Define Normal

I had a brief, but useful interchange on Twitter the other day, regarding rights, in particular the rights of people not to wear a mask and to refuse to give a reason when challenged. It turns out that to insist somebody explain why they refuse to follow the rules everybody else follows is an example of ‘indirect discrimination’. So, even if you think you are doing the right thing and following the guidance you can still be a bigoted monster with hatred in your heart.

What chance have we got against this? Along with involuntary micro-aggressions and the ridiculous CPS definition of perceived offence we are stuck between an immoveable object and, er… another immoveable object. Is breathing now likely to upset somebody – I mean, it might bother somebody who wishes you dead, but hang on isn’t the aggression in this case coming from them? My dogged determination to continue existing could be criminalised. To me, all this sounds like a five-star buffet for the human rights lawyers and their hangers-on.

The whole issue of human rights is a mess. Most ordinary people, of sound mind and reasonable expectation might imagine that, enshrined in law, should be rights to live your life free of threat, extreme hardship and undue harassment. It would be nice if everybody could be safe, secure, nourished and accepted. But what the movement has done is challenge, perhaps rightly, to a point, the concept of normal.

Copying verbatim from different sources, normal is variously defined as: conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected - characterised by that which is considered usual, typical, or routine - the standard or the common type - usual; thinking, behaving, or looking like most people approximately average in any psychological trait, as intelligence, personality, or emotional adjustment – and in the context we are concerned with here - free from any mental disorder; sane.

Ah, sane. Who gets to decide? Where does simple human tolerance for eccentricity in all its forms end and how far beyond that does ‘tolerance’ have to be enforced by law? Where, for instance do people who go so far as to wholeheartedly support gender election stand on transableism? This story from five years ago popped up on Twitter the other day and I quote-tweeted it. To date I have had around 500 replies and over 1000 likes and quote-tweets, not one of them in support. It clearly bothers people. 

This is, surely about as far from normal as it is possible to get. Actually wanting to be physically disabled (not just pretending) but also to be accepted as ‘normal’ has to be about as far from normal as it is possible to get. But, if you think about it, we have been coerced to embrace so many aberrant states that we now accept as ‘normal’ people who are almost entirely unique – the polar opposite of what normal actually means. War is peace, indeed.

If you search for body dysmorphia, body identity disorder, apotemnophilia and various other medical terms don’t forget to also check out Munchausen’s, paraphilia and narcissism. And if you do, try to decide whether you view all of this as normal, atypical, dangerous or just plain weird. And then ask yourself why we normies should pay for it all, because it is always those who conform to society’s norms who pay for its fringes.

If, on the other hand, you are on the side of humanities oddities, you might like to consider how theirs is a realm of strange self-justification. Some will no doubt land lucrative positions to proselytise for their causes and be given credence disproportionate to their numbers. To show solidarity, a certain flavour of politician will fly their flag and assist in the creation of every more nuanced and unfathomable human rights bear traps for the rest of us to fall into. Prepare yourselves for a future containing more transhumanism, transdeathism, transMartiansim or whatever. Expect free trans-trading where you can one day be a transabled black lesbian and the next become a ghost inhabiting the shell of a white, cisgendered paedophile.

Treading on eggshells here...

Me, I’m waiting for the day when I can self-identify as a comic-book superhero. I will campaign to force everybody to recognise and accept my transformation into that persona and address me by my proper name – TransHeroLord. And then, when my super powers fail to manifest, I expect to be granted the legal right to sue the state, with the full expectation that compensation will flow. How DARE you mock my lack of disability!