RantWoman apologizes in advance. It's not just that pandemic brain is making RantWoman a little scatter-brained and definitely more charm-challenged than average. It's also that RantWoman cannot decide whether the presence likely to show up along with all the seasonal angst, consternation, and ambivalence, will be SinterKlas (Wikipedia for the complexity of the reference) Santa Claus, probably clattering out of the chimney in some TV-land cloud of soot or some seasonal Baby Jesus.
This post is also getting long. RantWoman will try to emphasize some clear points where immediate action could be helpful, frame some points for community, and to name some questions that can't be solved immediately by anyone.
An immediate action point: RantWoman has been reading three meetings's materials. All of them include invitations to sign up for subscriptions to Western Friend in a Meeting-based group for a discount. Yeah discounts! The only problem: NONE of the announcements mention that Western Friend is available both in paper and online. RantWoman is pretty sure she is not the only person interested in reading Western Friend electronically. RantWoman of course does this out of necessity and is lucky enough to have various pieces of technology that make this very easy for her. But other people also for many reasons opt to read online and RantWoman encourages everyone organizing discount groups to tell readers they have the option of electronic versions.
RantWoman could of course email Mary Klein and ask her to pass along the announcement with any additional details that might be helpful. Mary is wonderfully responsive so RantWoman is not particularly worried about how this suggestion might be received.
RantWoman is writing in her blog specifically to elder two stream of voices, each coming from multiple people. One voice: "Oh look what we have done; you're not indispensable.." (Okay Friend, to jump up and down AGAIN on a theme RantWoman has touched many times, are you sure what you have done is something RantWoman will find helpful? Plus RantWoman is TOO happy to share burdens, so be honest, has ANYONE else taken initiative to ask you about ... accessibility issue in your life?)"
The other voices, also coming from many directions "Oh, that's SO UNFAIR of you to point out things we have overlooked." (Look Friend, have you considered that MAYBE you are overloaded and that there might be others who can carry pieces of this work? Like RantWoman has only been TRYING to offer help for YEARS and her offers keep getting declined. Besides, how about continuing revelation? How about the evolution of technology? How about creating opportunities for EVERYONE to learn? Is RantWoman getting repetitive AGAIN?
How about just start with some acknowledgments. Over the summer one such moment occurred. RantWoman looked at one name on a list, took a deep breath, and released the thought bubble "OK, God, What am I supposed to do with this?" Something was well held in the space, acknowledgments on two sides of a situation, Also, RantWoman, after blurting out strong opinions one issue, went home with a prayer "OK God, PLEASE do not let RantWoman's comments scare away another..."
But Back to accessible documents and the immediate step of continuing to encourage a positive effort. RantWoman wants to say a big loud "Oh SNAP" to one newsletter editor for doing a wonderful job, at least once, of putting headings on all the articles and both captions and alt text on the photos. And RantWoman for her part POSSIBLY underestimated the capacity of previous newsletter editors to learn what what is needed. RantWoman definitely though did not overestimate her capacity to help previous editors sort through the various technological issues needed to do this. RantWoman is HUMBLY grateful for a young Friend who has taken up the task with care and to RantWoman's ear enthusiasm.
The topic of accessible documents is only one of MANY topics not covered by a previous review of accessibility matters by the former Oversight now Care and Counsel committee. RantWoman is also grateful that many technological realities have evolved that RantWoman can access content on her own without having to bother anyone else. On the other hand, glass half empty note: RantWoman still collides with a welter of technology and intellectual property issues every time she decides to join a book group. RantWoman has not exactly pounded into her fellow book group participants all the challenges and RantWoman would not say anyone thought to ask.
Kindle / ebooks are not as easy to pass around as books on paper. Not everything published will be recorded and distributed by the National Library of the Blind and Physically Handicapped. And ebooks from the regular public library are, RantWoman thinks, intentionally in accessible to screen readers. RantWoman is either going to be glad she has funds to buy the Kindle edition or going to get her own crack at Ebook accessibility for an upcoming book group, but... Probably there is little here that is immediately solvable by anyone. In fact, if people's heads are spinning with a bunch of unfamiliar terminology that has to be fine--for now but a sense of spiritual accompaniment, willingness to wade in at least a little, and maybe tolerance for blindness tourism about the topic would mean a lot.
RantWoman also did not manage to bring up accessibility of reading materials and issues about accessibility specifically of Quaker materials before the Clearness Committee for helping RantWoman adjust to blindness decided they where done and RantWoman decided the members of the Clearness committee were either not available or otherwise overcommitted. Nor did the Care and Accountability Committee for a person with a disability that couldn't talk about disability manage to engage. RantWoman does not see well, but the one time a related topic came up, RantWoman detected only glassy stares of incomprehension. RantWoman's excessively Plain English to Quakerese malfunctioned in the direction of total silence which is probably just as well: the thought that was going to come out was something along the lines of "Look, you don't necessarily HAVE to understand all this stuff, but maybe could you just step back and let others who RantWoman perfectly well KNOWS do understand do what is needed.
This is probably more than enough for one post. As long as we are celebrating the evolution of electronic accessibility--in both Western Friend and in Friends' Journal
Two articles that especially speak to RantWoman
Radical Vulnerability
and for people thinking about how our Meetings look to newcomers,
Worship by Approximation
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