‘Well.’ The man seems to admit defeat. ‘OK. No problem at all. My people will fix it up for you.’

‘Bex, we’re going to be extras!’ Suze clutches me in excitement.

‘We’re going to be in a film!’

‘We can go and watch ourselves at the cinema! Everyone will see us— Ooh, what’s the film about?’ says Suze as an afterthought, and the man looks up from where he’s writing his mobile number on a card.

‘Pirates.’

Pirates? I look at Suze with renewed glee. We’re going to be in a film about pirates!

DiscriminHate LA

c/o 6389 Kester Avenue Van Nuys CA 91411

Dear Mrs Brandon

I was given your name by Andy Wyke, who was at the recent E.Q.U.A.L. benefit and heard your inspiring story.

I am president of the charity DiscriminHate LA, a lobby group set up to combat discrimination in all its forms. We consider that current definitions of discrimination are far too narrow. We have identified no fewer than 56 common grounds for discrimination and the list grows longer every day.

However, you are the first case of ‘pet-ism’ we have come across, and we would like to talk to you about your experience. Many of our members have spearheaded campaigns and we hoped you could do the same. For example you could:

Write an account of your discrimination story for our website.

Develop an outreach program for high school students who may suffer the same type of discrimination.

Lobby your local government representative for ‘Ermintrude’s Law’.

May I, at this point, offer you my sincere solidarity and sympathy. I am not familiar with the exact details of your case, but I gather it was a moving story and must have been painful for you to share.

I look forward to hearing from you and welcoming you to our fight.

All my best

Gerard R. Oss
President DiscriminHate LA
Survivor and Fighter: size-ism, name-ism, odor-ism, and sexual-practice-ism.
Author of I’m Different, You’re Different, S/He’s Different

LHA

LETHERBY HALL ASSOCIATION
THE PARSONAGE
LETHERBY COOMBE
HAMPSHIRE

Dear Mrs Ermintrude Endwich

Thank you for your recent letter.

It is always interesting to hear from an ‘unbiased member of the public’ as you describe yourself. However, I must take issue with your various points. The LHA is not a ‘bunch of Nazis with nothing better to do than complain about fountains’. We do not ‘meet every night in some grim little cavern’; nor ‘plot like the witches in Macbeth’. Our dress sense is, I would suggest, irrelevant.

I also rebut your assertion that The Surge is ‘one of the wonders of the world’. It is not. Nor will we ‘all be sorry when the brilliant Tarquin Cleath-Stuart is given a medal for it by the Queen’. I cannot quite imagine which medal this would be.