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sugarspikesart · 1 year ago

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As an autistic person who headcannons characters as autistic, I wanna add 1 more point:

Headcanons are not canon, they're called HEADCANONS for a reason, so they're not absolute. As long as I'm not stepping into gross/morally wrong/disgusting/illegal/shitty territory with them, I can do whatever the fuck I want with headcanons.

So If I, an autistic person, wanna headcannon the 80% of the RWBY characters as autistic, I can and I will and I don't have to give an explanation to anybody.

And this applies to everybody else. As long as the hc are not rootted in harmful or ableist bs, why do you care so much? It doesn't even affect you XD

Heck, I'm even gonna tell you all the characyers I hc as autistic (and with ocd) in rwby:

-Ruby (autistic, ocd)

-Oscar (autistic)

-Blake (autistic)

-Penny (autistic)

-Ren and nora (autistic)

-Phyrrha (autistic & ocd)

Have a great day!

I don't like it when the character's headcanon autism is made into an absolute.

I have a friend who is autistic and he has a very difficult time in this life. Being friends with an autistic person doesn't sound like a fun meme from the internet.

But character fans pretend that being autistic is the best thing that ever happened in a character's life. People are willing to make their loved ones autistic to justify them. Or they're willing to say that a quiet character with communication problems is actually autistic. It's annoying. I have big communication problems and don't like interacting with people because of bullying in the past. Does that make me autistic? For example, they call Ruby autistic. Ruby has some communication problems and don't want to make friends in v1 but it's not autism. It's normal human behavior in unfamiliar environments. Penny isn't autistic either. She is very energetic and active. She wants to make friends. She has no experience in life and is a freaking robot. How do robots have autism?

Hey I can say that Adam is autistic and that's why he killed people. He's autistic and according to fandom, anything can be forgiven for being autistic.

I'm going to conclude from the fact that you played the "I have an autistic friend" card and the contents of the third paragraph that you are not yourself autistic. So, from one non-autistic person to another:

Step back.

There are three main things your ask is doing that I want to make sure you recognize. If you recognize them and don't care, then this will never go anywhere. Otherwise, I hope this sparks some self-reflection.

You, a non-autistic person, are policing what autistic people can and cannot do in fandom.

You are conflating people critiquing or analyzing writing decisions with people defending a headcanon.

You're framing a personal frustration as a greater problem with the fandom.

The reason you gave for point 1 is this: "I have a friend who is autistic and he has a very difficult time in this life. Being friends with an autistic person doesn't sound like a fun meme from the internet." In other words, you looked at autistic people headcanoning a fictional character as autistic for fun and/or comfort, looked at a friend of yours, and then decided based on your experience as that person's friend that those autistic people on the internet are not allowed to have that headcanon because…I actually can’t figure out the exact reasoning you have here.

What does “being friends with an autistic person” have to do with headcanoning a character as autistic? What does not sounding “like a fun meme from the internet” mean in concrete terms? Are you trying to say that because an autistic person you know is facing struggles, all depictions and personal interpretations of autism in media must fit the mold of those struggles? Genuinely, I cannot understand the point you are trying to make by bringing up your autistic friend.

But if you want to bring him up, let’s engage with that action. You've used your autistic friend as a shield. You've said that he has "a very difficult time in this life." If that's the case, then I hope that things get easier for him. But before you plant his existence between yourself and criticism of your opinions, consider what you're actually doing. Have you ever asked him his opinions on autistic representation in media directly, or have you only ever used him as an excuse to invalidate the the myriad of autistic people expressing opinions you disagree with? Even if he dislikes or disagrees with what another autistic person thinks, that still doesn’t give you carte blanche to bring him up to invalidate other people’s opinions. People within a subgroup disagree all the time.

As for point 2, there is overlap between critiquing the writing decisions and defending a headcanon, yes, but the distinction is important when it comes to recognizing when someone is defending their headcanon and when they are pointing out a negligent-at-best flaw in the writers' material. A lot of what you've interpreted as defending a headcanon (I presume in the RWDE tag, since that's where it crops up the most because of hostile anons, and I have read nearly all of those posts) is actually the former.

Point 3. If you say "I don't headcanon that Ironwood is autistic," very very few people are going to argue with you on that. If you say, "I don't believe Ironwood is autistic-coded," then many people are going to push back on that with evidence. What's the difference? The former is personal preference. The latter is a debate position. If you have read the many essays put forth in the RWDE community explaining how the writers - intentionally or not - coded Ironwood as neurodivergent and still believe that both of those first two statements are identical in purpose and impact, then we cannot have a reasonable discussion.

I want to take a while to address the third paragraph because it is very revealing of your motivations. We’ll start from the beginning and work our way through to keep things comprehensive.

"But character fans pretend that being autistic is the best thing that ever happened in a character's life."

The phrasing here is already questionable - being autistic isn't something that "happens" in someone's life, it's an innate characteristic. To address the statement itself, though: who? Who is doing this? Who is genuinely headcanoning a character they love as autistic and then "pretending" that their headcanon is the best thing to happen to that character? You seem to be missing the fact that, a lot of the time, people headcanon their favorite characters as autistic because those real people are themselves autistic and can already see certain relatable behaviors displayed by the character. They often don't change aspects of the character - they add onto aspects already on display.

"People are willing to make their loved ones autistic to justify them. Or they're willing to say that a quiet character with communication problems is actually autistic. It's annoying."

"Loved ones" is typically used to refer to real-life people and particularly family, but judging by context I think you're still referring to fictional characters. What do you mean by "justify them"? Do you mean, "fans are willing to headcanon their favorite characters as autistic to explain those characters' behaviors"? Because yes, of course they are, that's part of how engaging with fictional characters works. And the next line? As an isolated statement it's just a statement of fact. Yes, people are willing to headcanon that a quiet character with communication problems is autistic because that is a common expression of autism. What's the harm in that?

I ask that rhetorical question knowing that your statement of "It's annoying" is a segue into the beating heart of your complaint: that you personally cannot see these characters as autistic. Because you are not autistic, all of these autistic headcanons are, on some level, attacks on you personally. These attacks are, somehow, erasing your non-autistic identity. Your example with yourself and your own communication problems, supplemented by bringing up Ruby, shows that you want to see yourself - a non-autistic individual - represented in the show. You want this, but when you see other people making autistic headcanons of characters you want to sympathize with (or otherwise cannot see as autistic), you seem to interpret those headcanons as impinging on your own. Erasing you.

You feel like you're on the defensive and so you treat the fandom as this all-encompassing hive-minded entity when that is not at all the case. The "they," the united fandom, that group hostile to you in your message does not exist in the way your cornered mind wants it to.

Headcanons are not a zero-sum game. Someone headcanoning a character as autistic doesn't mean you cannot headcanon them as something else. You are free to think that Penny is not autistic, that Ironwood is not autistic, and so on even if two hundred or ten thousand other people think that they are. That's your choice. If people having autistic headcanons for these characters is annoying to you, then block the blogs saying those things. Or, perhaps, acknowledge that you may have an opinion that differs from the majority of people around you and carry on. Fandom is a community but enjoyment is individual. If fandom is impinging on your enjoyment, disengage from fandom.

"...but it's not autism. It's normal human behavior in unfamiliar environments."

The idea of "normal human behavior" is spectacularly difficult to pin down. And just because something is common ("normal") doesn't mean that it cannot be a behavior shared by neurotypical and autistic individuals. One demonstrating some trait does not preclude the other doing the same.

Moving to Penny, you say the following: “Penny isn’t autistic either. She is very energetic and active. She wants to make friends.” Do you think that autistic people cannot share these traits? Do you think that all autistic people are lethargic loners? Do you hear yourself?

Your words again: “She…is a freaking robot. How do robots have autism?”

If I wanted to be snarky, my only response to this would be "There is this thing called implication" - but I'm making an effort, so I'll provide something marginally more involved.

Things in fiction do not have to have a 1:1 mapping to reality in order for people to find common ground with characters in that fiction. George Orwell’s Animal Farm is not derided as a meaningless story about farm animals being communists because people can see the reflections of actual society and real individuals superimposed onto those animals. If this figurative concept is still confusing to you, please research what fables and allegories are on your own time.

To even ask "How do robots have autism?" is to indicate a staggering lack of knowledge of how representation in media works. It's not my job to educate you, but less than two minutes of searching online brought up resources I can share: this paper exploring harmful autistic representation in media through music, this video discussing one of the most popular autistic robots (Data), and this video talking about representation more broadly (talk of autistic and autistic-coded characters starts at about 7:00). And for that last video, after you watch it, take what you said about Penny - "How do robots have autism?" - and apply it to the gems. Hopefully then you can see how absurd that question is. If you still need more material, do your own research.

Of course, there are multiple perspectives around autistic coding in fiction and I don't mean to say that any one perspective is "right." For some, autistic-coded characters often being depicted as nonhuman carries with it the dehumanizing implication that autistic people are "other" and/or that they are lacking something non-autistic people posses (which the aforementioned paper explores in depth). For others, seeing autistic-coded nonhuman characters existing, happy, comfortable with themselves, and/or still being treated with love by characters or the narrative can be a comfort. From my layman outsider perspective, it seems to come down to personal preference.

I want to circle back to point 1 to finish. I've been relatively polite in this response because I want to operate under the assumption that you're genuinely explaining your position and not trolling, but your message? Its implications? Incredibly impolite. Rude, overbearing, and overstepping, to say the least. It's not your responsibility - nor should it be - to decide what autistic character headcanons are and are not okay.

Depictions of autistic people as inherently violent, as dangerous, are too common. You, intentionally or negligently, reference these depictions with that last stray shot at Adam. What you’ve failed to heed is that these kinds of conversations require empathy, nuance, and the ability to listen and learn. The only ability you’ve demonstrated thus far is careless and callous disregard.

You looked at autistic people headcanoning characters as autistic based on overlapping experience and/or entertainment, said, “That’s annoying,” and then told them (even if only in the relative privacy of your own head and my inbox) to stop having fun. Moreover, you did it in an incredibly offensive way.

Stop, step back, learn, and do better.

#ableism #autism #fndm discourse #idc if this came off as rude #but i hate ableism #why do u care #anyways #rwby #rwby hc #headcanons #neurodivergent #neurodivergent hc

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