I really, really don't know what to think about this.

I recently listened to a presentation by Dr Tom Shakespeare, a noted visual artist and academic who happens to have achrondoplasia, in which he made a similar statement to that being put forwatd by Tomato (?) Lichy and his partner; that there is no such thing as a disability, merely a circumstance that society does not readily accommodate. In other words, a better, more tolerant and egalitarian world would include no-one who could be considered disabled.

It's certainly a challenging and noble sentiment. Dr Shakespeare's condition clearly denies him only a few physical dimensions. His cognitive abilities and senses are fully realised, and so it's easier for "normal" people to swallow his proactive approach. His life experience cannot differ so very greatly from that of the majority, we can imagine being in his place and the prejudice and the set backs he encounters, admire his good-humoured but straight-talking ownership of the genetic card he's been dealt.

It's harder when a person who cannot experience the world in the same way that most do, as Mr Lichy and his family cannot, claims that his lack of a primary sense is not only not a disability, but speaks of the deaf as if they were a nation, one with a language, culture and traditions of its own. Mr Lichy bandies the words "eugenics" at anyone who claims his desire to intentionally bring another deaf child into the world is morally wrong; he sees no difference between the civil rights movements for women, ethnic minorities, lgbt groups and the disabled. To deny the latter the right to be born is as abominable as permitting no black children to born, says he.

For the moment I'll leave to one side the point that sign language can be acquired by hearing or non-hearing people, allowing both to engage in the "deaf culture" he describes, while nothing in the world can teach a deaf-from-birth child to hear. I listened to Mr Lichy and his partner speaking through an interpreter today. Time and again they used the example of their living, deaf and by all accounts happy and brilliant child as justification for actively choosing to have another with the same condition. Tellingly, they relied again and again on visual examples; the couple both work in a theatre company, so they frequently mentioned the child's joy in performing arts, invariably talking about colour and movement and so on.

So the question has to be asked of this pair of doting parents; are blind people disabled? If you were to be told one of your frozen embryos would certainly develop into a child who could hear but could not see, would you be thrilled at the opportunity to induct her into "blind culture" or would you pause? Reconsider? Consciously reject her in favour of another?

I'm loathe to condemn this couple, I think they are highlighting something that needs to be debated, but I'm saddened that they feel the need to be so wilfully contrary. Going so far as to describe a child who can hear as disabled and saying they "feel sorry" for John Humphries because he can't appreciate a joke told in sign language just makes them appear like post-libertarian weirdoes.

What happens to human gametes and embryos in future, as stem cell research continues apace, infertility spirals ever-upwards and we in the West have less children and later in life to boot, is crucial. Human organs likewise. Personally, I say donation of any and all tissue should be an opt-out, not opt-in proposition. Living people are more important than the dead and yet to be born, end of story. As for who gets to be born and who doesn't... Urgh.

All I can say is this. I always thought a hallmark of parenting was the aspiration that your children would have better, fuller, longer, happier, richer (in every sense) lives than your own. In appearing to campaign for the "right" to ensure their next child will not be able to do a thing that they also cannot do (the least loaded way I can put it), this couple might be at the cutting edge of societal dynamics but they're stretching the definition of familial love to breaking point.

While highlighting the findings of the Progress In International Reading Literacy Study in yesterday's Sunday Herald, Joanna Blythman perpetuates anxieties that have been with us since the dawn of the post-war consumer age; each generation striving to make the lives of the next more comfortable, yet fretting over what might result from denying their offspring "character building" hardships, bordering on hysteria over the effects of the mass-media on child literacy, behaviour and health. In the fifties it was rock and roll and comic-books that took the wrap; a decade later psychedelia, later still punk; then the eighties rash of "video nasties"; today it's the games console and internet that are cited as the root cause of the happy-slapper, the 21st century juvenile delinquent. As ever, artists prove easier targets than the family (that hallowed institution, the benign veneer of which masks a multitude of sins).

While it is undeniable that English and Welsh children have slid down the literacy league table in question and that this slide coincides with a boom in digital media, drawing a line directly from one to the other (i.e. baldly stating that children read less because of computer games.) is the same kind of flawed reasoning that once led to suggestions that peanut butter caused criminality. Besides, it overlooks the facts that video-games and the internet frequently refer children back to the book shelf (via adaptations of prose), make books more readily available than ever (via Amazon, eBooks et al), offer opportunities to forge friendships over mutual love of fiction (via forums and chatrooms) and that the networking culture growing online depends utterly on the ability to read and write. Simply put, without literacy, the internet dies.

No, children aren't reading for pleasure because they don’t see their parents doing it, perhaps don’t see them at all, and one can assume it’s not Mario Galaxy that’s distracting mum and dad. Positive enforcement at home will do far more than any initiative foisted upon our over-worked and under-paid teachers, and is the only credible riposte to the louder, brasher charms of the games culture. Thank goodness Iain Bell was on hand to remind readers that an examination of our children's state of being can deliver nothing other than a verdict on our record as parents, and that those who are complacent enough to leave their little ones glued to the screen “for more than three hours a day” are just as guilty of neglect as those who’d permit their child unlimited access to the sweetie cupboard, the drinks cabinet or the keys to the tool shed.

I grew up in the eighties, a time when the child-centric censor’s bête noire was animated cartoons based upon brands of merchandise (Masters of the Universe et al). My brothers and I were exposed to hours upon hours of such thinly-disguised blandishments. Yet none of us are obese, illiterate or socially dysfunctional, despite being as fond of pleasure, as partial to the instant gratification of chocolate, toys and Happy Meals, as the next youngster. How did we escape our media-besieged childhood with minds and bodies unharmed?

Simple: our parents spoke to us, and when they did so we heard the word “No” more often than “Yes”. Pester-power is a myth; children will not ask for things, plead for things, scream and kick for things unless past experience shows such behaviours yield results. My brothers and I knew that is was foolish to ask for sweets outside the weekend, for toys at any time other than a birthday or Christmas. Such entreaties had not, would not and never did work. As long as today’s parents maintain their laissez-faire attitude to spending and debt, running themselves ragged spinelessly acquiescing to the whims of their bloated children* they will continue to cite their “time-poor” lives as the cause of their malaise, dumping blame at the feet of those third parties who sought only to educate or entertain but were left to raise their children. What is needed is not a change in the way we present books to the young (whose inherent love of narrative can be cultured, with perseverance, into a fondness for reading), but a revolution in how our society supports and values the time invested in them by their parents. We need to pull our heads out of the sand and rethink maternity and paternity leave, working hours, rates of pay and recreation. The only way to curtail the spread of the coach-potato kid is to help them avoid a future as coach-potato parents, not waste precious time trying to push the exponentially expanding digital genie back into its bottle.

*However, if this article is true, I have to question Nintendo's tactics; why blast the developed world with wall-to-wall advertising for a (relatively) inexpensive product you can only crank out to the tune of "two million a month"? What's the point of fiegning abundance on a product you either can't or won't release in adequate numbers than even come close to meeting demand? Won't the second such year of apparently orchestrated shortages inevitably inculcate a resentment toward Nintendo in general and the Wii in particular? I don't know, may be I'm missing something.