It’s an old cliché that everyone is out for themselves, but clichés are clichés for a reason. People are very selfish. Most people are only interested in their own well being, their state of content frustration and their definition of the world. That’s why, when sending out emails yesterday for the Disability Hate Crime conference, there was a lot of distrust, ignorance and disrespect that came back.

People did not understand that the Conference was about Disability Hate Crime, calling it instead a ‘Hate Disability Conference’. One gentleman replied with an answer which had a higher number of syllables in than his IQ score; “What a s*** argument”. A representative for one of the UK’s largest Solicitors’ firms finished of with a wonderfully Dickensian phrase “I am hoping that with the Great Repeal Bill on the horizon we will soon see the back of you and all you(r) ilk.”

People will happily assume they are the centre of the universe, who are we to tell them they are wrong?

Society has strayed a long way away from where it should be, if this is the reaction received when attempting to stop Hate Crime. Disability Hate Crime is not anti-social behaviour, it is Hate Crime. The victims suffer abuse, violence and every so often, death at the hands of the criminals. They are the most innocent and yet most ignored.