Author: BPI Admin

Interview: The Invisible Campaign

Recently Inside Out eNews had a chance to correspond with Bradley Chippington, the creator of the invisible Campaign.  Below is an excerpt of this conversation.

 

Inside Out eNews:  Brad, can you tell us what is the Invisible Campaign?

Bradley Chippington: I began to feel disheartened that there are few campaigns of awareness for (gay) male domestic violence cases. There is more promotion for heterosexual abuse but very little for gay or bi-sexual abuse. However just because it is not being paid attention to does not mean that it isn’t happening. In fact ManKind Initiative state that there are double the case of gay or bi-sexual male cases of abuse than that of heterosexual male abuse.

 

My research engendered me to create the Invisible campaign. Focusing on male victims, predominantly in same sex relationships. ‘Invisible’ is how it feels being in a relationship like this, your family sometimes doesn’t know. You’re invisible to the general public, as a male walking down the road with bruises and cuts over your face you’re more likely to be looked at as someone who as been in a fight or up to no good. Not as someone that may be suffering inside.

 

Inside Out ENews:  What raised your intrest with gay male domestic violence?

Bradley Chippington: My interest in domestic abuse in male relationships was ignited by my own experiences in an abusive relationship between 2010/12. My then partner engendered some of the most emotionally exhausting experiences of my life.

 

As I look back the warning signs are obvious from the beginning of our relationship, but I still fell madly in love with him. He maintained the high life lifestyle in a penthouse apartment, by escorting and appearing in porn films. He was completely the opposite of everything I was brought up to not be and instilled excitement into our relationship.

 

However after some time of being with him the excitement failed and only torment remained. I was threatened with my life from knives to shards of glass being slashed towards me. I’ve pulled him down from hanging himself. Every time I tried to break up with him he would lash out in violence or anger. Stabbing himself, trying to stab me. He pushed drugs into our relationship and as a crutch to his abusive nature I turned to them for relief and a means of escape.

 

There are countless events that I could talk about but to summarise my experience would include the following words: Verbal abuse, sexual abuse, physical abuse, mental abuse engendering a vicious circle of entrapment. Suffice to say I was able to get out of the relationship, but not before I was hospitalised a few times.

 

Inside Out eNews:  That’s so Horrific!  As you said, this happens daily and we cannot picture it because we sweep it under the rug where no one can see…So this project is a way of making this issue better known.

Bradley Chippington:  Yes, exactly! ‘Invisible’ is built from my initial project ‘Trauma’ which touched on the personal aspects of my experiences and the emotions this conveyed. The project is generally themed as a bolder, bloody piece that concentrates on destruction and violence.

 

Inside Out eNews:  What is the overall goal you want for this campaign?

Bradley Chippington: I want the work I create to contain a reflection of my own experiences but to build on the experiences of others. Currently I envisage a series of short films and a collection of posters, which have been designed for the victim as a method of communication saying “there is support out there and this is what you can do”, and also others aimed at awareness to the general public.

 

Inside Out eNews:  Where can people find out more about the Invisible Campaign?

Bradley Chippington: The website www.invisiblecampaign.com has recently gone active. Plus a Twitter feed @invisible_DV which both work side by side to show people the work that I am producing for this project but to also hopefully allow people a gateway which directs them to support groups.

 

Inside Out eNews:  We encourage you to visit Brad’s Invisible Campaign website and to follow the campaign on Twitter!  We wish to thank Bradley for allowing us a peek into this project .  We know it will be beneficial to pulling back the veil on this dark secret by shedding light on it!

Getaway with BPI on the Norwegian Getaway !

You’re Invited!

 

Getaway with BPI on the Norwegian Getaway !

A 7-Day Eastern Caribbean Norwegian Cruise

 

Mark this date on your calendar:  Saturday, November 8, 2014

Where: Norwegian Getaway 7-Day Eastern Caribbean

 

BPI Contact:  Mickey Wiseman at wisemanmikey@gmail.com

Cruise Line Contact: Michelle Zimmerman 1-877-416-9722 ext. 4398

 

There really aren’t enough adjectives to describe the colors of the Caribbean. The water shifts from aqua to turquoise to deep blue. Throw in some white-sand beaches, yellow, pink and green architecture, some rather colorful colonial history, plus great dive spots, duty-free shopping and you’ve got one amazing cruise vacation. And with Freestyle Cruising, it becomes one of the most relaxing spots on earth. So go ahead, find your place on a postcard-perfect beach and do absolutely nothing!

 

Blind LGBT Pride International has scheduled  this fun-filled vacation for all to enjoy!  Join us as we travel to the ports of Miami, Philipsburg, St. Maarten, St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands, and Nassau, Bahamas

 

Here’s what to do right now:

 

Register with our cruise contact Michelle Zimmerman, 1-877-416-9722 ext. 4398.  Just let her know you are cruising with BPI!

 

Deposit: $125 per person per cabin

 

 

Inside Cabin $1529 (double occupancy), $2094 (triple occupancy), $2699 (quad occupancy)

Ocean View $1669 (double occupancy), $2294 (triple occupancy), $2959 (quad occupancy)

Balcony $1829 (double occupancy), $2394 (triple occupancy), $2959 (quad occupancy)

**Rates are subject to change based on availability**

 

If you have questions please contact BPI Board Member Mickey Wiseman at wisemanmikey@gmail.com

 

See you on the Getaway!

 

Alice Cogswell and Anne Sullivan Macy Act

Legislative Imperative

 

The Issue

 

Since 1975, Public Law 94-142, now the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), has revolutionized educational opportunity for all children and youth with disabilities. However, without key improvements, our national special education system cannot fully keep IDEA’s promise of a truly appropriate education for students who are blind or visually impaired. H.R. 4040, The Alice Cogswell and Anne Sullivan Macy Act, is intended to do just that, to improve the delivery of appropriate special education and related services to all students who are blind or visually impaired and deaf or hard of hearing, including students who may have additional disabilities. Once enacted, the legislation will ensure that properly designed and individually tailored services are in fact provided, meeting the unique learning needs of students who are blind or visually impaired, and that the educators who serve them are prepared and supported to do their jobs well, based on evidence-driven best practice.

 

Strategy

 

During the next two years, the U.S. Congress may review and amend IDEA as part of Congress’ periodic reauthorization of the law. The Alice Cogswell and Anne Sullivan Macy Act can be passed by Congress at any time in advance of IDEA reauthorization, or it can be incorporated, in whole or in part, into reauthorization itself.

 

Legislative Proposal

 

ACB and BPI urge the U.S. House of Representatives to promptly pass H.R. 4040, The Alice Cogswell and Anne Sullivan Macy Act. This legislation will:

 

  • Ensure that every student with vision loss is properly      identified regardless of formal disability category or classification so      that all students who are blind or visually impaired, including those with      additional disabilities, are counted and properly served.
  • Expand knowledge about the scope and quality of      special education and related services provided to students who are blind      or visually impaired through refined data collection that tracks all      students with vision loss, regardless of formal disability category or      classification.
  • Expect      states to conduct strategic planning, and commit such planning to writing,      to guarantee that all students who are blind or visually impaired within      each state receive all specialized instruction and services needed by      students with vision loss provided by properly trained personnel.

 

  • Clarify that proper evaluation of students who are      blind or visually impaired includes evaluation for students’ needs for      instruction in communication and productivity (including braille      instruction and assistive technology proficiency inclusive of low-vision      devices where appropriate); self-sufficiency and interaction (including      orientation and mobility, self-determination, sensory efficiency,      socialization, recreation and fitness, and independent living skills); and      age-appropriate career education. Such instruction and services constitute      the Expanded Core Curriculum, the body of services which teachers of      students with visual impairments and related professions are expertly      trained to provide.
  • Ramp up U.S. Department of Education responsibilities      to monitor and report on states’ compliance with their obligations with      respect to instruction and services specifically provided to students who      are blind or visually impaired.
  • Assist parents and educators of students who are blind      or visually impaired through regular and up-to-date written policy      guidance from the U.S. Department of Education.
  • Establish      a national collaborative organizational resource, the Anne Sullivan Macy      Center on Vision Loss and Educational Excellence, to proliferate      evidence-based practices in the education of students who are blind or      visually impaired, to keep special educators current with the latest      instructional methods, and to supplement state and local educational      agency provision of the instruction and services constituting the Expanded      Core Curriculum.

 

Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

 

Democrats

 

Tom Harkin (D-IA)

Barbara A. Mikulski (D-MD)

Patty Murray (D-WA)

Bernard Sanders (I-VT)

Robert P. Casey, Jr. (D-PA)

Kay R. Hagan (D-NC)

Al Franken (D-MN)

Michael F. Bennet (D-CO)

Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI)

Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)

Christopher S. Murphy (D-CT)

Elizabeth Warren (D-MD)

 

Republicans

 

Lamar Alexander (R-TN)

Michael B. Enzi (R-WY)

Richard Burr (R-NC)

Johnny Isakson (R-GA)

Rand Paul (R-KY)

Orrin G. Hatch (R-UT)

Pat Roberts (RKS)

Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)

Mark Kirk (R-IL)

Tim Scott (R-SC)

 

House Committee on Education and the Workforce

 

Republicans

 

John Kline (R-MN), Chairman

Thomas E. Petri (R-WI)

Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-CA)

Joe Wilson (R-SC)

Virginia Foxx (R-NC)

Tom Price (R-GA)

Kenny Marchant (R-TX)

Duncan Hunter (R-CA)

David P. Roe (R-TN)

Glenn Thompson (R-PA)

Tim Walberg (R-MI)

Matt Salmon (R-AZ)

Brett Guthrie (R-KY)

Scott DesJarlais (R-TN)

Todd Rokita (R-IN)

Larry Bucshon (R-IN)

Trey Gowdy (R-SC)

Lou Barletta (R-PA)

Joseph J. Heck (R-NV)

Susan W. Brooks (R-IN)

Richard Hudson (R-NC)

Luke Messer (R-IN)

​

Democrats

 

George Miller (D-CA), Senior Democratic Member

Robert E. Andrews (D-NJ)

Robert C. “Bobby” Scott (D-VA)

Rubén Hinojosa (D-TX)

Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY)

John F. Tierney (D-MA)

Rush Holt (D-NJ)

Susan A. Davis (D-CA)

Raúl M. Grijalva (D-AZ)

Timothy H. Bishop (D-NY)

David Loebsack (D-IA)

Joe Courtney (D-CT)

Marcia L. Fudge (D-OH)

Jared Polis (D-CO)

Gregorio Sablan (D-Northern Mariana Islands)

Frederica S. Wilson (D-FL)

Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR)

Mark Pocan (D-WI)

 

Seminar: Medicare Coverage of Low Vision Devices

YOU’RE INVITED!

 

Making it Clearer: Medicare Coverage of Low Vision Devices Pending Legislation, Policy Implications, and What You Can Do About It

 

A Free Teleseminar Jointly Hosted by:

 

The American Foundation for the Blind

 

and

 

The American Council of the Blind

 

Wednesday, March 12, 2014, 3:00 p.m., Eastern

 

***Sponsored by HumanWare***

 

For further information, contact:

 

Mark Richert, Esq.

Director, Public Policy, AFB

(202) 469-6833

MRichert@afb.net

 

You are invited to participate in a free national teleseminar jointly hosted by ACB and AFB to learn about recent activities in the U.S. Congress to promote Medicare coverage of low vision devices. We are grateful to HumanWare, www.HumanWare.com, a global leader in low vision and other assistive technologies, for their gracious support which is making this teleseminar possible.

 

There is no need to register or RSVP for this free teleseminar. To join the call, simply dial the toll-free number below at least ten minutes prior to the March 12, 3pm Eastern, start time. Dial:

1-866-939-3921

Tell the operator that you are joining the “low vision devices” call.

 

We look forward to a lively discussion with all who are interested in advancing the cause of Medicare coverage for low vision devices and other assistive technologies. During the teleseminar, topics to be covered will include pending legislation in Congress, the array of policy implications of a permanent change in the Medicare program, and how advocates can participate in the policy process.

 

Background

 

For decades, the vision loss community has been advocating for Medicare’s coverage of assistive technologies, particularly low vision devices. Currently, Medicare will not pay for any device that happens to use a lens, regardless of whether such device incorporates any other features. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the federal agency responsible for the management of Medicare, has ruled that devices, such as low vision devices, that use a lens are excluded from coverage just as are eye glasses or contact lenses except in very narrow circumstances.

Now, for the first time, federal legislation would begin to change this unacceptable national policy by establishing a nationwide Medicare demonstration project to evaluate the fiscal impact of a permanent change in Medicare coverage to pay for low vision devices. The legislation, H.R. 3749, introduced by Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Gus Bilirakis (R-FL), would initiate a five-year demonstration project that would put low vision devices in the hands of Medicare beneficiaries who, after a clinical evaluation by an ophthalmologist or optometrist, can benefit from a low vision device and for whom such devices are medically necessary. The legislation is careful to require that the demonstration project be genuinely national in scope and is explicitly designed to yield reliable data and meaningful results. Once the legislation is enacted and the demonstration project is successfully completed, Congress will have significantly richer data upon which to consider changes to the Medicare program to make coverage of low vision devices, especially the most costly devices, a permanent feature of the program. Precisely how many individuals will receive low vision devices and how many physicians across the country will participate in the demo project will need to be determined by CMS, working in consultation with stakeholder groups, as it develops and implements the project. The legislation makes $12.5 million available for the project over five years.

Advocates are encouraged to contact your members of the United States Congress.

Blind LGBT Pride Applauds Facebook’s Expanded Gender Identity Choices

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Will Burley
Company: Blind LGBT Pride International
Address: 5010 Echo Street, Unit A
Los Angeles, CA 99042
Phone: (713) 364-9703
Email: vicepresident@blind-lgbt-pride.org
URL: http://blindlgbtpride.org

Blind LGBT Pride Applauds Facebook’s Expanded Gender Identity Choices

Los Angeles, CA – You don’t have to be just male or female on Facebook anymore. The largest social media site is adding a customizable option with about 50 different terms people can use to identify their gender as well as three preferred pronoun choices: him, her or them.

Facebook said the changes initially cover the company’s 159 million monthly users in the U.S. and are aimed at giving people more choices in how they describe themselves, such as androgynous, bi-gender, intersex, gender fluid or transsexual.

“There’s going to be a lot of people for whom this is going to mean nothing, but for the few it does impact, it means the world,” said Facebook software engineer Brielle Harrison, who worked on the project and is herself undergoing gender transformation, from male to female. On Thursday, while watchdogging the software for any problems, she said she was also changing her Facebook identity from Female to TransWoman.

“All too often transgender people like myself and other gender nonconforming people are given this binary option, do you want to be male or female? What is your gender? And it’s kind of disheartening because none of those let us tell others who we really are,” she said. “This really changes that, and for the first time I get to go to the site and specify to all the people I know what my gender is.”

Guillermo Robles, President of Blind LGBT Pride stated, “This is one more step acknowledging those that do not simply view themselves as neither male nor female. This action may appear to be unimportant to some but to so many it gives them the choice to express to the world who they are in their terms. The members of Blind LGBT Pride applauds Facebook for giving everyone the choice to express who they are.”

Blind LGBT Pride International is a special interest affiliate of the American Council of the Blind. Its mission is to promote the equality and inclusion of LGBT people who are blind or vision impaired by providing its members and allies a forum to promote access to and integration into the LGBT communities as well as to provide a means of expression for the views and concerns of LGBT vision impaired persons in the broader society. To learn more please visit http://blindlgbtpride.org.

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GW Micro and Microsoft Partner to Provide Access to the Blind and Vision Impaired

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Fort Wayne, Indiana (January 14, 2014) – GW Micro, Inc. (www.gwmicro.com) is proud to make a revolutionary announcement. GW Micro and Microsoft Corp. have partnered to make Window-Eyes available to users of Microsoft Office at no cost. Window-Eyes is a screen reader that enables people who are blind, visually impaired, or print disabled to have full access to Windows PCs and makes the computer accessible via speech and/or Braille.

To better deliver Window-Eyes to the people who need it most, GW Micro and Microsoft have collaborated on this global initiative, available in over 15 languages, to enable anyone using Microsoft Office 2010 or later to also use Window-Eyes for free. Access to technology is critical to people who are blind or visually impaired in order to have the same opportunity to compete in the workplace. As such, this initiative between GW Micro and Microsoft has the potential to reduce barriers for millions of people who are blind or visually impaired around the world.

As the population ages, technologies like Window-Eyes will become more and more important as the number of people with age-related macular degeneration and other retinal degenerative diseases increases. “This significant change in the way we are doing business reflects the changing perception of accessibility and also technology in general. Rather than wait for the world to change, Microsoft and GW Micro are leading the way,” said Dan Weirich, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for GW Micro. Weirich believes this technology can help millions of people gain access to their PC, and that providing it free of charge will open a whole new world of assistive technology to many people.

In light of the rapidly changing face of technology and specifically, the changing face of assistive technology, the combined efforts of GW Micro and Microsoft have the goal of providing accessibility to people who are blind and visually impaired for the long term.

Microsoft continues to take accessibility seriously. “By partnering with GW Micro in this endeavor we are demonstrating Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to provide all of our customers with the technology and tools to help each person be productive in both their work and personal lives.” said Rob Sinclair, Chief Accessibility Officer for Microsoft.

Eligible customers, using Microsoft Office 2010 or higher, will be able to download a full version of Window-Eyes starting today at

www.WindowEyesForOffice.com

. The website provides download instructions as well as additional details about this offer.

GW Micro, Inc. (www.gwmicro.com) has been a trusted pioneer in the adaptive technology industry since 1990, and continues to lead with innovative, customer driven solutions.

Contact:

Dan Weirich, VP of Sales and Marketing
dan@gwmicro.com
(260) 489-3671

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