Admit It. You All Forgot About That Weird Little Disabled Thing.

https://eu.usatoday.com/picture-gallery/sports/olympics/2026/03/06/2026-winter-paralympics-opening-ceremony-photos/89024753007/

It turns out though it's the same fair city. The same Aperture. Although, obviously, that Aperture takes on a new meaning amid a crowd with a large Visually Impaired contingent.

When we talk in terms of; "Visually Impaired" rather than; "Blind" we're not being politically correct. You just need to be a lot more accurate.

Like all disabilities Visual Impairment is really a spectrum. For the purposes of sport that spectrum can be divided into different categories.

In many ways it's a lot like the  Electromagnetic Spectrum. Bits there, bits not there, all coming in waves. Based on their frequency and amplitude those waves can be divided into different categories; Visual Light, X-Rays, Radiowaves, Wi-Fi, etc.

With the Tick, Tock of a metronome the Auditory Spectrum is also a lot like the Electromagnetic Spectrum. Waves which through their amplitude and frequency can be divided into different categories; Adult Male, Adult Female, Juvenile Male, Juvenile Female, Canine, Feline etc.

If someone has an impairment which prevents them from accessing part or all of one spectrum they might, quite reasonably, adapt by using all or part of another spectrum. Although I will fight anyone who claims that's what a Hearing Impaired Dancer is doing. They're just accessing the Auditory Spectrum through touch, via different appendages.

However a Visually Impaired person might rreasonably adapt to watching TV by accessing the Auditory Spectrum. By pressing the "Audio Description" button on their properly enabled remote control. I note that on my remote it feels the same as all the other buttons.

While I doubt it was intentional the UK broadcaster, the Channel 4 Network, has made quite the contribution to this particular talking point. Their coverage is anchored by Ade Adepitan, a man who can clearly find no peace in silence. So if even a suggestion of silence appears he has to attack it with his voice. As he's the anchor, the star, they're all copying him. 

My hearing is perfectly normal, for my category. As is my sight. However their constant war against silence not only drowned out the Audio Description it meant I've still got no idea what that thing with the Dancer and the mirrored door was supposed to be about. Although, surely, that is the origin of the Paralympic movement. Encouraging Wheelchair users to at least try and do something for themselves. Even if it's just shutting up.

Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy" has evolved into a more general look at the work of Fortunio Liceti. During the Dark Ages the Roman Catholic Christian Church forbid the depiction of skills and other Demonic imagery. Be it the illustrations of poems like Dante's or scientific research. Liceti developed a coded way of depicting such images.

Fortunio Licieti was certainly prolific. He was one the first to speculate that parents pass a sort of cell like material to their offspring and that cell like material can contain imperfections. Something he explored in his 1665 Book of Monsters.

That is part of a longstanding tradition linking disability, particularly those which are obvious, with evil. A very *ahem* 'accessible' example would be; "The Phantom of the Opera" (1986). In which mere electrical burns to the face see the genius cast out from the sphere of the beautiful people and condemned to the underworld.

Not that this really seems like the Forum to sully with reference to mere Andrew Lloyd Webber. Did I mention that I'm idly rich enough to speak many languages, via an App on my phone. I can also obtain the most generous of tailoring, via the Tennis Courts of Belgium(!)

Needless to say. Eugenicists who built on the work of Fortunio Licieti aren't exactly popular amongst this, rather horny, assembly.

Although I suspect all talking points will probably struggle to rise above Team USA's urgent need to get its catastrophic bleeding under control.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2RQ8YkqeEU (Assassin's Creed 4 Black Flag - "Parting Glass" Ending Song, Video, GTREntertainment).