I feel I need to say something about Atos. I have been feeling fairly positive about the Olympics on the whole: to be honest I never thought I would have a chance to live in such a great city as it hosted the games, and there is something awesome about living in London right now. Yet, at the same time, I have a very, very nasty taste in my mouth. The Olympics is being supported by Atos, which, as you may or may not know, is a highly controversial company that assesses people’s capability to work.

From what I have seen, both on Monday’s Panorama and through the internet networks of activists, Atos is the closest thing to an organisation of pure evil I know of. They are brutal in their judgements, taking no heed of the hurt they cause or lives they ruin. There are reports of amputees being deemed fit to work and stripped of their benefits. The company has no sympathy – it’s staff are trained to force people off benefits at all costs, working to quotas (despite the barefaced lies of Chris Grayling to the contrary). Through their judgements, people have been forced to suicide, just so that the government can slash the wealthfare bill.

How can I be so enthusiastic about an Olympic games propped up by such barbarity? The government seems to have something against disabled people: on panorama, it became brutally apparent that Grayling believes too many people are being deemed fit to work and that doctors are somehow being too soft. How can I support an Olympics at whose end such fascists get the credit? Indeed there’s a question in the first place over how I can support an Olympics which has cost the country billions when everything else is being cut.

When I think about it, the whole thing sucks, yet I cannot help being carried away by it. Earlier I squealed with joy as Britain won it’s first gold: Lyn looked at me with a mixture of bemusement and scorn – she is far more cynical about this whole farce than I am. Yet it always happens! I say I loathe sport and jingoism, yet never fail to get sucked in. but now the stakes are higher, and things are far more political and more relevant to me personally. Can I still cheer when Britain wins gold when I know that the company whose name is on the lanyards of the organisers is responsible for so much suffering? As I watch double oh seven parachute in with the queen for the umpteenth time, can I forget that the money used on carrying out such a stunt could have been used to buy countless new wheelchairs, communication aids and so on, at a time when budgets for such vital things are at their lowest? Yet somehow I do cheer, and I do forget. I think most of us do. I feel so conflicted about it, angry at myself for cheering. It feels as if I am being a traitor, betraying principals far more important than the outcome of a few races.