I came across a post today, which was commenting on Joe Clark’s article To Hell With WCAG 2. This article was to my mind was the first major piece of any kind to take an in depth look at the WCAG 2.0 documentation and present it to an decently sized audience outside those who spend days poking around all of the WAI.

I myself have commented on WCAG 2.0 more than once: like Joe I’m probably one of a limited number of people who has actually read all the documentation — and most of the comments on it, at least apart from the ringtones ones. It was Joe’s article which inspired me to look at WCAG 2.0 in the first place, and I thank him for it.

Sure, Joe can be an argumentive so-and-so at times, but so can we all. So he swears now and again. So fucking what? His posts are entertaining, and he cares passionately about accessibility — that’s why he gets fed up with people who aren’t doing their job properly.

So, as I say, I came across this post entitled To Hell With Joe Clark — and yes, he has noticed it — where someone disagrees with some of the things Joe is saying and then goes on to perpetuate an Ad hominem attack on him, saying that he has an egocentrical, cynical and often insulting style. He makes the point that Joe hanging up on a conference call doesn’t help matters — and he may well be right — but Joe doing this in no way invalidates his point of view or his argument.

I can see why someone might agree with some of these points as Joe’s not exactly famous for his softly-softly approach, but even if you think that, it doesn’t invalidate his argument. And personally I wouldn’t say he’s out and out insulting: brusque, yes: cynical, sometimes and egocentrical sometimes — but to me that’s part of the man’s quirky charm. For a start, you’ve got to be egocentrical to have a blog. Basically, what we’re all saying is: “My opinions are great; the stuff I do is interesting; come and hear me talk!”. And I like his style. On the other hand, I’ve not been in the Joe Clark firing line … yet, which I suppose could change my opinion!

Then Martin goes on to imply that Joe was bound to be set against WCAG 2.0 in the first place:

Joe Clark was dubbed the king of closed captions, so from his point of view WCAG 2 must be a step backwardsMartin Kliehm

This is another ad hominem argument; known as ad hominem circumstantial it seeks to say that someone would be bound to take that point of view because of their circumstances. This is irrelevant in a logical debate: either the argument is right, or it’s wrong, regardless of the personal circumstances of the individuals concerned.

He even attacks Joe when Joe is clearly right, such as over the fact validation is no longer required:

How was it possible that Joe Clark missed such an important point? Had he actually read his printouts, or was he just summarizing his correspondence with the working group?Martin Kliehm

He then takes the personal attack a bit further, with these beauties:

But there are more important issues. That’s a typical Joe Clark.

Joe Clark takes some points, but on a closer look his article leaves a bitter taste as another tool for enforcing his point of view […]Okay, probably most of us who care about web standards today have been nerds as teenagers. But then again most of us have quit playing Dungeons and Dragons and got some social life. We don’t spend hours in front of our TV and write angry nitpicking letters to the CBC.

Martin Kliehm

Okay then Martin, so Joe has an insulting style, does he? And that diminishes his argument, does it? Besides which, I don’t see how you can play Dungeons and Dragons without some form of a social life, it’s not exactly a one-player game, is it?

And then, in a comment at the bottom of the article, in response to a comment from Joe, he adds:

I don’t have anything against you as a personMartin Kliehm

… I pity the poor bugger he has got something against.

As it happens my own personal viewpoint is somewhere between Joe’s and Martin’s. On the points Martin picks out of Joe’s article, I agree with Joe on:

• Validating code is not a requirement of WCAG 2.0. Having code that parses unambiguously is, for which you may choose to validate, although this goes further than the current requirement
• Being able to define your own technology baseline, meaning anyone without that technology has little recourse. Martin suggests that hard-to-find technologies may not be a reasonable part of the baseline, but unless there’s someone wandering round enforcing what’s reasonable and what isn’t, you can pick what you like. Okay, it’s likely that Public Sector sites may have certain baselines set for them in some countries, but that still leaves the large private sector that can choose its own Target.
• Martin thinks the WCAG 1.0 conformance claim by using a logo is less clear than the WCAG 2.0 conformance claim of having to write a big long paragraph of text. Joe disagrees. So do I, because frankly who is your accessibility page for? Is it to impress other technology workers with how clever you are, or is it to help make your site more accessible?

And I agree with Martin that:

• You won’t need to check your DOM outputs in multiple browsers
• You still have to provide transcriptions for audio-only files unless the information is available elsewhere
• I don’t believe that offscreen positioning is banned under WCAG 2.0

And on most of the other points it appears that Martin agrees with Joe’s interpretation of WCAG 2.0 but puts a different emphasis on it or sees the consequences differently. I just wanted to to be clear that I’m not criticising Martin’s interpretation: I agree with parts of it; but I also agree with parts of Joe’s. Likely, both of them would disagree with parts of my interpretation, but I’d hope they’d not feel the need to get personal.

I know some people will probably think Joe is big enough to look after himself — and he is — but he shouldn’t have to put up with this sort of personal attack. It’s mean-spirited and vicious and it benefits nobody. But by all means, disagree with his arguments and opinions as much as you bloody well please…