[nfb-talk] NFB and ACB

[T. Joseph Carter]

Corey, I'm going to reply inline so that I can address your points one by
one.  I hope that's all right with you.

> I write this email in hopes to get answers and not make anyone mad with me.
> As a younger blind person in my 20s, taking steps to enter the rehab field
> to work with and help other Blind people.

Honestly, if someone gets angry with you for trying to find out for
yourself what the differences are, then they've got some serious issues of
their own.  This is not to suggest that you won't find hotheads on this or
any other list who pay their membership dues for one or both NFB and ACB.

I shall attempt to not be one of those people.  *smile*


> I have to ask why should I care about the NFB or ACB?
> 
> I have been lerking on these lists for a while now, and I am on some NFB
> lists, as I have time with my job and other pursuits I read both the Braille
> Monitor, and the Braille Forum.
> 
> I am trying to become better informed about both groups in hopes that I will
> join one of them.

Before we discuss differences, let's settle the similarities:

Both organizations are composed of real people who just happen to be
blind.  That means we don't aways agree on beliefs, ideology, or much of
anything else--and that's just within either organization in isolation!
The one thing you can be sure of is that most within either Federation or
Council are willing to defend what is important to them.

Some of us want ideological solutions.  Some of us want pragmatic
solutions.  Probably most of us make up our minds for ideology or
pragmatism as we go.  All three approaches are valid, respectable, and
somewhat limited.

Now, as to why you should care...  We are the blind.  For all our faults
and our accomplishments, what you see is pretty much what you get.  As a
rehab professional, it is important to understand where blind people are
coming from, collectively speaking.

As a person who is blind yourself, we (be it the Council or the
Federation) are your community.  As long as what you do is not directly
contrary to our aims as organizations, you can count on the support of the
organization and generally pretty good support of its membership.

I use the word "or" above, implying exclusivity.  I don't agree with those
in either who suggest that you cannot be a member of both communities.  In
fact, I can think of a few who are members of both and are generally
considered valued members of both.  I do think, however, if you come to
strongly identify with the core ideologies of one group or the other, you
will probably find yourself no longer a member of the other by choice.

The historical happenings that led to the formation of the Council aren't
really that important.  They happened decades before either of us were
born.  The stated reason for the split is probably best documented by the
ACB themselves.  Old-time Federationists might be quick to point out the
unstated reasons related to politics, racial segregation.  The old-time
Councilists (is that a term they would use?) would go on just as long
about term limits and suggesting that dissenting views are not tolerated.

As far as I can tell, these issues exist to give old-time members
something to complain about when the other organization comes up in the
discussions.  The ACB no longer practices the racism common of the era,
and frankly the politics don't matter anymore because they happened so
long ago that most of the people directly involved are dead now.  The NFB
seems to function without term limits, and the dissenting voices we are
supposed to want silenced have changed our policies over time by
convincing the majority that their viewpoint has merit.

The major difference that matters in my opinion is the ideological one.
We in the Federation tend to believe that the government is often the
problem rather than the solution to equality.  We believe it ultimately
falls to the blind individual to accommodate themselves if they need some
form of accommodation.  That means our success does not depend upon what
someone else does or doesn't do, but it also means we have no excuses if
we try and fail because there's nobody to blame.

The Council would be quick to point out the inequality in this.  Why
should a blind person have to do more to achieve the same result?  They
would suggest that reasonable accommodations should be made for the blind,
and are quick to remind us that the law in fact requires it.  You should
ask the ACB to expand upon this, since I as a Federationist cannot give
their ideological viewpoint the same treatment they could.

In short, the Council says that if you give the blind an even playing
field, then we can and will succeed.  The Federation says that we're going
to succeed, and we're not going to wait around for someone to level the
field for us.  Neither is afraid to use the law to further our ideology,
as you have probably already seen.  However, these ideologies are polar
opposites.  That's why I said that if you find yourself strongly holding
one, you'll probably not belong to the other organization--it wouldn't
represent you very well.


> The thing I keep coming back to is this, for all the good that is happening
> in both groups, there is so much fighting and accusing.
> It seems that as Blind people we are at war.

There we get into the differences that shouldn't matter.

As a Federationist, I do have a very hard time believing that the ACB does
not oppose everything we do simply because we're doing it.  Their local
affiliates have tried to shut down Newsline in some places.  They opposed
the Louis Braille coin because some of the proceeds would go to the NFB to
fund our Braille literacy efforts.  They opposed the legislation to create
a Colorado Commission for the Blind because they didn't want to have too
big a voice on that commission even after their own amendment to prevent
precisely that was incorporated.  These things all seemed to be more aimed
to disrupt the NFB than to do anything else.

But we Federationists are not immune either.  When the Council won the
case on changing the US currency, the NFB issued a statement which
included some blatant sniping at the ACB.  That was unnecessary.  In fact,
it was precisely the sort of thing many of us had been accusing the ACB of
doing whenever we accomplish something.  I doubt Dr. Maurer ever saw my
reply, much less actually read it, but I at least objected to that sort of
childishness.  I don't care who started it, he was responsible in that
instance of continuing it.


> I am getting the feeling that both groups in there own way are allowing
> politics to get in the way of the greater good, witch I thought was to
> improve the lives of the Blind, and give tomorrow's Blind a brighter future.

That sometimes happens.  The way to deal with that is to have people who
are willing and ready to step up and call that what it is: a waste of our
time and effort.  We need more people to seize upon the underlying issues
(because there are real underlying issues buried somewhere beneath the
politicking) and bring those to the surface.  Likewise, we must reject
those things that serve no purpose but to reciprocate the cycle of
animosity between the National Federation of the Blind and the American
Council of the Blind.

Like I said before, attrition has claimed most of those involved directly
with the original split between Federation and Council.  Our generations
don't have any valid reason to hate each other.  Frequently we do have
reason to oppose each other, but it can be done without demonizing our
respective opponents.


> As someone who is not currently a member of iether group I must say this is
> serving to scare me away.

That's happened quite a bit, I'm afraid.


> So here is my question witch I would love to be answered with out bashing
> anyone, why should I care?
> Why should I give my money and time to either group?
> 
> What good can I accomplish by choosing to join the ACB or the NFB?
> Think about it, you might just get a new member out of this email.

You should care because we have started to see a significant backslide.  A
whole generation of people have grown up dependent upon technology and
ready with a pile of excuses the moment their battery dies.  They never
learned how to function without magic tools to do the work for them, and
their employers aren't going to let them keep their jobs if they don't get
the work done.

You should care because the playing field is not level yet.  To my eyes,
it is now more unlevel than it has been since the day the Federation was
first created.  To add insult to injury, many blind people who have the
will to succeed in spite of that do not have the means to do it, and they
don't know that we're here to help them find those means.

You should care because many people still believe that to be blind is to
be utterly crippled and unable to function in society.

And you should care because only through your example will in concert with
a community of like-minded others who truly understand blindness because
we are the blind can you make the kind of impact I think you can have.
That is what we mean when we say that we are changing what it means to be
blind.  It's not just a catch phrase.