# ADA leads to death of UC Berkeley free online courses **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 13, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118 "2017-03-13T21:44:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/61 "2017-03-14T17:19:45Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > No, you’re not right. No one believes this. And when the fuck did **adaher** become reasonable??? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/62 "2017-03-14T17:29:04Z")
I’ve got a couple of unreasonable lines of argument going in other threads, don’t worry.🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Knowed\_Out](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/knowed_out/32/7380_2.png) [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/63 "2017-03-14T18:00:31Z")
Without pointing fingers of blame, I’m wondering if UCB decided to be practical about this. With the DOJ warning, UCB saw this as an opportunity to legitimately take down material they viewed as obsolete, and no longer applicable to their current educational standards. They can certainly give their current video library the proper ADA requirements as they produce them, but giving the same treatment to their legacy courses isn’t worth the effort, if those courses have diminishing educational value. My workplace did the same thing in switching to a cloud-based system. They left all the old content on the old servers and eventually phased them out. We were given the option to preserve our files on Microsoft’s One Drive, so maybe some UCB course developers did the same. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2017, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/64 "2017-03-15T08:45:11Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Really? [Here is a list of threads I’ve started](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/search.php?searchid=13978800). Certainly some of those are partisan in nature, but plenty aren’t (Venezuela, “gender assigned at birth”, genocide, Israeli settlements, Dopers intelligence, Pearl Harbor, news sources, global warming, Star Wars, post-literate, etc.) All I’d need is 50% + 1. I’m cheerfully confident. ---
**Author:** ![Enola\_Gay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ab097/32.png) [@Enola\_Gay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Gay)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2017, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/65 "2017-03-15T08:58:49Z")
When they had the site up, lot’s of people could get a free education & deaf people could take advantage of many of the free courses. Now no one can. What a tragedy. ---
**Author:** ![Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blue_blistering_barnacle/32/3386_2.png) [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2017, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/66 "2017-03-15T18:58:14Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > Ok, this gets to the heart of the issue. I don’t think anyone would argue the simple numbers, as in it’s a bigger tragedy if no one had access to the lectures than just the disabled students. It’s a simple numbers thing. However, I’ve yet to see an actual dollar amount quoted for how much it would cost Berkeley to correct their online course issues. Until that number is known, how do we know it would be an “unreasonable” burden? I think the _optimal_ resolution would be to correct the matter and let all benefit. This is a \*pro bono \*act. The stuff generates no revenue for them. It is free to the world. Any cost is more expensive than not offering at all. They already have to pay to provide bandwidth. (IIRC, they estimated 1 million to fix the problem) It would be like me complaining, “Your post did not include Braille, c’mon, get with it, fix that (and all your previous posts). How are blind people supposed to benefit from your wisdom, that you cast out so freely to the sighted?” I know this is a sensitive subject to you, and it is to me, too. I’ve experienced pushing my brother’s wheelchair halfway around a huge building in the cold and wandering through a maze of corridors and elevators in an ADA compliant building, just because the store we wanted to visit only permitted use of its revolving doors, and not its swinging doors. But we probably wouldn’t have been happier with no store at all. ---
**Author:** ![Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blue_blistering_barnacle/32/3386_2.png) [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2017, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/67 "2017-03-15T19:10:37Z")
In a slightly more perfect world, the ADA regulators could identify the offending videos, and mark them for removal. But having heard the expression “we can neither prescribe or advise”\* before, I’m guessing that was not possible. \*this means “we can’t tell you how to do it, we can only tell you when you’re doing it wrong” Berkely could have reviewed everything on its own, and only left up compliant material, but that costs, too. I guess it is possible that some at Berkely wanted to do away with this program anyway, and this provided a good excuse. ---
**Author:** ![Debillw3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@Debillw3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Debillw3)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/68 "2017-03-16T05:13:30Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > An extremely expensive accomodation is not reasonable. In what world is the line between “reasonable accommodation” and “unreasonable accommodation” determined by cost? It has nothing whatsoever to do with what’s cheap and/or easy to implement and everything to do with its function. “Reasonable accommodations” exist to bring disabled people to the same level as the average abled person, regardless of cost. “Unreasonable accommodations” are the ones that go beyond that. For example, a reasonable accommodation would be allowing a student to participate on their school’s track team with the assistance of a service animal. An unreasonable accommodation would be allowing said to participate by riding said service animal. Or to use a classroom example, given the general topic, a reasonable accommodation is allowing a student with learning disabilities some extra time to take a test or have the questions read to them or take the test in a quiet room. An unreasonable accommodation is allowing them until the end of the semester to finish the test or to Google the answers. Surely even someone thick enough to believe that cost or ease even enter into the equation is able to see the difference has nothing to do with either. ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/69 "2017-03-16T06:20:55Z")
> [@Debillw3](#): > > In what world is the line between “reasonable accommodation” and “unreasonable accommodation” determined by cost? Berkley spending a pile of money, or really any money, to change something they are giving out for free so that a minor percentage of the population can access it in the way they want to is unreasonable. And, under the law, they do have the option to just stop offering the free service. That someone actually brought suit - was _allowed_ to bring suit - against an organization that was providing something _for free_ because she didn’t like the _quality of the closed captioning_ is asinine. ---
**Author:** ![Debillw3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@Debillw3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Debillw3)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/70 "2017-03-16T06:36:16Z")
> [@curlcoat](#): > > Berkley spending a pile of money, or really any money, to change something they are giving out for free so that a minor percentage of the population can access it in the way they want to is unreasonable. “Want to” has nothing to do with it. People want plenty of things. The word “reasonable” is in there specifically to shield from people claiming that they should be allowed to do what they want. Once again, the amount it costs is wholly irrelevant. > [@curlcoat](#): > > And, under the law, they do have the option to just stop offering the free service. That’s right, they do. Nobody is forcing them to offer anything. When they make the decision to offer something, that’s their call–and with it, comes the obligation to make it available to everyone, regardless of race, color, gender, disability, etc. > [@curlcoat](#): > > That someone actually brought suit - was _allowed_ to bring suit - against an organization that was providing something _for free_ because she didn’t like the _quality of the closed captioning_ is asinine. Luckily, the ADA disagrees with you. Why do you keep emphasizing “free”? What should be the cost cut off where discrimination should be legal? Should that cut off also apply to race or gender? Would you be making the same argument if a McDonald’s got sued because they decided to have “Free burgers for White People” day? I mean, it’s free, so the people who can’t partake can’t complain, right? Of course not. That’s incredibly stupid. And, thanks to the ADA, disability is right there with race and gender when it comes to discrimination. The bottom line is this: if the closed captioning wasn’t at a level that put a deaf viewer on par with the average abled viewer in terms of accuracy in comprehension, then that’s on Berkeley, not the deaf viewer. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/71 "2017-03-16T16:59:18Z")
I wouldn’t call this an unintended consequence of the ADA any more than shutting down polluters is an unintended consequence of EPA regulation. This is that ADA working the way it has to work. If I write the regulations so as to say that you must have closed captioning unless doing so would be so prohibitively expensive as to prevent making content available, the result will be that every entity would claim that closed captioning was prohibitively expensive and no one would close caption anything. Similarly if you want to have a businesses accessible to people in wheel chairs, then you can’t exempt any ice cream store that says it can’t afford a ramp, even if doing so means that many able bodied people have to go without ice cream. To do otherwise would mean that no places would bother being handicapped accessible. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/72 "2017-03-16T17:39:58Z")
So if I own an ice cream shop, and decide to go to a beach one day and GIVE AWAY ice cream for the day, I have to make sure that my FREE ice cream stand is handicap accessible to anyone, or else I shouldn’t be giving away ice cream to everybody, and in fact, is against the law? ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/73 "2017-03-16T17:44:52Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#): > > I couldn’t really follow what the link in the OP was saying. Did Berkeley pull the courses because Closed Captioning wasn’t reasonable accommodation for deaf people? No. The captioning was bad. It may be that some of the videos weren’t captioned at all, but I think more to the point, a captioning service was being used that did voice recognition, and automatically added the captions-- it’s how they are frequently done on the cheap-- but you get lousy captions that way. The word “Catastrophe” comes out “cat ass trophy,” and so forth. And then, there are things the computer doesn’t recognize, so it “autocorrects”-- “Uber” to refer to the car service is new in the vocabulary, so it isn’t a word the system recognizes. If it is articulated well, it comes out right, but doesn’t get capitalized; if it’s mumbled, it comes out “super,” or “earlier,” or something. Sometimes the system just throws up a series of black rectangles, and several words are left out. And it usually has no idea how to deal with non-European based names. And then, sometimes the captions cover an important part of the screen. Watch the captioning on a live news broadcast, or sports event, and you’ll get the idea. Captions on network TV shows are prepared by actual people who sit down and work from the original script, and choose the placement of the text blocks so that it is clear who is speaking, and nothing important on the screen is covered. The quality of captions varies so much depending on how they are done, you can’t assume that just because you’ve seen quality captions somewhere, every caption, everywhere, is high quality. Sometimes they suck so much, they might as well not be there. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/74 "2017-03-16T17:49:31Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > So if I own an ice cream shop, and decide to go to a beach one day and GIVE AWAY ice cream for the day, I have to make sure that my FREE ice cream stand is handicap accessible to anyone, or else I shouldn’t be giving away ice cream to everybody, and in fact, is against the law? Since you’re giving it away, can you also ignore the health code rules for food preparation and storage? ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/75 "2017-03-16T17:50:11Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > So if I own an ice cream shop, and decide to go to a beach one day and GIVE AWAY ice cream for the day, I have to make sure that my FREE ice cream stand is handicap accessible to anyone, or else I shouldn’t be giving away ice cream to everybody, and in fact, is against the law? If you set your free ice cream tubs on a platform, and people have to climb up a few steps to get to them, and guy in a wheelchair rolls over and gets your attention, and says “Hey, could you hand me one?” And you answer “Sorry, buddy. You’ve got to get onto the platform and come and get it. No platform, no ice cream,” then yes, you have committed illegal discrimination. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/76 "2017-03-16T17:59:44Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > If you set your free ice cream tubs on a platform, and people have to climb up a few steps to get to them, and guy in a wheelchair rolls over and gets your attention, and says “Hey, could you hand me one?” > > And you answer “Sorry, buddy. You’ve got to get onto the platform and come and get it. No platform, no ice cream,” then yes, you have committed illegal discrimination. Strange. Do I similarly have to hold the cone for a person with no arms, or am I discriminating against them too for not having ice cream cone neck harnesses? ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/77 "2017-03-16T18:02:59Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > Since you’re giving it away, can you also ignore the health code rules for food preparation and storage? Now that you mention it, at a recent tailgate party I threw, I gave away hamburgers and hot dogs and I doubt that I followed any health code rules for food preparation and storage. Surprisingly, no police or health inspectors showed up. ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/78 "2017-03-16T20:35:43Z")
> [@Debillw3](#): > > “Want to” has nothing to do with it. People want plenty of things. The word “reasonable” is in there specifically to shield from people claiming that they should be allowed to do what they want. “Want to” has everything to do with this particular case. I don’t know the exact details, but the fact remains that Berkley did comply with ADA and did provide closed captioning, which the plaintiff says wasn’t good enough. Since this is an older bunch of videos, it’s possible that the CC on there is what was state of the art back then; given that this is Berkley, it probably was. Yet for some reason the plaintiff thinks it is reasonable for Berkley to pay to upgrade something they are already paying to give her for free. > [@](#): > > Once again, the amount it costs is wholly irrelevant. Actually, it is relevant. “Reasonable” includes cost to the service provider. The ADA cannot be used to insist that an upgrade is made that is not actually necessary for access just because someone wants it. > [@](#): > > That’s right, they do. > > Nobody is forcing them to offer anything. When they make the decision to offer something, that’s their call–and with it, comes the obligation to make it available to everyone, regardless of race, color, gender, disability, etc. And, it was available until yesterday, to everyone. This one deaf person decided that this free service wasn’t good enough for her and that someone else should pay to fix it. It’s like someone in a wheelchair saying that the ADA compliant ramp into a business is too steep and the business should pay to alter it. > [@](#): > > Luckily, the ADA disagrees with you. What makes you think that? > [@](#): > > Why do you keep emphasizing “free”? What should be the cost cut off where discrimination should be legal? Should that cut off also apply to race or gender? Because this isn’t discrimination. The videos had CC, old CC that didn’t work well, but then the videos were also old. You and she are demanding that a lot of money be spent to upgrade something that was being offered for free, and the result of that demand was Berkley deciding that the money they were currently putting into offering this service was now a bad investment. Look, I am actually a card carrying honest to gawd crip. I travel a lot and can’t do motel rooms that aren’t first floor. Most of the lower end ones, like Motel 6, Super 8, etc, don’t have elevators. To me, demanding that Berkley upgrade old videos would be the same thing as demanding that Motel 6 pay to put in elevators. Disability isn’t like race, gender and all that - you cannot turn someone away because they are the “wrong” color, but if all of your downstairs rooms are full, you can turn a disabled person away if they cannot access the upper floors. It’s on the disabled person to plan ahead or find another motel. Same with this - if the plaintiff wants _better_ access to the information on those videos, it’s on her to find it. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/79 "2017-03-16T23:15:06Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > Now that you mention it, at a recent tailgate party I threw, I gave away hamburgers and hot dogs and I doubt that I followed any health code rules for food preparation and storage. Surprisingly, no police or health inspectors showed up. Do you own a restaurant or grocery store where hamburgers and hot dogs are sold? ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2017, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118/80 "2017-03-16T23:37:52Z")
> [@Debillw3](#): > > “Want to” has nothing to do with it. People want plenty of things. The word “reasonable” is in there specifically to shield from people claiming that they should be allowed to do what they want. > > Once again, the amount it costs is wholly irrelevant. > > That’s right, they do. > > Nobody is forcing them to offer anything. When they make the decision to offer something, that’s their call–and with it, comes the obligation to make it available to everyone, regardless of race, color, gender, disability, etc. > > Luckily, the ADA disagrees with you. > > Why do you keep emphasizing “free”? What should be the cost cut off where discrimination should be legal? Should that cut off also apply to race or gender? > > Would you be making the same argument if a McDonald’s got sued because they decided to have “Free burgers for White People” day? I mean, it’s free, so the people who can’t partake can’t complain, right? > > Of course not. That’s incredibly stupid. And, thanks to the ADA, disability is right there with race and gender when it comes to discrimination. > > The bottom line is this: if the closed captioning wasn’t at a level that put a deaf viewer on par with the average abled viewer in terms of accuracy in comprehension, then that’s on Berkeley, not the deaf viewer. Like ladies’ days/nights at bars and other businesses? Those need to go. If I’m giving a couch away I don’t have to provide any assistance in moving it if someone in a wheelchair rolls up. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ada-leads-to-death-of-uc-berkeley-free-online-courses/782118.md?page=5)