Television Captioning Censorship Hurts Family Values

The National Association of the Deaf (NAD) urged President Bush to overturn a recent decision by the U.S. Department of Education to declare almost 200 television shows inappropriate for captioning by the Department’s Technology and Media Services for Individuals with Disabilities program, effective October 1, 2003. According to NAD President, Andrew J. Lange, the Department's action is government censorship and contradicts President Bush’s promotion of family values and parental accountability.

Under the current guidelines, applicants for captioning grants take into account the preferences of consumers, through grantee Consumer Advisory Boards (CABs) and other feedback mechanisms, when selecting “educational, news, or informational” programs for captioning. The recent decision deeming almost 200 television shows inappropriate for captioning apparently was based entirely on additional descriptive categories and actions of an external panel of five unnamed individuals.

Required federal rulemaking processes were completely disregarded, thus the public was not provided with the opportunity to provide written opinions, data, or arguments on the recently narrowed definition of “educational, news, or informational” programs for captioning.

Nancy J. Bloch, NAD Executive Director, said, “This secretive process amounts to censorship, which runs counter to the principles of the First Amendment freedom of speech. This action also segregates over 28 million deaf and hard of hearing individuals from access to the same shows as everyone else in America." In addition, Bloch added, families of persons with a hearing loss (parents, siblings, and grandparents in particular) bring the number of persons adversely impacted to many millions more.

Most if not all of the censored shows are in fact educational and informative. These include reruns of family favorites such as “Bewitched” and modern shows such as “Law & Order.” “Disney Monthly Original Children’s Movies” and “Pokemon” cartoons, fixtures in today’s youth culture, are also being censored. Virtually all sports programming has been censored, isolating deaf and hard of hearing students of all ages, not only in the classroom, but within the family, at the school lunch table, and on the playground. The censorship of these shows not only prevents deaf and hard of hearing children from watching shows that help them learn about the trends, culture, and society around them, censorship also prevents deaf and hard of hearing parents from making informed decisions on appropriate programming for their children.

“Without captioning, millions of deaf and hard of hearing parents, such as myself, are unable to preview shows for appropriate content for their children, to watch television programming with their families, or to engage in dialogue with their children in response to televised programs. Education does not stop at the schoolhouse door. My duties and responsibilities as a parent to pass on our family values to my children have been undermined by a few government officials," said Lange who called upon the President to practice what he preaches and restore parental authority by overturning the recent censorship decision.

Similar efforts to censor captioning in 1998 were met by a massive, nationwide outcry of consumer protest. These censorship efforts failed, in part, because then-Department of Education Secretary Richard W. Riley affirmed [2] that the government should not “supersede the individual judgment of millions of deaf Americans” nor should the Department single out particular television programs resulting in a denial of access for deaf and hard of hearing individuals.

“We’ve always enjoyed a close relationship with the Department in promoting education and family values. This rehashing of the 1998 issue is very disappointing,” Bloch said. Consumers are encouraged to share their views and opinions with Congressional members and Department of Education officials; contact information is available at:
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/home/ [3]

For a list of recently approved and disapproved television programs for U.S. Department of Education captioning support, click here [4].