Blind Bias

I don't go looking for this kind of stuff, but it cropped up in the feed via someone who seems to have an endless supply of it and just has to re-share every one of these pessimistic, fatalistic downers, it's gotten to the point where I unsubscribed from them because I'm sick of being told via these liberal-minded re-shares that life really sucks and/or is more likely to really suck when you have a disability because somewhere in the world another disabled person was ignored or done wrong and that's the prevailing attitude!

Blast that!

Among the piles of this kind of thing from them, this is one of the first and few I took the time to read and comment on, because I've got a life to live and I'm not letting them or anyone else try to convince me otherwise.

I'm going to debunk the myths held by employers according to what's said in this poor excuse of an article.

I'm also going to do a big HIGH 5 and KUDOS to my current employer and those in the past who have given me the same fair chance and treatment given to other employees.

Here, here!

Also, Why Many People With Disabilities Do Not Want To Be Considered Inspirational by Carola finch is an excellent read!

Now, on to the article.

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March 18, 2013, 10:27 AM

When It Comes to Hiring, Blind Workers Face Bias

By Leslie Kwoh

Associated Press

Article: A new survey finds that hiring managers are reluctant to hire blind workers.

Capri: that's exactly what shouldn't be happening, and we should not even be hearing about in today's world, where everyone is supposed to be considered equal and allowed equal opportunities. But as long as liberals keep running the media, they will keep digging around, looking for or making up the worst case scenarios to prop up their pro-affirmative action agendas. "You gots it bad 'cuz yer disabled/a woman/colored/too old/not as attractive as X so all the perfect people get hired and your life is gonna suck."

Article: When it comes to hiring blind employees, many employers remain skeptical.

Capri: They need to stop doubting and start learning. How else are people going to live a worth-wile life when some employers won't even give them a chance? And then you get the insult added to injury when ultra-right politics is always barking at you to "Get out there and get a job" well, you can't if no one will hire you because they're afraid of your blindness. Who is truly blind, really? You got the left telling you you literally can't get hired because everybody's a shallow idiot, and the right telling you to get off your lazy butt and get a job. This kind of politics saps my will to live. Screw it! If this is all you have to offer me, get the heck lost and let me live my life and actually thrive at it. I will not allow anyone to take that away from me!

Article: Bosses often assume blind workers cost more and produce less, according to a new study.

Capri: New study my foot! This is just liberal politics designed to make disabled people feel fatalistic, sorry for themselves, and mad at the able-bodied, and make employers feel bad because they don't have at least one blind person in their employ at all times! It's not a "study" or certainly not an objective one. It's all cheery-picking or even distortion and deception. And, shock journalism. the left will stop at nothing to keep their ultra victim narrative going.

Let me debunk this negative myth right here, right now.

To get ready for the 2012/13 season at my job, I worked obsessively on my time off to learn the music for three new syllabus grades, (by ear and from memory, I might add,) and never stopped working on the music. When the break comes, I continue working to review and polish the music so that it will be all the better the next year.

Sample 1

Sample 2

Sample 3

Sample 4

Sample 5

Sample 6

Sample 7

Sample 8

But any blind person can work just as hard at whatever they do and be just as productive as their sighted counterparts.

Article: They also believe blind workers are more prone to workplace accidents and less reliable than other workers.

Capri: What - the - heck - kind - of - ignorance!?

This is not only in error, it is downright bigotry!

I have never had a work place accident, and I am reliable. Anyone who knows me, knows that!

What sort of work place accidents do these people think the blind are more prone to? We are not likely to try for jobs that have a high risk factor for injury. We don't spill our drinks or trip and fall more than anyone else with sight. We don't drop things more, understand less, or forget responsibilities.

Article: The study, scheduled to be released this week by the nonprofit National Industries for the Blind, polled 400 human-resources and hiring managers at a mix of large and small U.S.-based companies. The group commissioned the survey, in part, to shed light on why roughly 70% of the 3.5 million people working-age Americans are not employed. (Legally blind Americans are eligible for Social Security disability, according to NIB.)

Capri: Part of the problem is that there simply isn't work out there that a blind person can do. There are lots of delivery jobs, but you have to be able to drive for that, to name just one example.

Article: NIB president and chief executive Kevin Lynch described the survey results as a “terrible surprise.” With the exception of certain jobs that require driving or steering, “there are very few jobs that a person who’s blind is not capable of doing,” he says.

Capri: But there also needs to be accessibility in the work place. How is a blind person going to manage to work some computerized device without a program to speak out what's on the screen for them?

Article: The findings reveal a disconnect between what employers say and what they do.

Capri: So most everybody's dishonest. Nice to know. (Sarcasm)

Article: While the majority of executives claim they want to hire and train disabled workers,

Capri: I hope this isn't going to be some sort of pitch for affirmative action, because that's not what anybody needs. I don't want to be hired or get a B grade on something just for being blind, and because some law says x has to hire x number of women, x number of (insert race) x number of "disabled" people.

Article: many view blind workers as an inconvenience.

Capri: Well that sure doesn't give anyone incentive to go looking for a job, does it? Who wants to be associated with such bigots, or risk getting turned down by these bigots over something that was never asked for? The real inconvenience is these closed-minded people who refuse to give a fully qualified person the job, based purely on prejudice.

Article: Hiring managers tended to be slightly more negative than human-resources managers, but overall results were similar.

Capri: In other words, if you're blind, not only are you out of luck because they say "you can't believe anything you hear and only half of what you see" but basically nobody can be trusted, the whole world is stacked against you because of a condition you didn't ask for and none of your own making. Swell, really makes my day…

All I can say is, that study needs to be re-done with better employers, because this just sounds like more depressing fatalism to me.

Article: Among hiring managers, most respondents (54%) felt there were few jobs at their company that blind employees could perform,

Capri: Like what, precisely?

Article: and 45% said accommodating such workers would require “considerable expense.”

Capri: Right, they don't want to be bothered upgrading their computerized equipment with screen-readers, well, THEY are the problem, not the blind person looking for a job. I guess money still shouts from the rooftops. You know, if all companies would insist on better technology that is accessible, that would really get the likes of Microsoft and Blackberry to get off their butts and start including accessibility built in to their products.

Article: Forty-two percent of hiring managers believe blind employees need someone to assist them on the job;

Capri: They would be wrong. Besides, everyone in training, needs some sort of assistance. There's nothing wrong with giving a little help when it's needed, but a blind person doesn't need someone helping them with everything all the time, or doing the work for them!

Article: 34% said blind workers are more likely to have work-related accidents.

Capri: You already said that somewhere above and it's still bollox. 34% is still way too high a percentage for this stupidity.

Article: One-quarter of respondents said blind employees are “more sensitive” than other employees;

Capri: Well - excuse them for one of the biggest collective brain-belches seen in a while…

Did these people have nasty experiences with some blind people who have serious entitlement issues? Because unfortunately there are people like that, and they are the bad apples that tend to spoil the whole barrel.

Or maybe it is these employers who are the ones being sensitive because being around blind people makes them uncomfortable. *Rolling eyes* It is possible that they have done any number of really obnoxious, unthinking things to insult someone who is blind. When you have a problem with my blindness, I have a problem with you.

Article: the same percentage said they were “more difficult to supervise.”

Capri: That's absolute bull! If anything, they would be easier to supervise, because blind people aren't just going to up and run off just whenever, especially not in a crowded work place. And, I don't require supervision… A visual impairment doesn't make anyone harder to supervise, that is just plain stupid.

Article: Twenty-three percent of hiring managers said blind employees are not as productive as their colleagues,

Capri: Bull! so what do these 23% want? For everyone to be working non-stop as fast as they absolutely can until their arms and legs fall off? I suppose for these lackwits a slight delay to listen to what some screenreader is saying would take an extra few seconds and that would bring everything to a standstill. *Rolling eyes* Please!

Article: and 19% believe these employees have a higher absentee rate.

Capri: They willingly believe very wrongly! Blindness has no influence on absences, and I don't remember when was the last time I missed a day or two of work because I was sick - and I don't stay off work for some minor little cold, either.

Article: Blindness is largely absent from corporate conversation about employees with disabilities with the exception of sporadic lawsuits:

Capri: Oh, so that's where this accident prone, difficult to supervise crap comes in, I suppose...

Well So you're saying that even among other disabilities, blind people get it worse than anyone else. What an uplifting article. I wish the few blind friends I have would stop posting this kind of dreck. A similar story went around with the same message, but aimed at deaf people, and the students in the experiment weren't really deaf.

Article: Last August, Hawaiian Electric Co. agreed to pay $50,000 to settle a discrimination suit by a partially blind employee, the AP reported. And in December, Bloomberg reported that a blind ex-banker at the Royal Bank of Scotland Group RBS.LN -1.24% lost a suit seeking disability benefits.

Capri: Yeah, you've made your - a - point, loud and clear - life sucks when people don't realize, or, don't want to realize you are disabled………….. I get it already, I get it. Really, I get it….. I just don't want it, okay?

Article: Rarer still is news about companies like apparel business SustainU, based in West Virginia, which hires blind and visually impaired employees to man its factory, according to the New York Times. The company said there was no difference in the cost and quality of its goods when compared to that of other U.S. manufacturers.

Capri: Yeah, so how about those people coming out with various details? Explain what it is exactly these blind people do at the factory, what if anything has been done to make the work environment more accessible. Just saying "Company X is great to blind people" tells me nothing. is the pay good? Is it real jobs or is it just some affirmative action scheme?

Article: Companies may have to invest some money to provide “reasonable accommodations” for a blind employee, as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act. However, says NIB’s Lynch, many computers and smartphones already have built-in features that enable users to change font size and light intensity. Installing voice technology that allows computers to “read” text to a blind employee costs just $1,500 to $2,000, he says.

Capri: Per computer. If everybody switched to Apple, there is Voiceover built in, no need to buy an extra thousand-dollar package.

Article: The American Foundation for the Blind has estimated that 88% of employee accommodations cost less than $1,000.

Capri: And it shouldn't matter, because the bottom line is, everything eventually has to be upgraded, and that costs. Accessibility shouldn't cost extra IMO, it should be standard. Maybe one day it will be.

Article: As for health insurance, company rates are determined by the number of incidents among the entire group – not individual employees – no evidence suggests that blind employees incur more costs than other workers, Mr. Lynch says.

Capri: And he is right.

Article: Blind employees may also be more loyal than most, he adds. A DePaul University study from 2007 found that employees with disabilities were likely to stay on the job four months longer, on average, than employees without disabilities.

Capri: Especially when 1. There are so few jobs to be had, and 2. For me, everything about my job is just great. I'm thankful not to have run up against bias in my line of work.

Article: The study also found that workers with disabilities took 1.24 fewer scheduled absences than non-disabled workers during a six-month period. But they took, on average, 1.13 more days of unscheduled absences.

Capri: Well sickness can account for those, whether you're disabled or not, and sometimes people with disabilities also have some sort of medical conditions causing them to be ill.

*Pfft* Well that sucked, but I had to say something about it.

Instead of spreading this pessimism around telling various people they are doomed to mistreatment because of disability, appearance, gender etc. how about informing people about what can be done to help one another work and interact better and ultimately destroy any barriers, real or perceived?