When I think back to my own experience of being under attack due to a disabilty, I develop several hypotheses.

The first is that human beings are social beings. Which is a polite way of saying that we are pack animals. Belonging is important to us. Once we belong, then the social hierarchy, and our rank within that hierarchy, becomes extremely important. I suspect this is one reason for the adulation of celebrities. Each celebrity sits at the centre of an abstracted social group. We are permitted to “belong” to that group; we invite ourselves in, to “join,” and then consummate our attachment; this fulfills some deep seated need.

One of the key ways of maintaining group identity is through exclusion. We define who we are by identifying who we are not. Identification of an out group helps cement the relations of the in group. Exclusion provides us with power. It is a means of obtaining submission through creating obstacles and barriers. “Want to join our group? Here is what you must do.”

Another key aspect is boredom. In my youth, I became highly sensitized to the mood of the group. Once the group became bored, it commenced looking for entertainment, for things to do. It began a hunt for targets, for the thrill of the chase, for the ravenous excitement of the pack attack. Since I was different, a clear member of the out group, I became the target.

This outcome was very confusing to me. I may have enjoyed positive relations with each individual member of the group. But this one-to-one relationship underwent a dramatic structural shift when those same individuals encountered me in a group context. Our prior individual relationship no longer mattered; I was abruptly “unfriended” in a way that was frightening and not at all abstract.

This created in me a profound sense of mistrust. One minute I was friends with X and Y and Z. But the next minute, once they came together as a group, and found themselves with nothing more interesting to do, they meta-morphed into something ugly and dangerous.

I learned to avoid groups.

I learned to distrust males.