Disabled voters face Election Day challenges

From CNN Money:

NEW YORK -- On Nov. 6, there's a very real possibility that many Americans with disabilities will not be able to vote because their local polling places will be inaccessible.

Advocates for the disabled are worried that local governments aren't doing enough to prepare -- as are some of the small businesses that outfit polling sites with ramps.

"We've gotten quite a few inquiries from major municipalities, but they're not following through to actual sales," said Dave Henderson, sales manager at EZ-Access in Algona, Wash. 

The family-owned business makes portable wheelchair ramps. Prices range from $500 for a four-foot ramp with handrails to as much as $4,000 for a 30-foot modular model.

In 2008, as many as 1,000 polling centers were retrofitted with the company's ramps, Henderson said. "For us, the election can be a big revenue generator."

This year, Henderson says he has gotten about 600 to 800 orders, and he's uncertain how the next few weeks will go.

Julian Gordon has similar concerns.

Gordon is the founder of Amramp, a Boston-based ramp-rental company that has locations in 46 cities. More than 100 polling places will be using its services this year, he said.

"Compared to last election, we could be doing about the same in business," he said. "What our franchisees are hearing is that in many places, money isn't being spent on buying or renting ramps for the polling sites."

EZ-Access and Amramp are at the forefront of what the disability rights community says has become a persistent problem.

According to a report from the Government Accountability Office, only 27.3% of polling places were fully accessible on Election Day 2008.


The problems included a lack of steel ramps or curb cuts in the parking area, unpaved surfaces and 1/2- inch-high bumps in doorways. The main focus of the report was people who use wheelchairs, although it also chronicled some obstacles for visually-impaired voters.

Federal law, including the Americans with Disabilities Act, requires polling places to be accessible to eligible voters for federal elections. And through the 2002 Help America Vote Act, states can get federal funds to improve polling center accessibility.

Still, disability rights advocates say problems remain.

Recent reports from the field are troubling, said Curt Decker, executive director of the National Disability Rights Network, which gets federal funding to conduct a national sampling of polling centers ahead of general elections.

One example: "I've heard from our folks that some polling centers in Detroit are clearly inaccessible," Decker said.

Mark Cody, legal director at NDRN's Michigan division, said his office recently found several Detroit polling facilities that "didn't even pass the eyeball" test of accessibility. The vast majority of 67 polling stations evaluated were found to be inaccessible during the Michigan primary in August; the test covered about a third of Detroit's polling centers.

Janice Winfrey, city clerk for Detroit, said she and an election official visited all of the sites evaluated by Cody's office and determined that all met the minimum requirement by law to be accessible to voters with disabilities.


"Do they have the best [wheelchair] ramps? No. But they are there. The elevator in one site may not be in the best location, but it's there," Winfrey said.

Advocates for the disabled in New York are also concerned.

"For the past nine years, random samplings of New York City polling places have found many with a 70% to 80% barrier to access for individuals with disabilities," said Julia Pinover, an attorney with nonprofit group Disability Rights Advocates.

The New York City Board of Elections told CNNMoney that it has determined that 57 of its 1,255 polling sites do not meet ADA standards. Among other things, it is mailing letters to offer voters at those 57 sites the option of transferring their registration to nearby sites that are accessible.

Advocates, as well as the small business people working in the field, say officials often cite a lack of funding as the reason more polling stations aren't accessible.

According to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, Congress gave states about $3.25 billion from 2003 until 2010 to improve the voting process, the vast amount of which was for purchasing fully accessible voting equipment and computerized statewide voter registration lists. But a very small piece of that funding was made available to make polling centers themselves accessible.

Doug Lewis, executive director of the National Association of Election Officials, said polling center accessibility is better today than in the past. 

"But are we fully compliant with the law all over the country? No," he said. "There is a money crunch right now. When that happens, progress stops."

New book about photography, history and disability out Oct. 15

From the publisher, Syracuse University Press:

"The stunning archive of images that Bogdan and his co-authors have amassed is a major contribution to the growing body of analysis of disability representation in photography. This book brings incisive, expert historical perspective to more familiar terrain and at the same time opens up important new avenues of exploration."—Susan Schweik, University of California at Berkeley "This book makes a substantial contribution to the history of the visual representation of disability in the United States. It should become an important resource to those who seek to understand the varieties of contexts and purposes in which people with disabilities were portrayed by others, and—equally important—portrayed themselves."—Philip Ferguson, Chapman University

Robert Bogdan is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Social Science and Education at Syracuse University. He is the author of several books including Freak Show: Presenting Human Oddities for Amusement and Profit and Beauty and the Beast: Human-Animal Relations as Revealed in Real Photo Postcards, 1905–1935. Photo: Charles Tripp, " The Armless Wonder," 1885. Photograph by Eisenmann. Cabinet card, Bogdan Collection.

Midget, feeble-minded, crippled, lame, and insane: these terms and the historical photographs that accompany them may seem shocking to present-day audiences. A young woman with no arms wears a sequined tutu and smiles for the camera as she smokes a cigarette with her toes; a man holds up two prosthetic legs while his own legs are bared to the knees to show his missing feet. The photos were used as promotional material for circus sideshows, charity drives, and art galleries. They were found on begging cards and in family albums. In Picturing Disability, Bogdan and his collaborators gather over 200 historical photographs showing how people with disabilities have been presented and exploring the contexts in which they were photographed.

Rather than focus on the subjects, Bogdan turns his gaze on the people behind the camera. He examines the historic and cultural environment of the photographs to decipher the relationship between the images and the perspectives of the picture makers. In analyzing the visual rhetoric of these photographs, Bogdan identifies the wide variety of genres, from sideshow souvenirs to clinical photographs. Ranging from the 1860s, when photographs first became readily available, to the 1970s, when the disability rights movement became a force for significant change, Bogdan chronicles the evolution of disability image creation. Picturing Disability takes the reader beyond judging images as positive or slanderous to reveal how particular contexts generate specific emotions and lasting depictions.

As part of settlement in Massachusetts case, Netflix pledges to caption all content by 2014

From The AP:

BOSTON — Netflix will offer closed captions on all TV and movie content by September 2014 as part of a settlement with a deaf Massachusetts viewer who sued the company.

The on-demand Internet streaming service agreed to the settlement Oct. 9 in U.S. District Court in Springfield.

Closed captions are currently available on 90 percent of Netflix's content, as measured by hours watched.

"Netflix has always been the leader in this, but it's a tall order to offer high quality captioning on such a broad range of devices," spokesman Jonathan Friedland said.

In the meantime, the company will display a list of available close-captioned content.

Captions can be displayed on a majority of the more than 1,000 devices, from computers to video game consoles, on which Netflix is available. But many devices and operating systems, such as Google's Android, did not exist when the company gained traction in the early 2000s.

Massachusetts resident Lee Nettles, along with national and regional associations for the deaf and hearing impaired, sued Netflix in 2010 under the Americans with Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination based on disability.

Other online streaming providers, including Hulu and Amazon, also have been trying to increase their captioned programming.

"Sesame Street" episode launches new service dog Muppet

From Canine Companions for Independence:

Don't miss Sesame Street Episode 43, featuring Canine Companions dog Hercules. Hercules helps new Muppet character Brandeis (pictured) find his calling as an assistance dog. The episode airs October 12, November 12 and November 30.

Here's the episode summary:

Brandeis, a yellow Labrador retriever, is looking for a job on Sesame Street. First, Leela hires him to fold laundry in the Laundromat, but Brandeis has a lot of trouble folding the clothing with his paws. Next, Chris hires him to sweep the floor, but he has trouble holding the broom.

Brandeis is sad, but just then, Elmo notices that Gina is working with a dog. She explains that she is training Hercules to be a service dog. A service dog works with people who need special kinds of help. Gina says that it takes a lot of intelligence and training for this career, and Brandeis is up for the challenge! He begins training right away, learning how to do things like opening drawers, turning on lights and picking up and bringing things.

After many weeks of training, Brandeis officially becomes a service dog! He is very excited and nervous about meeting the person he will be helping. Liliana, who is in a wheelchair, is nervous about meeting Brandeis, too. Liliana’s book bag slides off her lap, and Brandeis quickly fetches it for her. She laughs happily and thanks Brandeis. She then asks for a glass of milk, and Brandeis motions her to follow him into Hooper’s store and opens the door for her. Liliana praises him for his hard work. Gina and Elmo agree that that Brandeis found the perfect job!

Canine Companions enjoyed working with the Sesame Street team on creating an episode to increase awareness of assistance dogs helping people with disabilities. Looking forward to the broadcast!

New FCC rules on closed captioning fall short, deaf people say

From The Washington Times in D.C.:

Many deaf activists say they are disappointed with the shortcomings of a new law that requires television producers to add captions to popular shows like “CSI” or “The Office” when they are viewed online.

The Federal Communications Commission recently issued a set of rules to implement the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, known as CVAA. Deaf advocates are calling the new rules, which started to take effect Sept. 30, a step forward, but they also complain of too many loopholes in the law and the FCC’s rules.

Critics point out that the new law only applies to full-length shows that air on regular television, so shows that air only online on websites such as Netflix and Hulu do not have to comply.

“That’s a big issue, because there are more and more Internet-only shows and content,” said Christian Vogler, director of the Technology Access Program at Gallaudet University, a prominent school for deaf students in Washington.

To make matters worse, news organizations will largely be exempt because the law doesn’t apply to short clips.

“The Internet was a big barrier,” Mr. Vogler said in an email interview. “This law does much to break it down, but it’s not 100 percent successful at doing so.”

In Congress, Sen. Mark Pryor, Arkansas Democrat, and Rep. Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts Democrat, pushed the legislation to require more captioning, and President Obama signed it into law in October 2010.

The FCC began implementing the rule last week. Now, unedited, full-length programs shown on TV with captions must also be captioned when they are made available online. More updates will be phased in at later dates.

Advocates for the deaf acknowledge the CVAA law is progress for them — a deaf viewer who missed his favorite television shows can catch up online, while previously a show that aired with captioning available didn’t have to be posted online that way.

“More and more of us are not watching so much TV, and more of us are relying on our programs on the Internet instead,” Claude Stout, executive director of Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, said in a phone call through a translator. “What’s wonderful, if you miss a program on TV, you can go online and catch a program on TV that’s already been recorded.”

But the problem is there are too many loopholes in the new law, deaf advocates say, so many shows will not have to comply.

Andrew Phillips, policy lawyer at the National Association of the Deaf, said in an emailed statement that his organization is “appreciative of the efforts” to add captions to online shows, but added that the loopholes are “problematic.”

“Unfortunately, the CVAA does not cover all video-programming content on the Internet,” he said.
News organizations are also exempt from adding captions to video clips, although they would have to comply on content that they stream live or other full-length newscasts.

So when, for example, CNN puts on its website a segment about the tensions in the Middle East or ESPN posts the highlights of last night’s game, the stations won’t be required to include captions.

Learn sign language with Oscar-winning Deaf actress Marlee Matlin in new app, Marlee Signs

From Aldrin Calimlim at drippler: (The app was released Oct. 9, 2012.)

Already, we have quite an impressive collection of apps for the deaf and hearing-impaired, as evidenced by our AppList titled, well, “Apps for the Deaf and Hearing-Impaired.” But I reckon that AppList will have to be updated soon to include a recently released app called Marlee Signs.

Marlee Signs is a new sign language app that features, as you might have already guessed from the name, Marlee Matlin.

Marlee is, of course, a well-known actress who is herself deaf. In fact, she is the only deaf performer to win the Academy Award for Best Actress. (She won in 1986 for the film “Children of a Lesser God.”)

As it happens, Marlee is also a member of the National Association for the Deaf and the spokeswoman for the National Captioning Institute. And, interestingly, she once starred in a TV commercial for Apple’s Macintosh.

Indeed, Marlee is the perfect person to headline an app that aims to make learning the fundamentals of American Sign Language easier.

Marlee Signs uses high-quality demo videos starring Marlee herself. Among its special features are a “Slow Motion” setting for watching any video in greater detail and a “Spell” section for spelling any word in signs.

Designed for iPhone and duly optimized for iPhone 5, Marlee Signs is available now in the App Store for free.

The app includes a number of lesson packs, each of which is available via a $3.99 in-app purchase. Except for your first lesson pack, that is, which is available for free.

As someone who “speaks” sign language, I highly recommend giving Marlee Signs a spin.

Spacial debuts accessible radio broadcasting software to let blind, visually impaired people create Internet radio stations

Press release from Spacial:

SHERMAN OAKS, Calif. - Spacial, an award-winning maker of radio automation software, launched SAM Vibe, a powerful Internet radio broadcasting application that's fully accessible to users who are blind or visually impaired.

SAM Vibe lets broadcasters produce their own cloud Internet radio programs, whether it's news, sports, talk, or various genres of music. The software gives users the ability to upload and manage large music libraries, control scheduling and automate many aspects of program production.

Spacial created SAM Vibe to especially appeal to broadcasters who are blind or visually impaired. The software is fully compatible with text-to-speech screen readers, and can be operated using a computer keyboard instead of mouse. Additionally, the color scheme is color-blind friendly and optimized for contrast, with large fonts to make reading text easier.

"Lots of people want to be DJs but most radio broadcasting software is too complex for the average user and not designed to be accessible for people who are blind or visually impaired," says Pascal Laflamme, Managing Director of Spacial. "SAM Vibe has an easy and fully accessible interface to allow broadcasters with or without vision to create their own commercial-quality radio stations right from their PCs."

"As a media professional who is blind, I have expertise with many types of radio broadcasting software and believe SAM Vibe is a great solution for those new to Internet broadcasting," says Erin Edgar, who co-founded the Tech Access Weekly podcast covering accessible technology for the blind and visually impaired with her husband, Rodney. Tech Access Weekly created an audio review of SAM Vibe's features for low-vision and screen reader users, which can be found on the Spacial website.

SAM Vibe also makes it easy for kids to explore the craft of radio programming, and it's in use at the broadcast studio operated by SLB Radio Productions, Inc. at the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh. "With SAM Vibe, we now have an easy and intuitive way to teach kids to create and control their own broadcasts, whether for fun or career discovery," says Larry Berger, founder and executive director of SLB Radio.

SLB Radio is also evaluating SAM Vibe to manage iQ Kids Radio, its new 24/7 service launching with WQED in Pittsburgh in 2013. "Eight years ago we chose SAM Broadcaster for our studios and it has exceeded our high expectations. We're confident that SAM Vibe will also play an important role as we develop new forms of youth-based programming," Berger adds.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/10/09/4894168/spacial-debuts-accessible-radio.html#storylink=cpy

Resources needed for wave of autistic adults who are entering world not ready for them

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

Guido Abenes (pictured) appreciates their concern, but he'd really like his parents to stop worrying about him.

He's 25, he says, and he's doing fine. But he's also autistic, part of the generation of young adults who were born during the first big wave of autism cases in the United States two decades ago and are now struggling to strike out on their own.

"I tell them sometimes, 'Stop it, I'm doing things, I'm resourceful,' " said Abenes, who is a student at Cal State East Bay. "They're getting the message, I think. But they still worry."

Abenes, who wants to be a therapist someday and travel the world, is fortunate. He joined the College Internship Program in Berkeley, which provides him with a two-bedroom apartment he shares with a roommate, along with intensive, daily academic and developmental support to help him continue to thrive into adulthood.

But Abenes' situation is unusual, say autism advocates and experts, who are bracing for a flood of adults with autism who lack the support they had as children, and are entering a world that isn't ready for them.

It was in the late 1980s and early '90s that rates of autism started skyrocketing in the United States. A condition that once was considered rare, with fewer than 2 cases per 1,000 births in the United States, is now thought to afflict 1 in 88 children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It's unclear exactly what has caused the increase, but factors could include greater awareness and better diagnosing of the condition, as well as an actual rise in cases, perhaps related to environmental factors.
For those born in that first wave and now entering adulthood, it's a tough, uncertain future. Some, like Abenes, will go to college or find jobs and eventually move out on their own.

But most will not, studies show. Most will continue to live at home and will, at best, find part-time, minimum-wage work - or no work at all. Many will suffer setbacks in their condition. Two recent studies found that only about a third of autistic young adults had jobs or went to school.

"A majority of our adults are underserved or not served at all. They can't access the same services as adults that they had as children," said Jim Ball, board chairman of the Autism Society, a national advocacy group. "We are doing a lot for our kids, but these kids are going to live to 80 or 90 years old - they're going to live the majority of their lives as adults. What are we doing for them in that realm?"

Twenty-two years old is an important turning point for many young people with autism. That's when they officially age out of the public school system that offered them educational and other supportive services.

Kids with intellectual disabilities - most notably, an IQ under 70 - often have post-high school opportunities for continued improvement and some measure of independent living. Most of them will continue to get supportive care daily for the rest of their adult lives from state and federal programs.

And the young people at the opposite end of the spectrum - the ones identified as having Asperger's syndrome, a mild form of autism, who may have above-average IQs or skills that will aid them in college and careers - often manage adult life just fine.

It's the ones in the middle who suffer the most, autism experts said. They don't have enough of a disability to get major supportive care, but they're clearly disabled enough that they have a hard time finding, and keeping, jobs or attending college classes.

"These are kids who seem like they could do things and be successful, and they just end up staying at home because there are very few resources for them," said Dr. Carl Feinstein, director of the Stanford Autism Center at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital.

"Their parents are frustrated because they don't know how to help and they aren't so happy with their kids living in their home," he said. "Meanwhile, these kids grew up thinking they would have a driver's license and an apartment of their own, and they'd get married and have all these things that aren't happening."

That's where something like Berkeley's College Internship Program comes in. The program was started in the 1980s on the East Coast by a man who was diagnosed with Asperger's in his 50s. It serves young adults ages 18 to 26 who have autism or other types of learning disabilities, many of whom fall in that middle range of needing support.

The goal of the program is to provide the support services these young people may need to be successful in school and start a career, as well as teaching life skills to help them become independent adults.

The students live in housing provided by the program in downtown Berkeley, and they usually attend classes at nearby community colleges. At the program center, students get lessons in cooking and banking and other basic living skills. They learn how to budget their time, how to apply for jobs and how to get along with co-workers and bosses.

But it's expensive: The program costs $30,000 to $70,000 a year, not including housing or tuition at other academic institutions. Scholarships are available and insurance may cover some or all of the expenses.
For those who can afford it, or whose parents have the time and energy to seek the help, there are other, similar programs. Many college campuses, including Cal State East Bay, offer extra services for autistic students.

Some businesses are starting special programs for hiring autistic employees, especially if those employees possess skills like focus and an attention to detail that can come hand-in-hand with autism. One company, Palo Alto-based Semperical, is based entirely around a model of hiring high-functioning autistic employees as test engineers.

But those jobs and support programs aren't large and there aren't many of them. Meanwhile, the group of autistic adults needing these services is only going to grow. The first generation is entering its 20s - but they'll be hitting middle age soon enough, and there are even larger generations on their heels.

It's not just a problem for the autistic children and adults, but for their families - especially for the parents, many of whom worry they won't be able to care for their adult children much longer.

"I hear from parents in the Baby Boomer generation who have kids in their 30s now," said Kurt Ohifs, executive director of Pacific Autism Center for Education in Santa Clara. "They come to me and say, 'I'm afraid to die, because who's going to care for my son or daughter?'

Roloffs return to reality TV November 13 with "Little People Big World: Wedding Farm"

From Reality TV World:

TLC has announced it will premiere Little People Big World: Wedding Farm -- a new weekly series that will follow the Roloff family as they operate a new wedding venue on their recently expanded Oregon farm -- on Tuesday, November 13 at 9PM ET/PT.

In addition to chronicling Matt and Amy Roloff's attempt to refurbish a historic barn and launch the new wedding business, Little People Big World: Wedding Farm will also show viewers the day-to-day lives of the couple and their four children -- including Molly preparing to leave for college.

Little People Big World ended its original six-season run on TLC in 2010, however the family has continued to star in a series of occasional specials for the network since then.

According to TLC, the network will also continue to produce additional specials despite Little People Big World: Wedding Farm, which will initially consist of six one-hour episodes.

Little People Big World: Wedding Farm is being produced by Gay Rosenthal Productions -- the same production company that produced Little People Big World -- and executive produced by Gay Rosenthal, Joe Freed, Sven Nilsson, Amy Roloff, and Matt Roloff.

Britain's Channel 4 plans bid for broadcasting rights for 2016 Rio Paralympics

From The Guardian in the UK:

The Channel 4 chief executive, David Abraham, is preparing a bid for the TV rights to the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Paralympics, but could be derailed by a BBC plan to snatch back the rights.

Abraham said he is hopeful of retaining Clare Balding – who was highly praised for her presenting work during the London Olympic and Paralympic Games – as anchor if Channel 4 can win the upcoming bid for the UK TV rights to the Rio event.

"Clare is the face of our racing, so you know she is going to be working for us [at that time]," he said. "Everything is in place but we are four years out, no one gets a contract for that long. I am very positive about re-assembling the team, there was a lot of good chemistry."

Channel 4's coverage of the London Paralympics attracted record viewing figures, with the International Paralympic Committee hailing the event as exceeding its "wildest dreams".

The success has spurred Channel 4 to bid for the UK TV rights to the Rio Paralympics.

"International TV rights are managed by the IPC and we obviously have a very good relationship with them," Abraham said. "We are talking to them about how we plan Rio, and how we go about doing that."

However, the BBC is thought to be planning to snatch back the TV rights to the Paralympics, which it lost when Channel 4 tabled a record bid in 2010.

"We are not getting distracted by that," said Abraham. "We are very confident we have great ideas and a great relationship [with the IPC]. We have great presenters, everything is in place."

The viewing boost of a home Paralympics means it is unlikely that Rio will deliver more record-breaking audiences.

However, Abraham said that Paralympics GB athletes such as sprinter Jonnie Peacock, wheelchair athlete David Weir and swimmer Ellie Simmonds are now household names and likely to be a big draw in 2016.
"Rio is an amazing brand and the time difference is not as challenging as Beijing [in 2008]," he said.

He added that Channel 4 is not letting its commitment slip after the glow of the London event dies down, recently announcing a further £250,000 investment to search for more disabled talent to host programmes and subjects to cover beyond the world of sport.

In each Olympic/Paralympic cycle, the local organising committee for the event has the power to decide how it wants to sell the domestic TV rights.

The London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games took the unprecedented step of asking other UK public service broadcasters – Channel 4, ITV and Channel 5 – to submit tenders to host Paralympic coverage as well as the BBC.

The BBC's bid is thought to have been well short of the £8m to £9m tabled by Channel 4.

"We demonstrated quite well in this instance the degree to which two separate organisations [Channel 4 and the BBC] can focus resources to deliver two great events," said Abraham.

Why disability history should be on the school curriculum in Great Britain

From The Guardian in the UK:

Did you know that during the Holocaust, the Nazis ran a euthanasia programme, known as T4, that began as a way of cleansing Germany of "undesirable" disabled children?

In mainstream secondary school history lessons about the Holocaust, no teacher ever told me this. The only clue I got about the Nazis attitude towards disabled people was when I was told that in a concentration camp, I would have been sent straight to the gas chambers, because I couldn't have done any physical work.

Considering everything I had been told about the Nazis, I wasn't surprised. I do wish the T4 programme had been mentioned at school, though. Because no teacher ever hesitated to tell me that the Holocaust was about killing Jewish people.

Did you know anything about how disabled slaves were treated? I had never even thought about this until I heard a speech about it last year. Yet when my teachers told me about the slave trade, they never hesitated to tell me it was about white people owning black people who were made to work in their houses for free.

Did you know that King George VI had a very serious stammer? I didn't, until I watched The King's Speech (pictured). Yet no history teacher ever hesitated to tell me that King George VI was the father of the present Queen, Elizabeth II.

Did you know that Prince Philip's mother was born deaf? I didn't, until I watched a very good recent documentary about her life, The Queen's Mother In Law. This programme also revealed that she had severe mental health issues.

After the possible discovery of the skeleton of King Richard III and the revelation that he had scoliosis (curvature of the spine), I was informed by someone who has read Shakespeare's play Richard III that his disability is mentioned often throughout the script, but I had never been told about it in a history lesson.

This made me realise that mainstream secondary schools teach children hardly anything about the disability links in history. As a disabled person, I believe that this should change.

Just as lessons about the Holocaust were aimed at reducing religious discrimination, just as lessons about slavery were aimed at reducing racial discrimination, I believe that teaching children how disabled people were treated in important periods of history, or that historical figures were disabled, might just reduce disability discrimination, or maybe even disability hate crimes, in the future.

That's why I have recently launched a campaign called Old Is Gold to get disability links taught in history lessons in schools. I have started up an e-petition on the government website. If it gets enough support, I hope the idea might get debated in parliament.

If this campaign interests you, you can also follow it on Facebook at Teach Disability Links in History Lessons – Old is Gold.

The Drama of Aging and Caregiving, on YouTube

From The NY Times:

“I don’t want to take care of them,” Erica confesses in Episode 12 to the man she’s just slept with, speaking about her elderly parents.

“Who does?” The man is the real estate broker who has just sold her parents’ home in San Francisco so that, after a year’s resentful debate, they can downsize.

“People do. Children do,” Erica replies. “They think of it as payback for all the sacrifices their parents made for them. They think it’s a privilege.”

“I don’t know those kinds of people,” he says.

Amy Lippman invented those characters, told them what to say, then directed all 13 episodes of “Ruth & Erica,” a YouTube drama about aging and caregiving. You can find the first one today on the female-centric channel called WIGS, which stands for Where It Gets Interesting.

“I decided to write about something I was experiencing, and all my friends were experiencing — parents who’d been independent and self-sufficient, but were beginning to need more support and guidance,” said Ms. Lippman, who’s in her late 40s. “It seems to have come as a shock to all of us.”


Each slickly produced “Ruth & Erica” episode runs about eight minutes. New ones will appear on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; all 13 will live indefinitely online.

Funny how the number of movies, TV shows and books that focus on aging, and on dementia in particular, keeps growing. “It’s sort of in the ether right now,” said Ms. Lippman, whose own parents recently sold their house — a painful step — in Northern California.

I recently saw “Robot & Frank,” for example. It’s set in “the near future” when, apparently, people have even schmancier phones and zippier minicars and wonderfully helpful caregiving robots, but dementia remains incurable and elder care issues provoke as much family tension as ever.

“Robot & Frank” didn’t climb into my personal Top Five Movies About Aging (since you asked: “Away from Her,” “The Iron Lady,” “The Savages,” “About Schmidt” and “Iris” — what’s your list?), but it had its charms.

“Ruth & Erica,” which unfolds over a year, goes deeper. The veteran actors Lois Smith (pictured) and Philip Baker Hall give wonderful, wrenching performances as Ruth and Harry Rappaport, who fight their only child’s suggestions of a move to a retirement community as Harry sinks into dementia.

Maura Tierney (pictured) seems a decade or two too young to be their daughter. Flying in for visits and crisis management, she doesn’t look nearly careworn and frazzled enough. But she’s otherwise a very believable Erica — funny and honest and willing to say aloud what lots of adult children think.

Producing scripted drama for the Web gave Ms. Lippman a shot at something that would have been hard to pull off in movies or television. “It’s an opportunity to tell an intimate, realistic story with absolutely no pyrotechnics,” she said.

In fact, it was so realistic that during production, “almost everyone who worked on the series, including the crew, came up to me and said, ‘My grandmother.’ ‘My parents.’ ‘My sister had to move in with my mother,’” Ms. Lippman said. “I felt this reverberation.”

Profile of disabled rappers 4 Wheel City

From The Post-Gazette in Pittsburgh, PA:

Welcome to reality. You are a teenager in the Bronx, and you have been shot by a gun. You have a spinal cord injury and a new identity: paraplegic. Life as you know it is changed in ways you never imagined.

This was the reality of rap artists Namel "Tapwaterz" Norris and Ricardo "Rickfire" Velasquez, ages 17 and 19, respectively, at the time of their life-changing accidents.

Mr. Norris, now 27, was at his sister's birthday party when his cousin began playing with a gun. A bullet struck him in the neck.

Mr. Velasquez, now 32, was walking home from a party when saw a commotion ahead of him and heard someone shout about a gun. In an instant, he was on the ground, bleeding.

Although they didn't know each other at the time, they shared a journey. They would spend their young adulthood dealing with changes to their bodies, their relationships and their understanding of themselves. They would face the challenge of crafting productive lives. And they would discover that their common passion for rap and hip hop was the key to a meaningful future.

When they finally did meet, they realized that they could use the genre to portray their reality and to inspire people with spinal cord injuries and other disabilities to believe in themselves. They also shared the hope that they could influence at-risk youth to steer clear of gun violence.

"Rap saved us," the two men have said of their journey. "It helped us regain our lives."

In 2006, they launched 4 Wheel City (www.4wheelcity.com) to showcase their message of survival. On Sept. 27, their "Welcome to Reality" tour comes to the August Wilson Center for African American Culture. The free program is sponsored by Pitt's Office of Health Sciences Diversity and School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences.

The population of Americans with spinal cord injury is overwhelmingly young and male, said Katherine Seelman, associate dean of Pitt's School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences. Recent statistics indicate that 80 percent of individuals with the condition are men, and 56 percent acquired their injuries between the ages of 16 and 30.

Young African-American men are disproportionately more likely than their white counterparts to acquire spinal cord injury from a gunshot wound, she added. "In spinal cord centers in cities such as Detroit and Los Angeles, gunshot wounds are the No. 1 cause of SCI."

Such statistics and the stories behind them highlight the need that Mr. Norris and Mr. Velasquez set out to address. They saw that few people were reaching out specifically to African-Americans and Latinos with SCI. Hip hop music and culture could, they believed, be a powerful tool "to show the world that people with disabilities have talents and dreams and deserve to be treated equally."

They began with performances at rehabilitation centers and high school assemblies. Lately, they've seen their message reach broader audiences. "It's happening organically," said Mr. Norris. "It's taking a new life form. People are expecting it of us now."

In early September, they performed at the 2012 Summer Paralympics, which immediately followed the Olympics games in London. "It was breathtaking," said Mr. Norris. "Performing in the Olympic Park, traveling internationally, taking in culture. It was a real out-of-body experience."

London was the latest in a string of high points that include performing at Philadelphia's National Constitution Center for the city's annual celebration of the Americans with Disabilities Act and coverage on CNN and ABC News.

But the coup that may prove to be pivotal is their recent "Welcome to Reality" G-mix with Snoop Dogg. Through word of mouth, they scored an invitation to meet the renowned rapper and arrived with hopes of remixing their signature song, which urges youth to stay in school and off the streets.

"We didn't know how it would go, but we told him our idea and he went for it," said Mr. Norris. Not only did Snoop remix the group's anthem, but also he added a verse.

"Snoop supports the message, he's rapped about it in the past, but I think we accomplished something [different] by doing this," said Mr. Norris. "We brought him into our world."

"Hip hop is empowering," affirmed Lester Bennett, 37, of East Liberty, a Pitt graduate who served on the planning committee to bring 4 Wheel City to Pittsburgh. Mr. Bennett sustained a spinal cord injury at age 19 during an attempted robbery at the South Hills Junction T station.

"The show will be a great opportunity to address the stereotype of what a person with a spinal cord injury can or cannot do," he said.

As an advocate with Three Rivers Center for Independent Living and African-American, Mr. Bennett has a particular interest in how minorities adjust to SCI and ensuring that people are connected with resources. The 4 Wheel City event will feature a resource fair.

"Minorities do not take advantage of [SCI] resources to the same extent as the majority," Mr. Bennett said. One of the reasons, he believes, is the struggle to come to terms with disability. "People with spinal cord injuries fight the perceptions of others, but we also fight our self-perceptions. You face discrimination within yourself."

Mr. Bennett says he hopes that the positive message of 4 Wheel City will open people's minds to possibility. "I hope that people will come away saying, 10 minutes before I came here, I looked at myself as a person who couldn't do things. Now I feel that I can do a lot."

‘How to Survive a Plague,’ AIDS documentary by David France tells the history of AIDS activism

The NY Times review:

The currents of rage, fear, fiery determination and finally triumph that crackle through David France’s inspiring documentary, “How to Survive a Plague,” lend this history of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power a scorching electrical charge. This aggressive gay activist organization, better known as Act Up, formed in New York in 1987 and became the irresistible force that made seemingly immovable objects — government agencies and drug companies — give way, develop new treatments and speed them to the market as the AIDS epidemic spread unchecked among the gay population. 

Act Up came together by a kind of spontaneous combustion after a speech by one of its founders, the playwright Larry Kramer. An early demonstration, staged on Wall Street, protested the high cost of AZT, the first drug approved for people with H.I.V. some six years after the news about a mysterious illness that was killing gay men. The drug cost roughly $10,000 a year per patient. Burroughs Wellcome, the company that manufactured it, was eventually forced to lower the cost in what was the first of many Act Up victories. 

From the beginning the organization was extremely adept at using the news media, from its indelible logo — the words “Silence = Death” printed below a pink triangle on a black background — to its public demonstrations at the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and St. Patrick’s Cathedral. One clip shows members dumping ashes and bone fragments of AIDS casualties through a fence onto the White House lawn. 

The film is a briskly paced, straightforward chronology made up largely of footage shot mostly by the protesters (31 videographers are credited) and told in their voices. As the documentary gallops forward, it conveys the urgency of a desperate race against time. Many of the group’s leaders were H.I.V.-positive men facing imminent death. 

Their efforts were met with indifference and hostility from wary politicians. In New York City, Mayor Edward I. Koch called the demonstrators “fascists” after he was shouted down at a gay history exhibition, but he subsequently backtracked and used the words “concerned citizens.” In response to denunciations by Jesse Helms, the longtime North Carolina senator, Act Up members stretched a giant condom over his home. 

If the movie expresses equal measures of sadness and outrage, it is charged with the exhilarating excitement felt by soldiers on the front lines of battle. Its heroes may have been sick, but in their struggle they are fiercely alive. They include Mr. Kramer; Robert Rafsky; Ann Northrop; and, most visibly, Peter Staley, a formerly closeted Wall Street bond trader with H.I.V. who left his job and helped found the Treatment Action Group, an offshoot of Act Up. Self-taught in the science of AIDS, the group collaborated with pharmaceutical companies like Merck in the development of new drugs. 

A breakthrough came in 1996 with the arrival of protease inhibitors, whose workings are clearly explained in a remarkable animated segment. They produced the so-called Lazarus effect, in which the symptoms in seriously weakened AIDS patients disappeared in 30 days. The death rate plummeted. Increasingly sophisticated pharmaceutical cocktails have since made AIDS a chronic, manageable disease for those who can afford the protocol. Today, according to the film, seven companies manufacture the drugs, which have saved six million lives. 

The success of Act Up might serve as a template for other movements, like Occupy Wall Street, whose protesters also put their bodies on the line. But many of those protesters are not fighting the personal, immediate life-or-death battles faced by the members of Act Up, who quite literally saved their own lives.

In the words of Mr. Kramer: “The government didn’t get us the drugs. No one else got us the drugs. We, Act Up, got those drugs out there. That is the proudest achievement that the gay population of this world can ever claim.”

New TV project in California uses comedy to help kids on – or near – the autism spectrum

From Laura Shumaker for the San Francisco Gate:

Ever since Christa Dahlstrom’s eight year old son was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, he’s benefited greatly from extra support at school for those things that just don’t come naturally for him, particularly the unspoken rules of social interaction.

One thing that does come naturally for her son is engaging with, acting out and creating stories. “One of his favorite activities is enlisting the whole family to act out scenes from movies and TV shows. He has memorized entire episodes and can recreate them perfectly or combine elements from different stories to create something all his own.”

Dahlstrom, who lives in Oakland, found herself wishing there was a way to incorporate the ideas about perspective taking, give and take in conversations, or managing emotions into the shows her son loved. And she wondered why there wasn’t a television show to help teach social skills, the way other shows helped kids learn to read, or do math or learn about science.

So she decided to make one herself.

Dahlstrom teamed up with Jordan Sadler and Liesl Wenzke Hartmann, experts in social communication with a wealth of experience working with children on these issues. They too had been looking for lively and engaging ways to help families reinforce the learning from therapy sessions and social groups they conducted with kids with social communication challenges.

The result is Flummox and Friends, off-beat, live-action comedy that helps kids navigate the social and emotional world. The Bay Area-based team just released the pilot episode, which was funded in part by a grassroots Kickstarter campaign. I watched the pilot, loved it and enthusiastically recommend it.

“There are products targeting social emotional teaching on the market,” explains Hartmann, a San Francisco speech and language therapist. “But it’s hard to find something that adults and children can really enjoy together. This show gives families kid-friendly language to demystify and normalize social challenges, showing that everyone is ‘flummoxed’ by social rules at one time or another.”

“I wanted to create a show that really connects with kids’ intelligence and sense of humor,” said Dahlstrom. “I hope families will think of this show first and foremost as a comedy. If kids enjoy the jokes and the characters, they’ll watch it again and again and the educational messages will sink in naturally.”

The program focuses on the adventures of three quirky inventors and their neighbors. The show intersperses musical and animated segments with the live-action storyline.

Families and educators can watch or download the pilot episode for free from the Flummox and Friends website. They can also download companion guides – for families or professionals – that have ideas for ways to integrate ideas from the show into conversations and activities at home and in the classroom.

The Flummox and Friends team hopes the pilot episode will generate sufficient viewership and enthusiasm for investors and broadcasters to take notice. “We want to turn Flummox and Friends into a series, and I think our pilot will show there is a large audience that’s been waiting for this kind of show.”

“We are already getting a lot of effusive feedback from parents and educators – and kids! – through social media.” says Dahlstrom. “One parent wrote to tell us, “I’ve been wishing, hoping, praying for a show like this for my daughter. THANK YOU!”

 

You can watch the pilot episode of Flummox and Friends and find out more about the show at www.flummoxandfriends.com.