#we are neurotypical (no)

[inkskinned]

even 2 years ago people still said autism with a whisper. it was also how people sometimes whisper lesbian, like they're afraid of uttering a slur. autistic was either an insult or it was something terrible, a horrible burden only select people endure. "select people" were usually 9 year old boys and skinny white men.

they are not hispanic young adults with a dog and a life and friends. i can make (sustained, calculated, painful) eye contact. with certain people, i don't even have to count how many seconds i am holding their vision - i can just look at them. i can wear clothes that bother me, i will just have a worse day than usual. i might cry about any changes to my schedule - but change is scary! this is normal!

when i was 16 it was OCD. i mean that was the thing everyone said. i totally have ocd. they would arrange 6 colors of gel pen in rainbow order (no worry for indigo feeling left out) and they'd be "so ocd" about it.

if you struggle with intrusive thoughts, be careful at this next paragraph, but. at 16 i developed a compulsion that involved self-harm. my ocd was convinced i was simply forgetting that i'd hurt someone terribly - a thought that persisted for no clear or delineated reason.

at some point i will probably write about how the idea of "morally pure thoughts" was hell for me and others with ocd, but this was the odd dichotomy for many of us: they liked our "aesthetic", but were genuinely repulsed by our lived experience. "intrusive thoughts" now means "cutting your hair in the sink" instead of talking yourself down from believing horrible things. "so ocd" is a label without any true understanding.

it's something i've talked about before - in multiplicity - but i firmly believe in the veracity and necessity of self-diagnosis. i think it saves lives and it saves tragedies from occurring. as someone raised in a house that wasn't safe, self-diagnosis was, for many years, the only viable option. 15 and honestly googling: am i depressed or are there demons affecting my behavior.

but it is not genuine self-diagnosis anymore, most of the time. it is a strange, blanched version of that whispered word autism. now certain traits are constantly seen as "autistic" - any passing intense interest. any flubbed social interaction. people say it while laughing - a touch of the 'tism.

and i like the acceptance! i do. i like that people are talking about it. i like that if i self-identify, more people speak up and say me too, bitch. but there is something-else quietly happening, the way it happened to OCD. the quirky, "fun" parts have been washed and sanitized and removed of all suffering. now it is just something that makes you "a little bit silly."

it took me 27 years on this planet before i learned to make friends. something about me just seems incredibly odd, i guess, some kind of radiation monitoring. someone once (in a way that was almost friendly) told me i am doing the right things, but in a way that's off-putting. i have scoured myself raw attempting to be charming.

someone on tiktok does a deep dive into their particular passion. the top comment says "what kind of autism is this lol". like we are a breed of animal. like it has no influence on our experience. like our life is a fresh breeze, an open meadow.

more often for me, life was a drowning.

[deedra-posting]

Me when my best friend and I identify with V1 and Swordsmachine and suddenly it's about our friendship

Uhmmmmmm I like them yeag. Alt version under the cut

Nothing drastic just emojis lmao

[ambrosiagourmet]

I dunno, I kinda think that describing an often-viewed-as-autistic character as relatable to everyone is fun and rad actually. I think that the idea of autistic people being relatable to neurotypical people is cool as hell

[venusmage]

guys im almost 28 and got diagnosed with ADHD :'). i thought i was just a lazy idiot moron dumbass dipshit alien robot but apparently it was The Disorder

[asthedeathoflight]

Coda to my other post because I didn't want to completely derail it but we might not be ready for this conversation as a fandom but ableism is absolutely a contributing factor to the way Armand gets treated and im tired of pretending like it's not. The way autistic people of color get treated in our society is abominable and this fandom is not immune to perpetuating that. So much of how he gets talked about can be chalked up to "well he didn't perform empathy/emotion/regret like I wanted him to." If Armand was as effortlessly personable and correctly emotive as Lestat is we'd be having a different conversation. That's all I'm saying.

[krash-8]

neurotypicals will laugh when I say 'im autistic" like bitch im not joking AND now I know you think making fun of autistic people is funny

[chubbychiquita]

answer my strawpoll abt nd identity re: fat kink please

[d1sc01nf3rn0]

I'm seeing a lot of people with neurodivergency, specially under the autism spectrum say that "Laios is annoying, never shuts up, is insensitive, and I can't stand him"; and the irony is not lost on me lmao.

[bearotonin-international]

You're sooooo silly thank you for all the bears :3 <3

we’d say we are the silliest but polar bears exist

[mswyrr]

THG is the only pop culture story I can think of where the heroes (Katniss and Peeta) are disabled* and their happy ending doesn't require that they be "fixed" in order to be happy. IMO, part of why there's such controversy over the ending of the books in particular is that Collins wrote the pov of Katniss as a woman who is content and loves her life and her spouse and kids, but she's still very clearly mentally ill (and arguably somewhere on the spectrum). She has coping strategies and her life is good, but she will never be "normal" and Collins doesn't let the audience think that.

The one part, where she talks about how she handles the darker days, when she's really struggling, never fails to move me:

I’ll tell them that on bad mornings, it feels impossible to take pleasure in anything because I’m afraid it could be taken away. That’s when I make a list in my head of every act of goodness I’ve seen someone do. It’s like a game. Repetitive. Even a little tedious after more than twenty years. But there are much worse games to play. (Mockingjay, 332)

It's hard to express how important that is to me. Someone doesn't have to be "normal" to lead a good life. Someone doesn't have to be "normal" to have a life worth living, to give and receive love in good ways.

And, so, when people look at the villain in the prequel and say "he's just crazy, that's why he's evil. He's just a psycho, he's nuts," it's so out of place, it's so dissonant to me -- I think that's absolutely not the kind of story Collins would tell, given her prior handling of disability.

I don't think she's suddenly turned into a Victorian writer where you can know someone is evil because they're disabled because the writer thinks disabled people are warped creatures incapable of doing anything but bringing evil into the world. And the way people assert this, as if it's the pure, wholesome, most politically advanced reading of the prequel, is just - it doesn't compute for me. I don't understand how people get there.

I studied (for years) the treatment of mentally ill people in the mid-20th Century US. It was horrific. US forced sterilization and eugenics laws actually inspired N/azi Germany's forced sterilization, eugenics, and mass murder campaigns against mentally ill and disabled people. Nice, normal people have repeatedly convinced themselves that torturing and killing disabled people is how they will "purify" their society - they've done great evil in the name of rooting out the people evil is supposedly located within biologically.

Is it so hard to believe that people with normal brains do evil? Is it truly so impossible? Even in a story where the Games are about how a lot of people, the majority of whom are neurotypical, can be brought, via media presentation and entertainment techniques, into taking pleasure in their participation in evil? It's so hard to fathom that evil can't simply be located in someone being "psycho"?

Ballad already has Dr Gaul, who is evil and clearly neurodivergent. If Snow is too then the message starts to get kind of worrying? IMO, Coriolanus is more effective as a kind of “everyman” as an 18 year old - an example of the incentive structures (rewards and punishments) and propaganda that motivate “normal” people to go along. Of course, he will later become something far worse than that, someone who takes control of this thing, who uses his intimate knowledge of it and his insight into other “normal” people to make it worse, but that’s not the part of his life we see the most of. The part the book focuses on provides what I consider a powerful depiction of how ordinary people are acculturated into corrupt societies.

It's fiction so there's all kinds of interpretations that the text can support and exploring those is good. It's a stronger text because it has ambiguities and can be interpreted more than one way. But the intensity of some of the rhetoric is an unsettling contrast to what I've thought, for over a decade, Collins' themes and pov are as a writer.

*Shame on the films for removing Peeta's physical disability, though; in the books he lost a leg during their first Games

[inkskinned]

oh you know it's all latestage capitalism but the thing is. how are you supposed to be a person inside of this. a person trying to be a better version of yourself.

oh, you started working young, which was kind of hard, but it's just the way stuff works sometimes. and it was 2008 and your family couldn't afford heat. but it's fine, you grow a spine and get used to the professional world and besides it was the suburbs we're talking about here, like, your life could have been actually hard, so what if your father lost his job and you can't afford to move or turn the lights back on. and once you start making money, it's good. you keep doing that. because now they're relying on you. so you have to do that.

oh you were in thousands of dollars of debt at 17 years old so that you could go to school, because you have to go to school if you want to get a "real" job. you even did it "right", you worked parttime and attended community college before you transferred to a public school. you were under so many merit scholarships.

which is fine. you pick yourself up and you say like, okay. i graduated college. i'm holding down a job. i'm doing the Adult Thing, which looks and acts like this, according to all the books i've read. you start with the shitty job and then you climb that corporate ladder.

but the shitty job doesn't cover rent and you stretch yourself too-thin so you get sick. good luck with that. the shitty job no longer pays for your meals. everyone asks why you don't just move, but there's nowhere to move to. and with what money are you going to be moving? and then the loans come back, because they were never going to forgive them, because you were 17 and trying to do the right thing, which was stupid. people are now saying you shouldn't have even gone to school.

which is fine. but because you have no other option, so you do the shitty job, and you apply every day for like 5 new ones, and despite the fact everyone says "there's no one who wants to work!" it's actually just that nobody is fucking hiring so you can either work for 13 dollars an hour in the shitty place you know (where at least you have a passingly friendly relationship with the manager) or you can start from scratch again with a different 13 dollars an hour without knowing how much abuse from the new job you'll be taking.

and if you quit you lose your insurance. if you quit you lose your housing. if you quit, you'll be another burnout kid. the lazy ones. these assholes, look at them!

and you come home to a family dinner and you hear from your father the same old thing. how he worked hard at his job and yes it sucked for a while but he was able to provide for the family and then the house and the dog and the rest of barbie's dream vacation. how the insurance did cover some of it. how you just really need to start speaking up more in manager conversations so they know you're a go-getter. you want to tell him - did you know we're actually doing more now hourly than any previous generation? - but you can't remember where you heard that statistic, and you're far too tired for the fucking argument. and then he starts in on his usual bit. where's the house? where's your kids? where's your ambition.

the same job the same money the same hours doesn't do it anymore. the same nose-to-the-grindstone now just shreds your face off. there's no such thing as upwards mobility, not really. and as far as you're aware, the money certainly is not trickling. you do the soulless stupid shit you signed up for because you fucking have to or else you literally risk your life (food, the apartment, the insurance), but it's not getting you anything. you download the stupid "save more" app and you budget and you do every right thing and then the price of eggs is 7 dollars and you say - oh great! another thing i have to fucking worry about now!

and you go to your stupid job and everyone in your father's generation just tells you to be better about being an adult. they have their homes and their savings account and their bailout and they say. well have you tried not drinking starbucks. well your generation just spends too much on clothing. well you might just be too addicted to travelling. and you - because you need the job - you bite your tongue and don't say i am being held prisoner and you're suggesting i stop pacing my cell if i don't like the scenery and you don't say what the fuck do you think i've been doing with my money and you don't say i haven't spent a cent on something nice in literally forever much less coffee you arrogant asshole. you open and close your bank app and check your loans and check your credit score and check fucking zillow and ziprecruiter and apartments.com just one time more. and still they give you that demeaning little grin and say - see, what you need is -

what you need is for your meds to stop being so fucking expensive. what you need is for the housing bubble to explode into dust. what you need is for billionaires to choke on their wealth. what you need is actual help. what you will get is more economic advice from people who are older-and-wiser.

and above you, almost in a glimmer, you can see the wedged smile of your debt getting toothier, wider.

[brightlotusmoon]

https://mobile.twitter.com/nyxeiodeon/status/1613290554195955731?s=46&t=60mc076blPneTxyhvycsMQ

[castiels-slinky]

RED DWARF HCS!!!!

Rimmer is biromantic asexual. (Internalized homophobia, though; he believes that he is broken and tries to act as if he isn't in order to "fix it".)

Kryten doesn't identify with any gender, but he does usually use he/him pronouns for simplicity.

The Cat does, in fact, have a tail! He just hides it so no one pulls on it.

Lister enjoys making pillow forts, especially when he wants to watch his favorite shows.

Lister's also intersex because I said so.

Rimmer secretly cares deeply for everyone aboard RD. Yes, even the skutters. He knows all of their names and pronouns and everything.

Lister was heavily influenced by David Bowie, KISS, and the Sex Pistols. They all made him want to learn to play guitar and perform.

Kryten is SUPER into reality TV.

He has gotten everyone else into it.

They watch Keeping Up With the Kardashians together.

KOCHANSKI??? TRANSFEM.

Lister wants to decorate jackets for the other Boys From The Dwarf (tm), complete with all sorts of patches and buttons that he feels like they would identify with.

Rimmer loves to paint. While soft-light, not being able to do that upsets him greatly.

He is also VERY tactile. Being hard-light has made him far happier than he would ever admit simply because he can touch.

The Cat has made it his mission to try to bedazzle Rimmer's 'H'.

Holly is genderfluid who doesn't give a damn.

She's like. "She/Her? Yep." And then randomly goes, "Actually, he/him. No wait-"

They have game nights and such! Movie nights, too. They once all made friendship bracelets for each other.

Friendly reminder that my ask box is ALWAYS open! Feel free to drop headcanon requests. It always makes me happy! :)

[once-delight]

A boy and his beautiful, fascinating blender.

WIP, lol

[thatfrenchacademic]

"You have such great people skill! I am too abrasive, I'm not good at that."

Mate it doesn't exactly come naturally ok. My agoraphobic ass is, by default, spectacularly off-putting, a terrible conversationalist and account of hating having to make conversations, and really abrasive because "why are you still talking" and "so can I stop the conversation like, now?" is always on the tip of my tongue and will jump out of my mouth if I don't clamp down on it.

I think some people naturally have people skills ? But also many just LEARN them, the way you learn any skill. And you can have good people skills without enjoying interacting with people. You can have decent people skills even when conversation and people still does not make sense. You can absolutely bullshit your way into people skills because a lot of it is surface-level interactions that are virtually always the same. Lots of books, workbooks and manuals today will breakdown how to hold a conversation in various environments - and learning how to do it, even if I don't enjoy it and it still makes very little sense to me why we do things that way and it is still stressful and I would much rather NOT do any of it is a LIFESAVER.

What I am saying is, treat "people skills" like "basic cooking skills" or "cleaning skills". It doesn't matter if you don't enjoy it, if you are not interested in digging deeper, if it doesn't come off naturally, if the result is not outstanding, whatever. You just need these basics to get by in life, and it will make your life so much more easier. Getting started in the hardest part, it's intimidating, and you are super aware that you do NOT have the skills that every seems to have. Cooking skills approach: start small, start somewhere, read about it, and go from there.