Press 2 for Urdu
March 10th, 2008, 10:23 am · Post a Comment · posted by Brian
I went to the dentist last month. I was fortunate that Dr. Larue Curenton took me on as a new patient, as he’s pretty much retired from practicing dentistry these days.
But since his nephew’s my roommate (or rather, I’m his), I guess he made a concession due to the family link.
Anyway, Dr. Curenton gave me my first dental exam in about two years (shame on me!) and found a small cavity, which he subsequently filled.
Working here for a Florida Freedom Newspaper, I at last have dental insurance. It’s provided through Delta Dental, one of the nation’s handful of big dental services insurers.
When all was said and done, Delta Dental covered a small percentage of my dentist’s charges. A really small percentage. A teeny-tiny, dinky little percentage.
So what, I wondered, did they do with all the money they didn’t pay? I got a partial answer Friday, when I got a multi-page questionnaire from Delta Dental in the mail.
Seems according to California law (where Delta Dental is based), all health care plans will be obligated to provide language assistance as of January 2009.
“If you or a member of your family covered by Delta Dental cannot speak, read or write English well enough to understand information received from Delta Dental, or to communicate with your dentist, dental office staff, or Delta Dental about your dental coverage and treatment, then you may request language assistance beginning in 2009,” it said.
To emphasize the point, copies of the same letter and survey were enclosed in Spanish and an Asian language that might have been Chinese. Or maybe Japanese.
Now as a rule, I’m all for making sure everyone can understand everything. That’s why I cringe when I see bad grammar in official signage and publications.
As pointed out on last weekend’s A Prairie Home Companion, when an airport posts a sign declaring, “This is a non-smoking terminal,” I am relieved. If the terminal were smoking, it’d be on fire.
But if what the airport meant to say was “don’t smoke in the terminal,” they should post a sign that says, well, “Don’t smoke in the terminal.” And that’s English, bad as it may be. What about when it comes to multiple languages?
But I digress.
I’m not one of those folks who takes umbrage when I buy a product labeled in English, Spanish and French. I know that often means it’s yet another product made here in the U.S. destined for not only domestic consumption, but is also being exported to Mexico and Canada, under the liberalized export regulations of NAFTA.
(As another digression, I don’t understand why Hillary and Barack are getting their respective knickers in a wad over NAFTA. Don’t they understand how many millions of American jobs have been created under the trade agreement?)
But as a descendant of German, English, Welsh and Austro-Hungarian ancestors, I take pride in the knowledge that my forefathers were eagerly studying English before their feet even touched our shores.
Great Grandfather and Great Grandmother Schneider knew our national language was English. They knew that to fit in, to participate in, and to benefit from all America had to offer them, they had to assimilate.
In the 1880s, the thought of government translating every piece of paper it generated into multiple languages was not only laughable, it was an insult to those new Americans who applied themselves diligently to becoming Americanized.
And so back to Delta Dental. Rather than paying me a decent amount for required dental services, they’re taking that money and making sure that folks who arrive here but don’t seem to recognize the same urgency in learning English that my ancestors so enthusiastically embraced, needn’t bother learning our language at all.
Even more distasteful was that Delta Dental really wanted to know my race as well, as if that makes a difference in providing (or not providing, perhaps?) dental care services. Plus they even wanted to know if I am or am not “Hispanic or Latino.” (Aren’t they the same thing?)
While they offered a couple hyphenate-American choices (African American and Native American), they don’t offer European American. In fact, all of the white races are lumped under “Caucasian,” even though none of my ancestors hailed from the Caucuses.
Of course, we could check “other races” or “two or more races,” but they really don’t care what those races are. Apparently the races that make up my family’s lineage arr less important than the few they take the trouble to delineate.
When placed in this dilemma, I always just check “Native American.” After all, I was born in the United States, which makes me a native of our nation. I’m not an American Indian, however, if that’s what they mean. (Indians I’ve spoken to often find “Native American” a patronizing term created to make white people feel better and more PC.)
More interesting, the form doesn’t offer any opportunity to provide explanations or clarifications. If a customer doesn’t fit into their narrow parameters of race and ethnicity, well, too bad. We’re irrelevant.
So when I filled out their online survey but had no opportunity to clarify my responses, I navigated Delta Dental’s cumbersome Web site trying in vain to find a means of providing feedback. Finally I used the only form that seemed to work: I filled out their online grievance report!
Here’s what I told them:
“I find it distasteful that you even considered sending out the tacky ‘Language Assistance & Demographic Profile.’ We are Americans. In America the language of the land is English. When you start kowtowing to particular ‘demographics’ and become so eager to divide us by race and ethnicity, you unravel the fabric that makes us a nation.
“But since you want to play these childish games, fine. I fully expect to see all materials from you translated into German and Hungarian in the future, recognizing my ancestry of which I am quite proud, and since you seem so intent on appeasing everyone who otherwise has no incentive to learn our language when they come to our shores.
“And as for ‘race,’ that other tacky and distasteful question that nosy snoots so badly want to know, I am Anglo-Saxon with a smattering of Celt, yet you don’t even offer that as an option on your form.
“Apparently you feel it necessary to discriminate against German- and Hungarian-speaking Anglo-Saxon Celts. I should file a complaint with the government about your insensitivity toward and discrimination against those of us of who boast proud north-central European ancestry.
“Now doesn’t that sound ridiculous?
“No more so, though, than wondering if I am or am not Hispanic. My ethnicity is also not Thai, Burmese, Nigerian or any of hundreds of other nationalities I can think of, yet you fail to mention these. What makes Hispanic so important and relevant over the rest of the backgrounds that make us Americans?
“So here’s an idea: stop squandering money that could be used for actually paying more of my dental bills, skip the stupid feel-good surveys, and just send everything out in English.
“If someone is too lazy to learn the national language, that is their own problem, not that of the rest of us, whose ancestors actually made the effort to learn it.”
I’m sure that’ll inspire Delta Dental to stop diverting funds from customers’ reimbursement in lieu of funding surveys and needless translations.
But if they—and every other firm or government entity that feels it necessary to cater to people who don’t bother learning English—are insistent on offering their materials in a few languages, then they’d better be prepared to offer it in any language any customer wants.
Besides, I’d really love to see one of Delta Dental’s convoluted reimbursement reports written in Urdu, just for grins. I’m sure it’d be just as comprehensible.
