[optacon-l] Ripple Effect (was An Interesting Message
- From: Catherine Thomas <braille@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 15 Jan 2009 16:24:48 -0500 (EST)
Today I received two messages from a person wanting to donate two
Optacons. This person had been an active Optacon user but because of
inability to keep them in repair has decided to give up using them. I hope
that the person's mind can be changed. In addition to providing repair
information, I wrote a message reminding him or her of the things the
Optacon can do quickly that other devices either can't or are too slow.
Photocopying right-side-up; reading cans, bottles jars, medication info;
verifying that a printed label printed in the exactly right spot; signing
documents independently; reading mail or at least envelopes; a person
shouldn't have to give up this level of independence. Now of course it's
possible that the person has diabetic neuropathy or some other condition
that makes Optacon use difficult if not impossible but maybe not. Anyway,
the messages made me very sad but at the same time it underlined the
importance of our work especially outreach.
So, though in principal I agree with Mark that the past is the past, I
don't think it can be ignored and swept aside when real people were really
deprived of their independence by a careless word or a misguided idea.
If you go back through the archives a couple of years, you will discover
many stories of how people got and kept jobs because of the Optacon.
Should all those people have been forced to stop working just because
TeleSensory chose not to manufacture the Optacon any more? There was one
story which came close to that. The job had to be modified to account for
the absence of the Optacon.
I don't want to belabor this issue, but I think it adds to our
understanding as we reach out to people to know that this happened.
I could name at least thirty things I did within the past month that I
could not have done alone without the Optacon. I could name a second
thirty, maybe more, that were done more efficiently because of the Optacon
that could have been done using a scanner but have taken a lot more time.
Anyway, for many, there was a ripple effect, on employment, on personal
independence, and on dignity and privacy. For those people who would
prefer to be using an Optacon and can't because they couldn't get them
fixed or replaced, the past is very much not dead.
Cathe;rine
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-Catherine Thomas
braille@xxxxxxxxx /
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