But in the same way that good jokes are frequently grounded in gravity, serious questions are begged by this episode. To start, I would like to think of myself as alert to how dangerous allergies can be given that I've had to race my wife to the hospital several times because of life-threatening allergic reactions to bee stings and other things. Which is to say, if I were persuaded that the types of scents that DFL leaders wanted to proscribe really were the cause of serious distress, I would be obliged to quit the joking and support appropriate accommodations. However, my lay understanding of the research does not suggest this. Not at all.
Stage fright is a perfect example.
Two final points need to be made here. They are on target, naturally, but I would make the point stronger still. But that's not to say that any minority customarily has a right to force a majority to make itself over. At the risk of elevating smells to heights that are much too lofty, a useful parallel has to do with religious rights and sensibilities. Not that we like talking about it very much in a culture that increasingly values tolerance over all other virtues, but the fact is, there are prices to be paid, by definition, for being a minority.