Note by @fastfinge

@CatHat @CStamp @RachelThornSub How else should I frame it? Describing an image for someone else is an inherently social act. It’s akin to language translation in some ways: only the translator is qualified to judge the accuracy of the effort, and may be the only one with the context to do it correctly. And there are some things that can easily be described in one language, and only with difficulty in another. There are also expressions and idioms that might not carry over at all. But in other ways it’s harder, because there is a data mismatch: an image contains a lot more data than a stream of words does. So the translator also has to decide what is important, while remembering that what they include says as much as what they don’t. See, for example, the argument about mentioning race in alt text. If you don’t mention it, the reader is going to assume the person in the image is white, because that’s most readers default. But if it’s, say, a mug shot, if you do include it you’re now making an entirely different statement. That’s why it’s on you, as the author, to decide what impression your blind reader should be left with, and craft your alt text to that effect.