It is a deeply entrenched cultural narrative that differences need to be overcome. Literature and film are filled with characters with atypical minds and bodies who, when not used as tropes for pity, overcome their personal limitations through heroic effort.

sat shivah

normal is what is called normal by people who are considered normal.

When you hide, not only do you live in fear, but also in shame.

T4 Program. This program specifically targeted for extermination adults considered abnormal and disabled, including those diagnosed with such conditions as epilepsy, physical malformation, insanity, feeblemindedness, depression, and alcoholism.

Because normal is contingent—on history, on power, and, most of all, on flawed humans faking it until they make it.

a judgmental science that categorized and ranked some humans as biologically better than others.

tagline: “Kill defectives, save the nation, and see The Black Stork.”

This history shows how normal became the normal we live with now: a mash-up of the standard, average, perfect, ideal.