Okay, I missed most of this thread because I've never cared for Facebook, Twitter, et al. and frankly hate how they've caused a decline in more traditional web forums and tend to bring out the worst in people, but my general thoughts on the "Blind Community" are as such: As a general rule, I'd argue that blind people are too spread out and isolated from one another for us to fit the usual definition of community. Heck, outside of attending a school for the blind, reunions thereof, and spending some time in vocational rehab targetted at the blind, I don't think I have ever met another blind person in meatspace, and outside of the handful of blind accessibility mailing lists I'm on and the Audio Games Forum, I don't think I've ever met another blind person in cyberspace either. That said, while its inaccurate, "the blind community" strikes me as about as good a term as any to reference the set of all blind people, and not too far off from how the term community is used in other informal context(e.g. referring to the set of people who play video games as "the gaming community" despite it also not being anywhere close to being a unified community and instead a loose collection of communities dedicated to specific franchises and individuals with no strong connection to any particular community). Admittedly, it's less wordy to just say "the blind" or "gamers" dropping the arguably incorrectly used term, but honestly, I've got better things to do than trying to make everyone else use English exactly like I use it, and conversation would be much more bland if everyone wrote and spoke in the exact same way. And yeah, governments thinking "the most expensive option must be the best" and trying to force that on all individuals and businesses involved is a bad thing, though I'm not convinced its strictly a US problem... or specifically an accessibility problem considering how much the feedback loop of "businesses use it, so schools teach it, schools teach it, so businesses use it" favors expensive, Proprietary software like Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, and 3DS Max over FOSS options like LibreOffice, The GIMP, and Blender. On 1/30/23, Linux for blind general discussion <blinux-list@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > The evidence I found surprising was blind community exists because of > government product orders? >> as if only members of this blind community live in the States, and >> that to belong some government must be providing your products? > > > Perhaps this is the "blind culture" mentioned here. I think it is > possibly a US phenomenon, although I do live here and don't consider > myself to be a part of it. But the thing is that the government here > likes to tell us what to purchase, and it's always the most expensive > product available, but they don't actually make the purchase, seeing as > how employers still hesitate to hire people who have visual challenges > or who are blind. The problem is that employers are also told what they > need to purchase for us - I saw this at my current job - and it's also > the most expensive products, and these simply don't work for everyone. > So yeah, I get it. There is a "blind community" and possibly a "blind > culture" as well, but it's a fabrication of governments and marketing > firms, not a real community that has grown organically. > > ~Kyle > > _______________________________________________ > Blinux-list mailing list > Blinux-list@xxxxxxxxxx > https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list > _______________________________________________ Blinux-list mailing list Blinux-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list