I was sitting at the breakfast table listening to the Today programme this morning. A lady came on who was objecting to the use of a new cure for deafness in early childhood on the grounds that deafness is not a disability and the child would be unable to choose to embrace their deafness later in life. One of my dear ancestors was sighing over this and remarked that a laudable desire on the part of Women, Black people and Gays to take matters into their own hands and defend their own interests had gotten out of hand when taken up by the disabilities lobby reaching the point where the disability was no longer accepted for what it was. I suggested that the problem may have come rather earlier when Homosexuality was put in the same category as Femininity and a healthy melanin count instead of that of deafness and schizophrenia. Said ancestor declared that it is impossible to have a sensible conversation with me and left the room.

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