autisticmay

[autisticmay]

Did you know

that Tumblr’s Community Guidelines forbid “promotion or glorification of self-harm”?

I don’t realistically think that I would get banned for it, but it does strengthen my feeling that I’m not allowed to have the opinions about self-injury that I do.

(I wasn’t addicted to it, I wasn’t depressed, it wasn’t about self-hatred, it wasn’t unhealthy. it was easy to stop. but the only reason I stopped was because other people were concerned.)

[autisticmay]

“Well if so many disabled people are being killed then why am i not seeing it on the news?”

I give you one good reason brenda

[autisticmay]

I wrote this almost in one unbroken stretch this afternoon, so it’s not the most carefully composed thing ever. But this is an idea that I’ve been turning over in my head for a long time-- since about 2012 at least, when a feminist writer I’d previously respected posted an article saying, basically, that rape survivors should just stop having all those inconvenient feelings and Cooperate With The System. Or, arguably, since I was about eight years old and had a teacher who was very much about this kind of “motivation” to follow rules.

I occasionally hear people say that women who’ve been sexually assaulted have an obligation to report it. I understand their reasoning. But let me widen the scope a little.

If people are avoiding doing something because it’s too difficult or painful, there are three basic strategies you can take to change that:

1. Make the process easier.

2. Give the person more support.

3. Make the person more desperate.

[autisticmay]

““Sickness” as we speak of it today is a capitalist construct, as is its perceived binary opposite, “wellness.” The “well” person is the person well enough to go to work. The “sick” person is the one who can’t. What is so destructive about conceiving of wellness as the default, as the standard mode of existence, is that it invents illness as temporary. When being sick is an abhorrence to the norm, it allows us to conceive of care and support in the same way. Care, in this configuration, is only required sometimes. When sickness is temporary, care is not normal.”

— Johanna Hedva, Sick Woman Theory

[autisticmay]

I take off my glasses when I’m upset/overwhelmed for exactly this reason. 

Just realized a huge reason I hate wearing my glasses is because my blurred vision reduces the likelihood and intensity of me making eye contact with someone

[autisticmay]

[ID: “It is no surprise that so many women and girls have what are delicately called “control issues” around their bodies, from cutting and injuring their flesh to starving or stuffing themselves with food, compulsive exercise, or pathological, unhappy obsession over how we look and dress. Adolescence, for a woman, is the slow realisation that you are not considered as fully human as you hoped. You are a body first, and your body is not yours alone: whether or not you are attracted to men, men and boy swill believe they have a claim on your body, and the state gets to decide what you’re allowed to do with it afterwards.” end ID]

[autisticmay]

garnet

[autisticmay]

So I agree with you as far as, it’s definitely possible to learn social skills and get better at dealing with social situations with practice. But I feel like it doesn’t make sense to call that curing autism?

Not knowing information about social skills isn’t what makes me autistic. What makes me autistic is something about my mind that caused me to not learn those social skills the way most people learn them. Whatever that something is, it’s still there, even though I’ve managed to “catch up” in some ways by learning more.

As I see it, the effort I’ve put into learning social rules is sort of equivalent to my glasses. They let me see as clearly as anyone else despite my nearsightedness, but they don’t make me not nearsighted anymore, so I wouldn't call them a cure.

---

My personal theory is that part of the reason that autistic people don't learn social rules as easily is just that we're too overwhelmed with other things to notice what’s going on with social rules as easily as other people do. A lot of the environments where young children get to socialize with each other are really loud and chaotic (playgrounds, school lunchrooms), and for me that made it hard for me to think clearly or understand what people were saying. 

But when I started having opportunities to socialize with a smaller group of people in a somewhat quieter setting, I learned a lot and got much better at having conversations in a pretty short period of time. Once I was less sensory-overloaded and paying conscious attention, I was able to figure out some of those social rules that, I guess, most people figure out at a much earlier age. 

That’s probably not the only factor in why we have trouble with social skills, but it’s definitely possible for us to learn and improve if we get the chance to. I know some older autistic people who are actually pretty smooth. It’s really encouraging to see how they’ve figured out ways to deal with awkward social situations. 

so a quick google search and a few articles made me really happy when i found out you actually (in RARE CASES) CAN ‘outgrow’ autism??

i think there have to be a lot of factors but my theory out of personal experience is having very high functioning autism. as i grew older i started to learn how social interaction actually worked the more i had conversations on my own. of course the failures werent fun and made me develop social anxiety but whatever

the more i interacted and the more i realized there were actually people who understood me helped me grow and learn. but how i did this you ask?

im unschooled!!!!!!! after years of being abused by staff in special ed classes i finally was able to “drop out” in 7th grade, and etc etc social learning.

and i think that’s how autistic kids should learn. not about bullshit math problems or things they blatantly dont enjoy doing. learning about social cues and how to interact. its a tough battle but its worth it.

of course today my only excuse for charisma is being really anxious and trying to start a conversation with cashiers but hey it’s a start

my conclusion: autism can’t be 'fully’ cured (im still sensitive to light and sound) but at least the social aspect of it can be somewhat tamed if you’re high functioning enough. for now i’m extremely independent and often leave the house on my own to shop/etc. despite being 15. so go out there and?? idk consider my advice you dont have to go and talk to people

[autisticmay]

“children aren’t little monsters that need to be herded and corralled and trained. they’re very tiny, very confused people, and it’s our responsibility to teach them how life works.“

This. Treating people who need help as threats to be managed and controlled is the source of so many problems. 

So many Pro-Spanking advocates talk about how they “Deserved” to be hit by their parents because they were “a bad kid.” And it makes me so sad.

You weren’t.

You weren’t a bad kid, and you didn’t deserve to be hit. Maybe you were a difficult kid, maybe you struggled with boundaries or rules or expectations. Maybe you had bad behavior much of the time. But you, yourself, were not and are not a BAD person for that, and you didn’t EARN violence. You didn’t have it coming. It shouldn’t have happened to you. 

[autisticmay]

Being neurodivergent does not mean our brains are ‘worse’ than neurotypicals.

Different does not equal inferior.

[autisticmay]

Autists are the ultimate square pegs, and the problem with pounding a square peg into a round hole is not that the hammering is hard work. It’s that you’re destroying the peg.

—Paul Collins (via autistic-answers)

[autisticmay]

[Image description courtesy of: The Thinking Person’s Guide to Autism

image: Vertical rectangle infographic with a background gradating from white at the top to green at the bottom. Title: Green bold text reads, “Autism Understanding” Subtitle: Black text reads, “ What can you do to embrace neurodiversity?” A column of icons in light blue squares on the left is paired with a column of black text-based suggestions  on a white background on the right. First row: Icon of a speech bubble. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Say what you mean” Suggestion in plain text reads, “Some autistic people may not be able to see your intentions or read body language so help them understand what you are thinking.” Second row: icon of an explosion. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Reduce sensory input” Suggestion in plain text reads, “Autism affects the senses and can cause overload. Can you reduce the noises, smells, colours, patterns or lights in your environment?” Third row: icon of a smiley face. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Be a mentor or friend” Suggestion in plain text reads, “Autistic people say they suffer from misunderstanding and from an overwhelming environment. Find out how their autism affects them.” Fourth row: icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Reduce pressure” Suggestion in plain text reads, “Try to reduce the number of options and give clear expectations. Offer regular constructive feedback to help mutual understanding. Fifth row: icon of an hourglass with most of the sand descended. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Allow Thinking Time” Suggestion in plain text reads “At least six seconds, which is longer than you think! Perhaps invite them to respond by email or arrange to with them again later.” Sixth row: icon of a five-pointed star. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Play to their strengths” Suggestion in plain text reads “People are at their best when they can be themselves so be flexible with how the work gets done to allow space for their way of thinking.” Seventh row: icon of thought cloud. Suggestion title in bold reads, “Be open-minded” Suggestion in plain text reads “Does it really matter if they take their shoes off in the office? If they wear headphones? Understand how they regulate their sensory input.” A green horizontal rectangle below the suggestions contains an orange Minecraft-style cow (?) next to white text reading, “Aspergers Adventures—Minecraft and Meltdowns” Below that, a blue Facebook icon is followed by white text reading, “www.facebook.com/groups/aspergers.adventures” and then a lighter blue Twitter icon followed by white text reading “@McraftNMeltdown” To the right of the green rectangle, on a white background shared with the suggestions above, large blue text reads “Autism Ambassador” Underneath the blue text, smaller green text reads, “Southampton • Hampshire Isle of Wight • Portsmouth”

[autisticmay]

[autisticmay]

I know this probably isn’t the platform where I’ll reach the most parents, but I think that if we viewed a child’s ‘failures’ as failures on other people’s part to help, kids would be so much better off.

I saw a mother brag about how she took her twelve year old’s phone away for four months until their grades came up… but got angry when people asked what OTHER methods she used to help the child.

Was she sitting down and helping the child with their homework? Was she asking if there was something going on in the child’s school life that was making things harder? Trying to help her study? Actually teaching the child to self-regulate and prioritize tasks? Helping the child keep up with due dates and taking them to study groups?

No, nothing. Just punishing the kid for not doing well, without anything else. Of course the mom was real defensive, even though no one was even judging her—it was other parents interested and seeing if the mom had tips and tricks to make it work! And then it came out that the child had been being bullied in school, leading to their grades slipping. Nothing to do with the phone to begin with.

But the mother saw the child’s grades as simply a reflection of some character flaw, instead of approaching it from a perspective of ‘what can I do to help this child do better?’

[autisticmay]

I'm not sure why you started this off with "actually", because that makes it sound like you're contradicting something I said? But I agree with you, the concept of the uncanny valley is a useful way of explaining why people often have such strong negative reactions to people who look unusual in subtle ways, including people with disabilities. (I wrote a few things about this a while ago, on my non-tumblr blog.)

Explaining why people tend to react negatively to "uncanny valley" things was just not what I was trying to do in this post. People can resist the "uncanny valley" instinct, if they're aware of it and try to resist. I think that what sometimes happens is, if people already dislike the "uncanny" person, they no longer have a reason or desire to resist that instinctive negative reaction.

So I wanted to remind people that when an "uncanny" person does something that is actually dangerous for an unrelated reason, that's not proof that the instinct is correct. Linking the actual danger to the "uncanniness" feels right, but it's not, and it does a disservice to the many people who are "uncanny" but not harming anybody by it.

@ the internet at large

Look, I know Mark Zuckerberg has a weird-looking face. I know his facial expressions look strange. I can see it too. 

But this thing where someone who has a Weird Trait does something wrong, and everybody jumps into making fun of the weird trait, as if that’s the most important part, as if “look how weird he is” is the perfect nutshell encapsulation of “he’s a bad person”? You know that thing? 

Please consider what this does to all the people in the world who have that weird trait, but who aren’t billionaire owners of shady companies or whatever the evil of the day is. 

It’s chilling. It’s scary, to be reminded of what so many people really think about people like me, and how much of people’s acceptance of weirdness is temporary and conditional.

[autisticmay]

Seems like your answer to my previous ask is rather pro-life i.e. "all pregnancies should be carried to term regardless of the consequences or the quality of the life resulting from said pregnancy". I've never been able to wrap my head around that kind of logic, it seems the mainstay of neocons everywhere. Maybe medical school has indoctrinated me to care more about quality of life and health than about abstract notions of the worth of unborn individuals. Who can say :/

why on this earth would you come to the askbox of a multiply disabled person and expect them to respond kindly to your insinuating “y'know since disability makes life harder, wouldn’t it be better if no disabled fetuses were ever born”

note: for people just tuning in, this is in reference to my recent post about selective abortion of disabled fetuses where i goddamn literally say that i don’t support restricting abortion or shaming people who selectively terminate?? because it’s not about individuals??

[autisticmay]

@ the internet at large

Look, I know Mark Zuckerberg has a weird-looking face. I know his facial expressions look strange. I can see it too. 

But this thing where someone who has a Weird Trait does something wrong, and everybody jumps into making fun of the weird trait, as if that’s the most important part, as if “look how weird he is” is the perfect nutshell encapsulation of “he’s a bad person”? You know that thing? 

Please consider what this does to all the people in the world who have that weird trait, but who aren't billionaire owners of shady companies or whatever the evil of the day is. 

It's chilling. It's scary, to be reminded of what so many people really think about people like me, and how much of people's acceptance of weirdness is temporary and conditional.