Netflix’s Lack of Dialogue

When looking into the faulty and incorrect closed captioning on different platforms and videos, Netflix appeared on numerous sources. This was especially in reference to their television show, Queer Eye. A deaf man, Rogan Shannon, made a point online through a Youtube video and numerous tweets pointing out Netflix’s mistakes. Tweet by @shan_no_says (24 Jun): “Okay, @netflix. I want to know why you don’t caption every single word. I can see what people are saying not matching up with the captions. Also, pardon me, but DO NOT FUCKING CENSOR PEOPLE. I want to know what is said word. for. word. That’s the whole fucking point of captions.” He makes it very clear that he wants to know every single thing that is going on audibly and thats the whole point of closed captioning in the first place. Netflix responded a few days later to his tweet regarding their closed captioning, and more specifically the closed captioning on their show Queer Eye. Tweet by @Netflixhelps 28 Jun): “We’ve heard about the caption issues on the service, specifically for @QueerEye. After looking into it, there’s lots of dialogue missing from the Fab 5 that shouldn’t be. We’re fixing it. In some cases, we do bleep incidental profanity from our unscripted series.”  Shannon was glad that they responded and he is hopeful that they will follow through with what they said and he wants to be aware of what steps are going to be taken to keep subtitles the way they should be on their shows. The fact that Netflix responded to Shannons’ comment means that this is an actual issue. This article is from 2018 and there is a chance that Netflix has started working on this issue, but there is still a long way to go to ensure that the deaf and hard at hearing communities get the best viewing experience. This is especially in regards to automatic closed captioning versus the power of real human services creating the subtitling for shows.