September 2, 2005
On behalf of the Canadian Cultural Society which is a national non-profit Deaf cultural organization, I write this letter to endorse and give full support to the human rights action being brought forward by Gary Malkowski, Scott Simser and Nancy Barker to make captioning in movie theatres more easily accessible.
We are equal tax-paying Deaf Canadians. This means equal participation in society regardless of race, language and cultural affiliation.
The practice of not providing rear-window captioning, TDS-CSS or other methods of captioning in all movie theatres is clearly discriminatory. It is fine for those who do not use it to say that just one theatre is good enough. It is not good enough. The public would never accept it today if films with sound were shown at only one theatre in the province. It is our right to have access to films like any other individual in Canada. With today's increasingly high level of technology, we do not think it is undue hardship for theatres to provide this. It is business tax-deductible.
We salute the courage and determination of Gary Malkowski, Scott Simser and Nancy Barker in their efforts to seek equal access to movies in the theatres for the Deaf, deafened and hard of hearing population in Canada.
We shall look foward to the day when we will enjoy the same rights as others.
Regards,
Helen Pizzacalla
President
Canadian Cultural Society of the Deaf