VP Kamala Harris spoke in Washington this week on the ADA's 32nd birthday.
San Jose-based software maker Adobe marked the 32nd anniversary of the enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act this week with a blog post detailing how companies can—and should—support the disability community. It was written by Andrew Kirkpatrick, Adobe’s Director of Accessibility.
“In the absence of regulatory clarity [regarding the ADA regulating digital access], the role of private companies in helping make improvements [to accessibility] should not be ignored, and it is up to all of us to help make sure we are aware and taking the right steps to create accessible experiences,” he wrote. “It is important to educate and build awareness around accessibility and the needs of the disability community, and we also need to build accessibility into the earliest stages of the development cycle and user experience; here are a few ways to get started.”
The gist of the post is a prime example of the old axiom that “it takes a village.” Adobe certainly does try hard to do their part in uplifting disabled people, but they’re merely one organization. It takes a collective effort of all companies—of all sizes and industries—to ensure that disabled people and accessibility are properly prioritized. More pointedly, it’s necessary for lawmakers to recognize the ADA requires retrofitting so as to reflect technology’s stranglehold on everyday life. No one foresaw this happening three decades ago, but it did and the law should be amended to acknowledge it. After all, disabled people use the internet too.
In a new interview with me conducted by email, Kirkpatrick said the ADA’s anniversary “always provides a reminder to reflect on what we have accomplished, important work that needs more attention, and how we can drive greater progress.” The work is crucially important, and he (and Adobe) are staunchly committed to “equal access to information and opportunity for everyone.”
“The ADA was a pivotal milestone for the protections it provided for people with disabilities, but a lot has changed since it was signed into law in 1990. The internet and digital experiences are clearly different today—they’ve become an integral part of our daily lives—but parts of the internet will still benefit from improvements to make them more accessible,” Kirkpatrick said of the landmark piece of legislation’s legacy. “It’s important to update our regulations to create accessible experiences for the ways we use digital tools and the internet now and for the future. I’m supportive of the recent letter to the Department of Justice requesting additional rule-making to address this, and we at Adobe are continuing to make accessibility a core focus for both our employees and our product experiences.”
The letter to which Kirkpatrick alludes was written by Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington State. It was directed to Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke, who leads the DoJ’s Civil Rights Division. The letter was co-signed by many of Murray’s colleagues, including Massachusetts’ Elizabeth Warren.
Kirkpatrick feels society is finally is giving the disability community their due.
“The disability community intersects with every other community. I think that the public is seeing this more now than ever as people who happen to have a disability are being accepted for who they are and are being shown as their authentic selves, especially in advertising campaigns, news, and entertainment. This in turn helps other people with disabilities envision themselves in a greater variety of career and educational settings,” he said. “The disability community has long been underserved, but the events over the last few years, like the pandemic and shift to remote work, have put accessibility and the needs of the disability community at the forefront of priorities for many companies and organizations. These shifts have led to a greater understanding of the challenges the disability community faces, [and] more emphasis [is placed] on building an inclusive culture and ensuring that people with disabilities voices are being heard and are afforded opportunities to engage. Now it is now up to all of us, from private companies to public legislators, to take the right steps to improve access for everyone.”
Kirkpatrick hopes the increased public sentiment towards digital equality, and Adobe’s own contributions to the cause in the tech space, helps spur true change.
“The message right now is to focus on the improvements that can be made to create protections for a more accessible future, inclusion of users in the process, and encouraging clarity in the regulations and standards that we use to address accessibility,” he told me.
