Four businessmen held a reunion after not seeing each other since university. All had become successful and rich in the intervening forty years, and were having dinner in a very expensive restaurant when one of them received a call on his mobile. He excused himself to answer it, and in the meantime, the other three started discussing their sons’ respective careers.
“My son is an engineer,” said the first. “He works for one of the big motoring corporations, and has worked on a number of well-known sports car designs. In fact, he has earned so much that he bought his girlfriend one of only fifty limited-edition supercars and gave it to her as a Christmas present.”
“Really? Well, my son is an architect,” said the second businessman. “He’s designed many large and distinctive buildings, and has become quite rich as a result. In fact, he’s so rich he designed and built a mansion just for his girlfriend. She only moved in last month.”
“That’s nothing!” said the third. “My son designs yachts and owns a yacht construction company. They are very, very expensive and count celebrities, Middle Eastern royalty, and Russian oligarchs among his customers. He is so rich he gave his girlfriend one of these yachts last summer.”
They were all congratulating each other on their sons’ successes when the fourth friend came back from dealing with his phone call. “And what about your son?” he was asked. “We were all comparing notes on how well ours have done. Has yours been successful?”
“Well,” he said. “It depends on how you define success. He had gender reassignment surgery at 21 and has been a beautiful young woman for the last six years.”
That stunned the others into silence, tinged with distaste and not a little disgust as their prejudices rose to the surface.
“But,” continued the fourth man. “She’s done quite well really. Why, in the last year alone she’s been presented with a supercar, a yacht, and a mansion.”