer spent £20K on a wheelchair lift in 2000 and it has NEVER been used.
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I agree that in modern society far too much emphasis is placed on the eyes and not enough on the ears. This is demonstrated by the fact that whilst we can shut our eyes, our ears never stop functioning, even when we are asleep! Daniel Barenboim gave a series of lectures on BBC Radio 4 a couple of years ago on the importance of hearing and articulated this point much better than I could.
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Peter, explain yourself. Explain to the license payers : what you perceived the problem to be , why it had to be dealt with, what the options were you considered , what the rationales were behind rejecting some and selecting one, how you decided to communicate the decision to those who were tasked with executing it. If you can't do that because you don't have time or feel you don't have to ... fine. If you can't do it because you didn't do it in the first place ... not fine. And to all those posters who asked what harm it does ... try tuning in to Ant and Dec on a Saturday night when they're reading out the competition conditions and you'll begin to understand. Jackanory was entertainment ... double-u-double-u-double-u-dot-bee-bee-cee-dot-co-dot-you-kay-forward-slash-cee-bee-bees-forward-slash-jackanory ... isn't.
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What planet is the author of this article living on?
I am all for improving disabled access to computers, I think computers can help disabled people a lot, but, let's look at this issue objectively:
The specific complaint was that of television presenters not reading out the URL of websites and simply referring viewers to look at the URL presented on the television screen.
How useful is a website going to be to a blind person if they can't even see the website in the first place!!
So what value is there in reading out aloud the web URL to blind people if they can't even access the website!
Now whilst there are some text to speech conversion programs around, they're only going to be of any use on websites which are very high in textual content, and then how can the blind person navigate around the website using hypertext links if they can't even see those links in the first place!
The author clearly hasn't thought through what he's proposing.
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If the goal is for visually impaired people to access websites then yes it can be achieved, but it's a very poor way to achieve it using conventional websites intended or the seeing population.
What needs to happen, is standards defined, mechanisms established where webpages are specifically created for the visually impaired, and a voice recognition system is used to enable the viewer to navigate the webpage by speaking aloud.
This could be done quite easily.
The downside to this, is that content providers will have to put extra effort to develop the content specifically for the webpages for the visually impaired.
In principle, I'm in support of this idea.
But please, let's not try to pretend that the highly complex webpages and websites with URLs all over the place, links, buttons graphics can be accessed by blind people.
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#3: spot on. I have both visual and cognitive impairment. On a good day I can cope with the constant scrolling headlines on the BBC News Channel (although my experience as a user of the BBC service would be greatly enhanced by their removal), but even on a good day I have to change channel or turn off the television whenever the intrusive sign language translator is present. Why can this service not be offered as an optional one given the number of alternatives that the digital service offers?
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Accessibility for all?
How can that be? Isn't that the definition of being disabled? That some elements of life that are accessible to non-disabled people are not accessible to the disabled.
As a society, we should do what we can to improve accessibility of everything to everybody, as some would say, equality for all. But the fact is, if you're blind, you are not ever going to have 100% equal access to what life has to offer, by definition!
Someone please tell me, how a blind person can navigate a mouse around a webpage when they can't see where the mouse is and can't see where they want to place the mouse cursor.
If they could achieve that, then they surely could drive a car from one town to another! Not sure the Police would be too happy about it.
Be realistic folks.
But there are things we can do, as I've mentioned in another post, to create special websites for them, but at the end of the day, they are never going to have 'equal' access. Limited access yes.
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This isn't PC-gone mad. The PC are things that force more time to be spent on unnecessary extras. The extra time taken to read out the web addresses is negligible, and until recently all web addresses were read out anyway.
What IS embarrassing for him is that Peter Horrocks decided to write a blog on defending an already pointless news story. Laughable.
Not to mention his use of statistics, he is either being deliberately misleading, or an idiot. I'm going for both.
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Too right the websites,s e-mail addresses and telephone numbers should be spelt out. It is irresponsible of the newspapers to ignore this fact that blind exist, though I guess they don't have blind readers to their papers but I'm sure blind readers like to hear the news on their websites.
I would love to see more subtitling through the BBC News website videos.
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Sorry Peter ... here's a suggestion (at last !) Go to your Strategy people and get DDA compliance and integration of services onto/within/across presentation platforms and delivery media punted higher up the agenda NOW. Build a business case on the downside of non-compliance , financial penalties , damage to the brand , and on the upside of enhancing the brand , and customer demographic (e.g. a technologically aware ageing visually/aurally disabled population increasing in the next 10 years). Work with manufacturers on TV/computer/internet integration , text-to-speech and speech-to-text systems. Provide a more complete range of subtitling and signing options for the deaf and hard of hearing. The public might have more respect for the BBC as a Broadcaster if it spent more of its license money on these investments for the future of the service rather than on some of the transitory stuff. Increase spending on infrastructure during a recession. Everybody's doing it !
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Surely, if a visually impaired person cannot see the URL on the TV screen then they will not be able to see the BBC website either?
Secondly, if you cannot fathom out that the BBC website might be bbc.co.uk then...
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All very well but when you click on the accessability link the Windows systems do not appear to include vista
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I have a simple question...if a blind person needs to have the URL spelled out on TV, how would they be able to read the website?
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If any Martian wants to understand the mindset of far too many Britons, this debate would be a great start. No doubt many of the people churning out the same tedious tropes about "PC Gawn Mad Under ZaNuLabor's Gordon Clown and Tony Bliar" are those who whinge about the youth of today and the disappearance of politeness and manners. Why does it affect your sad little lives if the BBC decides that it would be better for the blind if websites were read out? Clearly politeness and consideration only extends so far. Who could possibly take offence and, while we're here, have any scientists developed instruments for measuring the depths to which once great newspapers have plunged if they consider this news?
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I'm severely disabled, including a mild degree of visual impairment (I can use a computer but I can't read a book or correspondence). After a few years of disability, you grow a thick skin. You don't start fussing about such standard phrases as "as you can see on the screen", because you're too busy dealing with not being able to get into buildings for medical appointments, collapsing after being mishandled by the ambulance transport service, having to sign a form you can't read, taking the wrong medication because the font size on the box and the leaflet is tiny, being thrown out of a shop because you asked politely for assistance due to being disabled, being constantly stared at for using a walking aid, having strangers come up and ask rudely what's wrong with you, and not getting enough to eat because the care provided by Social Services is minimal and often appalling.
I'm thrilled to hear that the BBC is turning its attention to how to improve its disabled access. As for its range of stories, instead of the constant stories about how benefits are going to be reduced, with all the implications that most benefits claimants are lazy scroungers or downright fraudulent, how about some investigations of the extraordinary level of disgust and hatred that people with disabilities have to face. Look at the comments in this column, or any time a benefits story gets covered in Have Your Say, if you don't believe me. Why don't you look at the detrimental effect this has on the mental health and self esteem of people with disabilities, especially those who already have mental health problems. Or perhaps an article about how the benefits system is weighted against people with disabilities, and the enormous number of seriously disabled people who aren't getting benefits because they can't manage the mammoth forms or have been treated badly by the DWP. Or a discussion of how most adults with disabilities are living below the poverty line, often housebound and/or isolated.
Why don't you start showing people with disabilities in a way that makes the public realise that we are real people, that we can be intelligent, educated, strong-minded, creative, sexy, brave, incredible achievers, and also completely ordinary. Look up Mandy Leighton-Bellichach, one of the most inspirational women I know.
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Wheras I more or less agree with your overall point, disingenuous waffle such as:
"Eleven million adults are considered to have a disability in the UK which affects their everyday life, and this group make up 19% of the working population and an even higher proportion of our audience. For instance 21% of the audience to the BBC News at Six on BBC One is considered to have a disability."
does you no credit at all.
Clearly not all 11 million have a vision problem and of those who do, how many are watching a TV news program? You just lump in all people with a disability to make sure you have a nice big number to justify your position. Transparent and insulting spin.
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I can't believe some of the comments here, which are clearly written by none disabled people with no idea of what its like living with a disability. I'd like to know where all the programmes for us blind and partially sighted people are, because as far as I'm aware the only one is In Touch. I hardly think 20 minutes once a week is plenty of specialist programming.
I find it hard to understand that simply reading a number or a URL out can be seen as political correctness gone mad. Its not a lot to ask, and can make a real difference to someone like me. I'd like to see how some of these PC bandwagon jumpers coped if they had to live with a disability.
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I'm afraid I find your post deliberately misleading. You state that 21% of the 6pm audience have "a disability". That statistic is entirely irrelevant to the issue at hand - whether reading out URLs is a legitimate accomodation for the visually impaired or simply political correctness. The term 'disability' includes a wide range of people who are not visually impaired - e.g. the deaf, those with learning difficulties, people with mobility problems etc.
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And we pay the licence fee for this?
Having lived with a legally blind person for more than 30 years I can say the last thing they would have ever worried about would have been the phrase "as you can see on your screen" being said on TV.
Yet more "BBCer than thou" madness.
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Once again a BBC editor has to shout down any implied criticism of the way BBC News is run. Try thinking before you hit the send button.
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Seriously, this is one of those silly examples people make up to exaggerate political correctness isn't it?
A tele*vision* channel is bending over backwards because people who can't see might be offended by using the term 'as you can see'
how can you not see that this is going way too far? every tv show requires the viewer to use their eyes, obviously you can listen to the news or conversation quite easily, but you are always going to miss out on the visuals if you can't see - surely that is offensive too? Have many people even complained?
I have no problem with the reading out of addresses and phone numbers, and have always assumed this helped the 'visually impaired' - fair enough, but to suggest that saying 'as you can see' is offensive is taking it to the point where almost everything could potentially be offensive to someone and will result in watering down content to (as many commentators pointed out after Brand-Rossgate) the equivalent of beige
why couldn't you have just used the rationale that it takes up a valuable second with worthless words (then again maybe that second is good to give people a chance to write it down?)
and yes your use of statistics is quite shocking, I dare say 'offensive' - very misleading and irrelevant, it implies 1 in 5 people cannot properly see - they probably just have glasses (like me!)
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I am wondering whether certain persons responded to this blog posting that they have actually broken the law by being blatently abusive and offensive and discriminatory to disabled users of the BBC's website.
Some insist that the visually-impaired (fully or partly) should not use the television. Wrong, not everything is on radio that is on television also does this mean that unimpaired persons should only watch the television.
Some seem to have ignored the fact the visually-impaired are not able to use the Internet. Wrong, the Internet is accessible via screen-readers and braille.
Some seem to think that its just BBC.co.uk that is shown on-screen. Sorry, wrong again, the BBC shows addresses/numbers of local police, airlines, railway companies, travel agencies, various other authorities when news stories relate when relatives need to find information. Are they saying the blind are not allowed access to this vital information?
There seems to be a lot of self-centered, selfish, jealous, non-thinking people about these days....
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I'm baffled as to why someone who can't see would want a TV! After all, what's wrong with radio? And the license fee is much less!!
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"91. At 7:28pm on 19 Feb 2009, paultrollope wrote:
We're not talking long urls here - from memory the BBC has some policy about having no more than two words after the bbc.co.uk anyway."
If we're talking about this blog then
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2009/02/bbc_news_and_disabled_audience.html
is a bit of a mouthful.
Otherwise they're basically just pointing you to the website in general.
However I can't see why they can't have audio version of website address etc. included in the program via the extra facilities digital TV is supposed to offer though.
I do think the clearly serious offence generated by calling people "viewers" should be considered and that word should go on the ever growing BBC watch list.
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To read out a URL instead of chirping 'as you can see' - for the benefit of those who cannot see - is not Political Correctness. It's known by most people as common sense; something which ironically most attackers of Political Correctness profess to be defending.
So our BBC is right on this one. This doesn't, however, mean they don't commit the crime of PC anywhere else...
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It seems to me that most of the people screaming "PC GONE MAD!" have entirely missed the point. I would understand their disbelief if BBC news reporters had been asked to ommit the word "see" because it might offend people who can't, when in actual fact it seems a very logical thing to do to read URLs and phone numbers out to the visually impaired. Are stairlifts and handrails "PC GONE MAD!" as well? No; they're just useful.
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I think the phrase 'political correctness gone mad' has gone mad. You hear it said about stuff that's got nothing to do with political correctness. It's good someone is thinking about accessibility of information for the blind, but an internal BBC memo on the subject is more than enough on the matter surely, not memo -> press leak -> 2 hyperbolic news 'stories'.
But that doesn't stop the 'It's political correctness gone mad' crew. Virtually anything can set them off. A skate park gets opened for teenagers, it's 'political correctness gone mad', Anything involving the disabled, it's political correctness gone mad. Anything which is intended to help minorities at all gets called 'political correctness gone mad'.
I think they should ban the phrase entirely on the grounds that it's not politically correct. That'd show em.
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@qantumblip
Do you have much knowledge about web accessibility, qantumblip? Assistive technology? Accessibility standards?
Just curious...
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Fine, read out the URLs. I don't really care.
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I'm a libertarian web developer, so you can be assured that I'm extremely experienced in both political issues and (more important) accessibility of content on the web.
It appauls me that anyone would deem it unnecessary to read out a web address on TV. Putting aside the issue of blind people for a moment, I guarentee that the majority of viewers wouldn't even bother to take note of any text written on the screen - only stuff that's spoken aloud. That is why we hire newscasters after all, isn't it? As for blind people, developers like me spend a huge amount of time ensuring that web pages are as accessible to the disabled as possible. A lot of time and money goes into this - so why are you people trying to dampen that initiative? You should be ashamed.
This has absolutely nothing to do with PC, or ensuring that blind people are "included". This helps everybody - not just those who cannot see.
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One way to fill up a few more seconds on the news channel I suppose.
Seems a struggle to fill it with content so I suppose reading out numbers/urls will go someway to filling the day.
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It's also incredible how many people don't know that blind people can use computers. Really, it's quite simple - software reads out whatever text is on the screen, and the user navigates either via voice control or simple keyboard shortcuts.
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#126, Tarquin,
You've used the word 'offensive' five times in your post. I suspect that says more about you than about the BBC.
To quote the original piece:
This issue is not about avoiding causing offence. It's about information and how to access it.
I think it's very sad how so many of us in this country have now become determined to attribute 'fear of causing offence' as the sole reason for any act of simple thoughtfulness that aims to make minority groups feel (or be) included.
Why can't you people get it into your heads that sometimes decisions of inclusiveness can be made not from the fear of causing offence (as the hysterical newspapers and their swivel-eyed "it's PC gone mad!" readers would have you believe) but rather out of simple courtesy, out of generosity of spirit?
I realise that explanation wouldn't provoke the same degree of outrage, fill as many column inches, or provide the same ease with which to attack the Beeb - but hey, facts are occasionally inconvenient like that.
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You could also ask your Web development team to make this site more accessible, and web-standards compliant especially on the issue of image tags:
Use 'Title attribute' instead of 'ALT'
See here:
http://support.mozilla.com/tiki-view_forum_thread.php?forumId=1&comments_parentId=158805
Thanks for listening and taking the initiative.
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Peter Horrocks:
This is an excellent and sensible decision regarding the decision about BBC News Coverage and the persons with Handicaps.....
~Dennis Junior~
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138 dotconnect
I know what he said, and to be honest I don't agree with him - I also rarely attack the beeb and have no agenda against them
I admit I may have been too strong, and as I said I have no issue with the reading out of numbers and URLs - I thought this was already standard practice
What people have picked up on is saying you aren't allowed to say 'as you can see' which I think was probably worded wrongly in the original memo and misinterpreted by people, it looks like you can't say 'as you can see' - which, if you've ever worked for a large corporation you would know soon becomes some draconian rule enforced at the bottom end, which would imply that you can't even say 'as you can see the number is 123456'
probably wasn't the intended effect, but it would've been avoided had the email originally simply said 'could it please be regarded as policy that all numbers and URLs shown on screen are read out verbally etc'
again, I think I was too strong, so sorry about that - I was mostly enraged by the poor use of stats in the article, but I still think there's been an error in communication here (how ironic)
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Get a grip people!
We are talking about something that will take, literally, two seconds to read out and will be of no inconvenience to other viewers.
There are more important things in the world to moan about than this.
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Surely the point Mr Horrocks was making about 21% of his audience being disabled is that as an organisation they have a duty to consider the needs of all their customers, and accommodate those needs as best they can within reason.
What business wouldn't try to be flexible for its customers?
In the past decade or so, more buildings, transport and so on have become more accessible to people with disabilities (mobility-related).
This is also of benefit to many more people with buggies, luggage, minor passing injuries and general exhaustion.
It beggars belief that all these years businesses have been so indifferent to the needs of their customers.
I would support the call for the end to thud-thud music drowning out speech. Especially the sort of music that's popular with the hard partying under 30s who don't watch much telly anyway.
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what surprises me most though, is that so little happened in the world yesterday that the newspapers have to write about this.
I agree that this is a sensible decision, and am disappointed that so many seem to be against what clearly helps those that might have a visual impairment or simply those of us who have trouble looking at the tv while trying to write something down.
some of the comments on this blog would surely get moderated off if it doubted a person being able to do something because of their race, gender, faith etc.
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I don't know how blind people will cope, but as a fully sighted person I'd guess that by the time I've realised a web address is being read out, searched for pen and paper to write it down and got back into my viewing armchair, not only will I not remember what it was, but the news will probably have ended & we'll be midway through the lastest episode of Eastenders.
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The BBC provides more than enough provision for the disabled. As they should I might add.
Still this addition is just pushing the boat out to the extent that it becomes liberalised nonsense, but hey...I forget, it's the BBC and liberalised nonsense is the thinking mindset of the majority of its employees.
This of course will please a section of people but the majority will scatch their heads.
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I worked for RNIB for over ten years so hopefully my opinion here will count for something. For one thing, blind and partially sighted/visually impaired/whatever the current PC phrase (I really can't keep up) don't mind if you say "nice to see you".
However, and Peter I hope amongst all these comments you will take this to heart "as you can see on your screens" is entirely superfluous as are many comments in the news. Furthermore the speed at which these are read out are too quick for anyone to take down (I had a similar problem with our local council who answered the phone with a recorded message that started with the word "Wednesday" followed by a statement about bin collection. So I had to ring back because the sentence was in an absurd order).
Whilst on the subject, why is the news site referred to as bbc.co.uk/news instead of news.bbc.co.uk?
At least you've realised that it's possible to set up your public site without the three w's. (the RNIB site did it many years before yours. I know. I set it up).
If the BBC was really serious about helping blind people, they'd have the government cut the license fee to them to 10% of a full license and then ask me why I left RNIB. You'd be in for quite a shock...
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It looks like this was a misunderstanding. The problem with the phrase "as you can see on your screens" is not that it is offensive, but that saying that instead of reading the website excludes part of your audience.
I assume the presenter saying "as you can see the website is at the bottom of the screen, that's www.bbc.co.uk/specialreport" would be acceptable. It directs the attention of sighted people but still includes those who can't see.
As others have pointed out, your numbers for the disabled seem wrong. Are 11 out of the 61 million general population disabled? Did you take the "long standing illness" numbers from National Statistics by mistake?
I know people have different disabilities but the NHS has numbers for the registered blind in England from 2006: 152,000 as registered blind and 155,000 as partially sighted. I couldn't find numbers for Scotland / Wales / NI but I imagine they would be a similar proportion of people.
http://www.ic.nhs.uk/statistics-and-data-collections/social-care/adult-social-care-information/people-registered-as-blind-and-partially-sighted-triennial-2006-england
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#112: Of course blind computer users don't use mice.
FWIW I'm neither blind nor otherwise disabled, and I rarely use a computer mouse either. Why not? because 99% of the time it's quicker not to. If you use both hands for touch typing, stopping to mess around with a mouse is usually a waste of time compared with pressing two or three keys.
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Politically correct or an ininformed bigot? I know which I'd rather be...
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#141, tarquin
Ah right, I understand. Tbh I didn't pick up on that aspect at all.
Even with that in mind, I have to say I honestly doubt that the memo was about any potential 'offence' that might have been caused by the statement ['as you can see'] - rather I took it to mean how useless the statement was to people with impaired vision (and how it could easily be remedied).
Essentially what you've said in your last post then, I guess.
(Btw, really no need for you to apologise - but very decent of you that you did)
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I don't think this is being politically correct it's about treating people with respect. So many people seem to have lost respect for others and it's good to see the BBC treating blind and partially sighted people with respect. Well done.
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I am disabled and I am not in the least bit interested in anyone being political correct; I just want to be remembered and catered for when you are providing a service to the "masses". I do not need your patronising blog above - I pay the same as anyone else for my license and I'd just like facilities like subtitles etc to be available at the push of a button. I don't want my needs to inconvenience others or be a big deal.
It would be nice for TV manufacturers to personalise TVs so that you always get the service you need if it is available, especially in an age where a signal can carry so much more information. Some do have very basic facilities but many need to be switched for every programme.
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I don't really see this as a problem when considered against the amount of redundancy and repetition in the actual news broadcasts. It gets seriously annoying at times: we get a presenter outlining the story then handing over to a correspondent who repeats the outline of the story in full, then maybe hands over to a video clip that waffles on and on. Then we get 20-second bursts of drossy electronic music accompanying just as drossy photography to lead into a story. When it's a pop star we're forced to listen to half a minute of this drizzle before the story starts. If all this extra stuff were cut back, about three times as many stories could be presented in a given time.
My thumb is perpetually on the channel swap button so I can turn elsewhere for the five minutes of video clips or half-minute of music we're dished up. If only all news could be delivered at the pace of the 90second roundup.
So I don't see how anyone can grumble at the extra five or ten seconds to read out a URL or two.
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Of course, if the BBC employed more disabled people instead of the "tokenist" approach they currently have - then they'd have someone to ask about these things wouldn't they? Until then we'll just have to put up with the 12 year olds with no grasp of the patently obvious things in life who (for instance) think the BMW "Mini" has been made for 50 years! >:(
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Peter, my apologies as I'm going to make an assumption. You are a white, middle-aged man with no disabilities to speak of, eg you're not visually impaired, you're hearing's good, you're not in a wheelchair, etc. If this is the case, then your blog highlights the continuing problem regarding political correctness in our society; people deciding on behalf of minority groups what the needs and wants of that group are, whilst not actually being a part of that group.
For this reason I found your blog rather annoying. Why? Because there are too many people out there trying to show how "right on", caring and PC they are, not for the good of anyone but their own ego. Not once in your blog did you mention talking to visually impaired people to get their views and feelings on what they need. If you're so concerned about this issue then go and ask them? Contact organisations to find out. Alternatively, as the BBC is an equal opportunities employer, then I'm sure that there are plenty of visually impaired BBC employees that you could easily ask.
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"148. At 01:01am on 20 Feb 2009, FearHope wrote:
As others have pointed out, your numbers for the disabled seem wrong. Are 11 out of the 61 million general population disabled? Did you take the "long standing illness" numbers from National Statistics by mistake?
I know people have different disabilities but the NHS has numbers for the registered blind in England from 2006: 152,000 as registered blind and 155,000 as partially sighted. I couldn't find numbers for Scotland / Wales / NI but I imagine they would be a similar proportion of people.
http://www.ic.nhs.uk/statistics-and-data-collections/social-care/adult-social-care-information/people-registered-as-blind-and-partially-sighted-triennial-2006-england "
Aye a dodgy use of statistics, indeed.
However can you imagine having to read out that web-link? Or worse having to listen to it then write it down?
If they (the BBC) seriously want to address this issue, they need to implement the technology, not just pay lip service to the issue.
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Re Post 156.
@ Peter Horrocks: please first visit the Ocuh! Message boards including See Hear and Read Hear Ceefax pages 640-645 for some background reading.
Next add Sign Language Interpretation on the Saturday 7.45 am repeat of Newwatch and mentioning this on BBC Two Ceefax page 646 and 648.
Then visit the Newswatch (BBC News and BBC One) See Hear (BBC Two) and In Touch (Radio 4) and You and Yours (Radio 4) and Feedback (Radio 4) Teams to discuss broadcasting a piece on making the News more accessible.
Even better, talk to Peter White and his prosuncer (In Touch presenter!), Memnos Costi and his poducer (See Hear! presenter) and Mat Fraser and Liz Carr (Ouch! Podcaster) to get some in-house thoughts form your own broadcasters who access TV News. Peter W is your Disability Affairs Correspondetn after All
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@ post 85, you've got to be kidding! You do realize that even in a mouse-driven operating system like Windows, you can get by without a mouse, don't you? In fact, a lot of actions in Windows are quicker and easier by using the keyboard than the mouse.
Have to click an icon to launch something? Don't make me laugh.
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Actually this IS political correctness gone mad, and I'm sure you could accomodate those with sensory disabilities quite successfully without this bleat. Or is this a "fulsome apology" demanded by though police?
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#98
Well... if blind people have the wonders of modern technology to allow them to use the internet (which sounds fantastic by the way), then can they not use the same technology to read out URL's on the screen in the same way?
If we should be expecting to adapt broadcast to cover all people.... should we not have the sign guy in the bottom corner of every program?
Should we have foreign subtitles just incase someone is watching that doesn't speak English?
In response to the "hard of hearing chap" who "has the TV on in the background". If you aren't paying attention to the TV, you are expected to miss on-screen messages!
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#160, SiriusWonderblast
Actually, it's not.
It's a rebuttal. It's one of the purposes of an editors' blog.
Had the swivel-eyed right-wingers prone to spluttering "its-PC-gone-mad" at every opportunity not made the stupid association between the memo and political correctness in the first place, there would have been no reason for Peter to make this post.
It's not that difficult to grasp.
I'm afraid you've shown yourselves up on this one.
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It does rather seem to be the case now that nasty people just rant out "PC gone mad" at every opportunity and try to make out typing a few hundred words a blog is some "big deal".
I am ashamed to share a country with these people, it is embarrassing.
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#161, Benny1001
No is the short answer to that.
I have to ask: what is it with this unhelpful "why should I?" attitude in this country nowadays? Have we all really become so selfish and cynical about any act of courtesy that we kick up a fuss over something like this?
Everyone knows TV cannot possibly cover all bases and respond to every possible viewer's needs (in the way that you imply with your slippery slope argument), whether we're talking about blind people or any other 'minority'.
It's about balance.
If you consider the reading out of a URL instead of the reading out of "As you can see on your screen" to be such an incursion on the enjoyment of yourself and other sighted viewers, then boy I feel very very sorry for you.
I think we've become so brainwashed by the press constantly telling us how we (the majority) are victims of "political correctness gone mad" that we've not noticed what it's turned us into: dismissive, self-absorbed and ungenerous.
It's about time this "backlash to PC" had its own backlash, because its clear the pendulum has swung too far the other way.
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Peter, this can hardly be construed as 'political correctness gone mad' - it's a sensible decision and I'm certain the people that are affected appreciate the sentiment.
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The only fact that needs to enter your Mr Horrocks is that you have an audience. Whether that audience is one legless, armless, veteran soldier, or a million wannabe Kylie Minogues is immaterial. Your Charter simply requires you to reach out, be accessible, be fair and equal to each and every one of your license payers. So you see you should be spending every penny you have on making your service open to your UK audience before going on your Network adventures for people in other nations, and even on other continents.
You now have a very sophisticated digital signal for your audio and visual output and that means offering people choice through that big red button. It doesn't matter what people want it is what they need to make your service accessible that matters.
Save yourself the embarrassment of a few crass words (whether they are PC or not is an utter irrelevance) by catering for all those who make it possible for you to have a blog, a job, and the ability to make mistakes in front of your audience. A goodly percentage of your audience will not be able to see well; a goodly percentage will not have good hearing; a goodly percentage will not have nimble digits; a goodly percentage will have little limb dexterity; a goodly percentage will have no useful or adequate speech, hearing or sight. You are required to provide access to these people as best you can ahead of all the other things you guys like to do with your little old play thing.
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http://www.ic.nhs.uk/statistics-and-data-collections/social-care/adult-social-care-information/people-registered-as-blind-and-partially-sighted-triennial-2006-england "
Aye a dodgy use of statistics, indeed.
However can you imagine having to read out that web-link? Or worse having to listen to it then write it down?
Can you imagine it being shown on the screen and then having to write it down? Any URL that is too long to be read out is probably too long to be shown on the screen as well.
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What a bizarre and depressing series of comments!
Why are SO many people SO desperate to argue against something so simple that might just be of some small benefit to blind or partially sighted people?
And to those who say 'surely blind people can't use the internet if they can't read the URL on the TV screen' or some such hogwash. Shame on you. Utterly utterly ignorant the lot of you.
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It's simple.
If they can't read what's on a TV screen, how is anyone going to be able to read what is on a computer screen? So the information is of no use to them anyway.
Yes, to me it is PC gone mad.
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Brian-A #169
Maybe it is you who are simple but you definitely know nothing about PC access for the disabled. Braille readers allow the blind to access and read the internet, large screens with extended fonts allow the visually impaired to read at their own pace.
So if someone is kind enough to read out a URL the blind or partially sighted can then at their leisure review the information.
People who constantly droan on about Political Correctness gone mad normally mean 'there is nothing in it for me'. Reading out a URL has no effect on you but it might help 1000 or 10000 or 50000 people. But because it doesn't make your life better you think it is wrong to help others. You are British Society gone mad.
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#170 - well said.
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#170
Actually the subject matter in this blog and in the "attacks" on the BBC by the press are about Political Correctness in the sense that a stereotype has been formed with an implied label attached. Hence "as you can see" stereotypes, and "visually impaired" labels.
As I understand the PC doctrine, from wherever it actually started, it is wrong to stereotype and label individuals. The BBC has an "audience", a noun that describes a number of individuals. Hence the whole notion of PC is about "what is in it for me as an individual within that audience". The BBC has the job of facilitating their audience without resorting to patronage.
People cannot have PC both ways. If we are going to describe groups then we are "forgetting" the individuals who make up that group (or at the very least ignoring that they are all different). It is what makes PC a sham, an impossible notion that serves little purpose to anyone, meaning it will always be "mad". As an individual I really do not care what people think about me as long as they do not give me a label - my name is good enough. If they want to stereotype me with all the others who share my name then that is their problem not mine.
And to agree with your last sentence - yes we will not get better until we stop thinking in PC terms and treat everyone as the person they are.
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forensix - I totally agree with you, PC is a sham. It doesn't really exist except in the minds of a few newspaper editors and their gullible readers. If PC was as bad as everyone says then Little Britain wouldn't exist on TV and neither would Jimmy Carr. Its a catch all phrase to insult anyone who has the temerity to disagree with their narrow world view.
If you believe Peter Horrocks account at the top of this (I have no reason to disbelieve him) he doesn't say anything about 'as you can see' being insulting - just discourteous.
I am a self employed IBM mainframe trainer and one of my clients is the IRS (US equiv of our Inland Revenue) in Washington DC. In my most recent class there I had 1 blind student and 1 severely visually impaired student. What amazed me most with both of them was their capacity to easily remember things I had said when my other students (and me it must be said) get lazy and don't remember - we can easily read it back. I guess it is just an adjustment they make, and no-one in the class seemed phased by me desparately trying to avoid saying 'as you can see on the screen' which I did a number of times.
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Echo PilgrimsProgress.
I don't think Beethoven would have been the least bit fazed by anyone saying "you should hear your 'Moonlight Sonata' - a thing of beauty". He "heard" it alright just not in the way we do.
It is so easy in a PC world to feign insult and offense as if they are the first things we turn to when conversing with others. We all learn pretty quickly in life who is deliberately being offensive or insulting and we quickly move on, unless we think as kids that we can win the resulting conflict. And as for replacement words for ones that have become "dirty" then I really do wonder how small minded people can be! I am always amused that in the IQ scale no one has ever complained about the terms "moronic" at its lowest reaches or "genius" at the highest.
And you are absolutely right about the brain compensating for one inefficiency by making something else exceedingly efficient.
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We are all missing the point with regard to disability. Many disabilities are hidden, so BBC have a public duty to expand the perception of
disability on all their programs!
Being in a wheelchair is not the only disability. Therefore the blue badge scheme should also drop the iconic wheelchair image which is discriminatory for all other disabled groups!
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I think that the BBC is right to do this. I also wonder why Justin on CBeebies has a regular interaction with an invisible off-air voice in the Mr Tumble programme. This must be frustrating for children who are deaf especially as the show includes sign language. Not all deaf children will have subtitles available.
And, for what its worth, I also think that it should stop the left wing bias and release the Balen report as both of these issues have also caused much offence.
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It's disappointing to see the degree of ignorance about disability in the responses, which is why the more the BBC can do to shine a light on the last socially acceptable form of discrimination the better. So kudos to Peter Horrocks.
As for those who criticise the concept of PC, all I can say is that the first time you are physically assaulted for daring to be disabled in public you realise just how vital it is to change the way many people think; and PC is the term we use to describe that process.
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I notice theat Sky is moving to have 20% of its programming audio described, so it is good broadcasters are responding to the increase in awareness of the need to make TV more accessible.
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Perhaps a small reality check would help? It goes a little something like this...
I am completely blind.
I am Director of Accessibility for Nomensa, a company that builds websites for some of the best known organisations in the world.
I am a Director of the British Computer Association of the Blind (BCAB, an organisation entirely composed of visually impaired computer users.
http://www.bcab.org.uk/
I use a piece of software called a screen reader, to access my computers and mobile phone. Find out more about screen readers here:
http://www.nomensa.com/resources/articles/accessibility-articles/what-is-a-screen-reader.html
I do watch the BBC news on a regular basis. I do not get ticked off when people use phrases related to seeing, I use them myself.
I do get ticked off when someone mentions a website, but doesn't tell me the URL. I do not think it's unreasonable to ask for URLs to be read out, especially when it's understood that it isn't only visually impaired people who will benefit.
I don't watch snooker on television, I can think of umptten things I'd rather be doing. I do think it's interesting that broadcasters didn't seem to have any trouble describing the balls when TV was in black and white though...
So please, trust me when I tell you that making a little change like this to the way you broadcast, may make a big change to the way someone chooses to deal with technology and media in the modern world.
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To KennethM Message 176.
Justin uses Makaton on Something Special
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/grownups/about/programmes/somethingspecial.shtml and not BSL http://www.deafsign.com/ds/index.cfm?scn=article&articleID=35
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Showing a general awareness and consideration for your 'viewers' is a perfectly reasonable action and I commend you for your direction.
Perhaps you could now ask your staff to stop announcing 'the news from where you live/are' as Gordon Burns has never been in my lounge and I live in Manchester not Liverpool nor Preston nor the Lake District.
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I'm concerned about the assumption that appears in some of these messages that blind people don't use computers. I am totally blind and use a computer regularly for information gathering, correspondence, shopping, etc, same as anyone else, with the use of a screen reader programme and a Braille display. I also work in ICT support providing support for sighted computer users. Not reading URLs can be very frustrating for me as for many other blind and partially sighted people.
The biggest problem that many of us visually impaired people face is the negative assumptions made by people who have not taken the time to find out.
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mel and jade and to all the others that supported the BBC decision dare to speak out the addresses well done.
To those that say "blind don't use computers, watch TV etc. What do you know.
Obviously little.
Do you also complain about flat areas on ramps so wheelchair users can stop for a rest and the rest.
The extra effort to actually say the URL etc is just basic.
It is discriminatory to not do it.
Just as in the USA blind people have absolutely no way of being able to tell their bank notes apart. Bank notes are all the same size and even the supreme court agreed that something should be done. but it hasn't.
When I ask people why not one of them has been able to give any answer and most say "what's your problem"
Seems we have the same problem here .
Any way when you're writing it down wouldn't it be easier if you didn't have to squint at the screen to get it right. this helps AL
It seems to me that you who complain about this are exceedingly selfish, have no empathy and should be forced to be blindfolded for some length of time.
Well said everyone who has said the PC knockers are twits.
Now I am not blind ( though without glasses I focus 10 cm from the tip of my nose and stumble around the house in the dark wondering if I am about to step on one of the cats) But I am not stupid either so Congratulations BBC in another step to being equal.
170 pilgrimsprogress
"People who constantly droan on about Political Correctness gone mad normally mean 'there is nothing in it for me'. "
True words as we can see from some of the reactions here.
176 what the heck has the Balen report got to do with disabled rights?
156. At 10:44am on 20 Feb 2009, 1967Ross wrote:
whateva . Ross did you do a survey .? It seems from some of the letters that you might be the one with the problem.And that some appreciate the change. But you know better and can speak for all.
what is your disability if you mind?
150. At 01:14am on 20 Feb 2009, gsoper wrote:
Politically correct or an uninformed bigot? I know which I'd rather be...
well said I'm with you
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"But where does it end? Does that mean presenters will be banned from saying: 'If you don't want to know the football scores look away from the screen now', because that could be just as offensive. It's insanity."
This from the standard piece was an attempt at sick humour?
Why would they bother looking away?
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