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PaperclipPerfector  25d ago (text post)   29434 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 12, 2025

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To me, disability means lacking the ability to do something.

the inability to experience emotions

But also, if you’re trying to describe disability in terms of mechanical action rather than experience, both of your first examples are about the inability to experience things most people can experience (inability to experience light, inability to experience sound).

I don’t have a dog in this fight, but I don’t really see what you’re describing as a coherent rebuttal.

The inability to experience light and sound both severely affect one's ability to go about their life without obstacles and participate in society. That's why they are disabilities. If you are blind, you can't drive a car for example. It has especially been true historically, with modern technology and social accomodations many disabilities like lacking an arm are much less of a disability that before. Lacking sexual desire doesn't severely impede you life, if it does so at all. It's also a matter of severity rather than just inability. My vision is terrible without my spectacles for example, but even if I lack the ability to see properly and it would impede my life if I didn't have spectacles, I wouldn't consider it a disability because it isn't severe enough.

To add on, if lacking the ability to see light or hear sound was just flavor and didn't impede your life, then I wouldn't consider it a disability at all. For example, many people with synesthesia will describe their additional perceptions as deeply enriching and for some it would be fundamental to their human experience. However, I don't consider lacking synesthesia to be a disability. I wouldn't consider it a disability even if synesthesia was a majority trait and thus engrained in human culture, resulting in those without it being unable to understand and participate in core aspects of human culture.

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