(marker scratching)
(electronic video game chime)
So, true or false?
You, a hearing person,
if you are with a deaf or hard-of-hearing person
and you want to watch TV together,
or listen to something,
and you are not much of a captions fan,
will turning up the audio
be beneficial for the deaf person you are with,
and they don't have to have captions?
The answer is false, but also true.
The real answer is,
it's all going to depend on each individual.
If they're hard of hearing,
you're probably going to get by with that.
If they're deaf, even with some residual hearing, like me,
probably not.
The video was actually inspired
by a comment that was left in my video
about how hearing people say,
"Ah, you don't need captions.
"I can understand you."
I probably should have done a video on this earlier,
but I just never got around to it,
never really thought about it,
or it's just one of those things,
that was always on my list,
but I actually never filmed it.
This kind of thing has sort of happened to me before,
in US History.
You know where you're supposed to watch videos,
and then take notes,
I told my US history teacher,
"Hey, I need captions on this thing,
"otherwise I can't really do the assignment,
"because I'm not going to know everything,
"I'm not going to understand everything."
And his response was,
"Well, just sit in front of the computer speaker.
"It'll be louder, it'll be helpful."
It wasn't,
thus my assignment was incomplete,
and therefore, my history teacher
decided to make fun of me
and read my answers
and literally laugh about them
in front of the class,
so the class laughed along with him.
So, here's the thing, right?
If you are hard of hearing,
if somebody's got enough hearing,
it might work to turn things up.
But, if you're watching the television,
it's probably not going to work,
because the sound is more spread out,
whereas if you're watching a YouTube video,
it's easier to get by without captions
if you've got the sound directly in your ear.
For me, I can watch some YouTubers,
without any closed-captions on their videos,
as long as I've got earbuds in my ears.
I would not be able to understand that same YouTuber
if we were just watching it on the television,
because the sound is so spread out.
And no amount of turning the audio up
is going to help.
It's either going to...
I'm not going to hear it,
or it's just going to be muffled.
Sometimes, I have my TV up very, very loudly,
but I still have the captions on.
I just have it up very loud
so I can hear some of that sound,
because I just want some of that sound.
But I know I'm not going to be able to understand everything
that's being said.
Maybe a couple of words, but no.
In fact, yesterday I saw a commercial,
and there were no captions on it,
but the only words I heard were, "But"
and, "Sometimes."
No, wait, that was the memorial I went to.
The commercial said the word, "Value."
That was the only word I got out of everything.
Now, if you were to turn the audio up on the television,
and you sat directly in front of the speakers,
yeah, it's going to be louder,
but that doesn't mean it's going to be any more clear,
and it doesn't mean you're going to understand it.
It's just muffled,
and in fact, turning it up can make it worse,
because then you're just having so much noise in your ears,
to the point where it might actually hurt your ears,
and then you just won't be able to figure out
what's being said,
because you're too busy going, "Ow ow, ow, ow, ow."
So, the moral of the story, hearing folks,
if you're with somebody who needs captions,
and they tell you they need captions,
or they even ask politely for captions...
They're asking politely,
how can you say, "No."
Don't tell them that all they need to do
is turn it up, because, frankly, they, we
know more about what we can understand
and what we can't understand better
than you.
I remember when I went to my ex-friend's house once,
and we were watching the Evil Dead,
the newer one,
and I didn't even say anything,
but her boyfriend, also my friend at the time,
just went and turned on the captions for me.
I didn't say anything,
I didn't ask for anything,
I was like, "Oh, wow."
That's probably the first time then
that anybody had put on any captions for me,
besides my Dad, but, whatever.
I don't think anybody has ever,
besides the teacher,
I don't think a friend has actually said,
"No, just turn it up."
And if that ever did happen,
I would probably walk out the door.
Because, if I'm not important enough to you,
and you don't realize that I need captions,
and you don't think they're good enough for me,
or I'm good enough for them...
What am I trying to say here?
You probably know what I'm trying to say here,
but if I'm...
but if it's...
if I'm not...
I don't know.
If you just refuse, I'm going to refuse
giving you my company, basically, right?
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I uplink every Mondays, Thursdays and sometimes Saturdays.
And I will see you later.
Bye!