My dad visited us yesterday. My parents are in town to help look after my grandmother, so Dad popped in while mum stayed with her. He had picked up a copy of the Metro en route, and while he was here we took a collective glance at it. Interestingly, dad spotted an article oddly relevant to us, about a man who had just been given a communication aid after being paralysed for twenty years. It was an interesting article – well worth a read. Mind you, it raised some interesting questions, like why now? Why did the poor fellow have to wait all that time for a voice? Given the way in which such devices are becoming less and less of a rarity, why was this article written in such a gushingly emotional manner? It was written as if VOCAs had only just been invented, and this guy was some sort of a pioneer. The media frequently take that stance – it always strikes me as a litte odd how they use such stories to elicit motion. What irritates me is the pitying manner in which they write about such things: it only reinforces negative stereotypes of disability. I wish this guy luck, but I also wish journalists wouldn’t use such cases as a source of pity, and instead ask why it took so long for him to get the equipment he needed.