Letter to FCC From Amy Cohen
RE: Matter of DA-06-1802A1
My name is Amy Cohen Efron, and I am a deaf person who is a registered voter in the State of Georgia. Closed Captioning is a most vital accessibility tool for me to use and it helped me to be a part of the mainstream society. It helped me to understand what is happening and what is being said on television, and it helped to bring closer to my family, friends and the community.
I still have a very vivid recollection about my dad went to Sears in 1980 and he purchased a bulky closed captioning decoder unit which cost over $350 dollars. It was very expensive back then, especially my dad couldn't afford luxuries for his family. Once he brought this unit home, I was only 13 years old, and I practically broke down crying with extreme joy and delight. Imagine that I prefer having closed captioning decoder OVER the Atari gaming system which I have turned down? Imagine!
After opening this box with glee, and my dad and I instantly hooked up this decoder to our old television. I practically FORCED my family to watch a very FEW shows with closed captions WITH ME as a PART OF THE FAMILY. (There were only handful of prime-time shows that offered captioning back then.) I even REFUSED to let my family members to watch other shows that does not offer closed captioning while I AM THERE WITH THEM. I know how it felt to be excluded from my OWN FAMILY for so long when we all were watching our favorite shows. In 1980's, we all were watching the Little House on the Prairie tv show (which was not closed captioned back then) - and I kept asking my mom, what was Laura saying, and why Charles was upset. Mom always said with her best intentions, "I will explain later." Of course, she forgot to explain later with me. That did not make me feel good at all.
Fast forward, 26 years later - I am fully independent, tax paying individual and post-graduate professional working in an education industry, I still watch TV shows, news, sports, weather and documentaries with closed captions. There is one missing void --- as a Jewish person, I rarely see any Jewish faith-based shows that are captioned. Being Jewish is important to me, and I know how it feels not be included in Jewish activities, involvement with services at the temple, because of course, they don't usually offer sign language interpreting consistently. Moreover, the faith-based videotapes and/or tv shows about Judaism are not captioned.
I am pleased to see how the progress been made in 2006, and we still are excluded for several things - the DVD special features are always not captioned, some late night shows are not captioned, the public access shows in local Atlanta - especially DeKalb County public meetings that was aired on TV are not captioned, movies in airplane flights are not captioned and lastly, the internet web-based video streaming shows are not captioned.
I was shocked after learning your decision on August 7, 2006's public notice that reversed previous and ongoing progress toward equal access to information. In that case, your agency granted exemptions to two television programs to continue broadcasting without closed-captioning. These two television programs are faith-based.
Why? Why? Is it because of financial burden? Please.... this is not a good reason. Closed captioning costs are not expensive. Tell that to my late Dad who forked over $350 dollars in 1980 (which is approximately $1,000 dollars to today's value) - and his annual income back then was approximately $16,000 dollars a year! COME ON! I didn't ask to be deaf, I was born that way, and bless my family who know about their priorities, and made sure to include me in family, exposing me with the world through closed captioning, and providing cultural literacy with me. Thank god for my family.
FCC - please reconsider your decision, and it is a dangerous precedent you have established. This decision you made had brought me back to 1980's sitting in the living room asking my mom and dad, what was Laura saying and why Charles was upset, and I knew I will never get the answer...
Sincerely,
Amy Cohen Efron
Comments
There’s more letters like this at www.edsalert.com
I rem when this came out too. Never in my life did I feel so happy to be able to sit with family and understand whats going on without asking questions. !! Even now I email instead of calling and relying on phones and etc.
“the DVD special features are always not captioned, some late night shows are not captioned”
Some DVD special features do have caption (if the DVD have the caption menu). I’m not sure what late night shows you are talking about, but those late night shows (Conan, Leno, Letterman, and many others) I know all have caption.
Very nice article and well written … I hope it will open some eyes at the FCC.
A class-action suit was recently settled in regard to captioning of DVD extras, so we should start to see some improvements soon. In any case, it is not accurate to say such extras “are always not captioned.” I’ve seen several that were captioned.
I also thought the Sears decoders were more like $200. So I looked around and found this “history of captioning” website that says they were $250:
http://www.linkelectronics.com/htm/techcc.htm
Sorry to nitpick but you know how it is, people will try to find one single thing that is not accurate and use that to imply that the entire article is not accurate.
Wow.
You’d think that faith-based shows would try harder to GET captioning so they could reach a broader audience.
Good for you girl!CC is a Godsend for those of us who need it.We need more not less!Seems most deaf hard of hearing people just “take -it” and dont complain enough .Even our gov`t publicly states non discrimination,but in fact does against us.
HELLO!!!
I AM SHOCKED THAT FCC WANT TO REMOVE THE CLOSED CAPTIONING DUE TO THE MONEY.
OH WELL SO WHAT. WE ARE MUST CHERISHING IT FOREVER . I AM PROFONDLY DEAF AND CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT CLOSED CAPTIONING SINCE I BOUGHT A NEW DECODER IN 1980 FROM SEARS. MY SON IN LAW ACTIVATED IT FOR ME. OH MY GOD I REALLY ENJOY IT FOR MY LIFE.
TELL FCC THAT PLEASE KEEP IT FOR THE DEAF’S WORLD FOREVER, ALWAYS.
I did send letters to those people from FCC complaining about it… And told them to plug their ears and understand how we go through. But I wonder what happened after the meeting few days ago. What was the results? Did deafies went to protest???? Am curious the outcome of the FCC meeting.
I am processing to file to be send to FCC for against Lafayette, LA tv station because they don’t want to put REAL-TIME closed caption (due $$$) for preparing an emergency when disasters coming as hurricane, tornado, or bad weather.
It is God who made people to invent captionings on any TV programs, DVDs, Videotapes for us the deaf and hard of hearing to learn and understand what goes on with the world that He created. My wife and I enjoy watching Christianity shows on TV. Praise the Lord fpr His providence to us all. Amen!
I loved reading this story about the importance of accessible TV. If anyone wants to contact the FCC about their current actions which are undercutting the cc’g regulations, please please
send an email to FCC Chairman Martin.
See all the national groups’ Action Alerts at
http://www.hearingloss.org/advocacy/index.asp
http://www.tdi-online.org/tdi/news-091806.asp
http://www.nad.org
http://www.aapd.com/News/telecomm/060915aapd.htm
Unless the FCC hears from you today, they will think they can get away with this.
END
We need to keep pressioning FCC to honor its compromisses with deaf people.They are all greedy trying to save $$ for themselves, I agree with you that all videos and DVD should have CC…..After watching “tigers living in Africa” from Discovery Channel which was closed captioned and later I purchased the same title and 2 more ( dinosaurs in america and sabretooth)from discovery store and I was shocked learning it doesnt have any CC in their videos and DVDS. Furious I called demanding explanations from Discovery and they said the FCC is clear and CC are for TV programs only . They arent forced to make CC in their DVDS and Videos . I made a research and found out that law is right but full of fouls. We need to unite and force FCC to change its policy and improve more in order to help Deaf People s needs. You are brave and we need to keep fighting to get what is necessary to fullfil our needs
Jorge