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May 22 2023
PDA: Are we repeating the same mistakes we’ve already made?

This article was co-authored by David Gray-Hammond, Tanya Adkin, and Autball

If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a noise?

While a lot of PDA literature, including the recent practice guidance, does indeed state that non-speakers and intellectually disabled Autistic people can have a PDA profile, are we ignoring the elephant in the room?

What does PDA look like in non-speakers and intellectually disabled Autistic people?

Nobody seems to know.

“Those with severe IDD were excluded from some of the analyses regarding the rate of PDA in subgroups, given that it is difficult to envisage the whole PDA phenotype developing in an individual with severe or profound general cognitive dysfunction.”

Gillberg et al (2015)

It seems as if no one has even asked them about their experiences.

“For this study, only data from parents who reported their child to have mild or no learning difficulties/intellectual disability were included in the analysis.”

O’Nions et al (2014)

The above quote was taken from a paper called “Development of the ‘Extreme Demand Avoidance Questionnaire’(EDA‐Q): preliminary observations on a trait measure for Pathological Demand Avoidance.” It literally sought to develop, and did develop, a tool for the identification of extreme demand avoidance/PDA. While guidance does say that the EDA-Q is not a diagnostic tool, they also say the following:

“Nevertheless the EDA-Q is useful in assessments”

PDA Society Practice Guidance

Much in the way that historical research around autism has looked at young, white boys, creating bias in the diagnostic criteria (which is responsible for an unfathomable amount of harm); we are creating diagnostic (but not) tools for PDA that exclude intellectually disabled Autistic people. No wonder we aren’t finding them!

There seems to be some very familiar narratives appearing around PDA.

There is a suggestion of a spectrum of which PDA only exists in those with average or above average IQ’s. This is disturbingly reminiscent of Asperger’s and the sub-categories of autism that were consolidated in the DSM 5. The era in which PDA was conceived was the era of the spectrum. It seems that we left PDA behind.

One of the reasons these sub-categories were consolidated is because of the lack of diagnostic consistency, much like we see within the PDA narrative now. We have clinicians refusing to accept it’s existence, additions and adaptations to criteria, the not so subtle suggestion that PDA can only exist within a certain type of cognitive function. Those that think it is not exclusive to Autistic experience, and those that think it is a trauma-response or highly sensitive neuroception. There is no agreement as to what PDA is. As such, it’s no wonder that so many clinicians are refusing to accept it’s existence.

Another one of the reasons for the consolidation was the tendency to dismiss the needs and struggles of those that were labelled “aspergers” or “high functioning”, versus the ignorance of autonomy in those deemed “low functioning” and the attribution of any co-occurrences to “severe autism”. Is the reason we are not identifying intellectually disabled PDA’ers because those driving the narrative are attributing any additional needs to “severe autism”? This would also explain the exclusion of non-speakers. They have not moved on from the spectrum era.

We also need to consider “Aspie supremacy” where by a group of people considered “aspergers” felt that they were superior and separate to “general Autistics”. We are seeing the same thing arise in corners of the PDA community and we believe that the exclusion of intellectual disability from the narrative is contributing to this.

There is literal and blatant exclusion of non-speakers. This is done by leaning heavily on speech and language, and “high verbal ability” in the suggested identification of the PDA profile. Again, have we learned nothing? The long held assumption, that non-speaking meant non-thinking and non-feeling, seems ever prevalent in narratives around who does or does not fit the criteria for PDA.

We are not saying that PDA does not exist. The authors of this are either PDA or have PDA children themselves. What we are concerned about is the proliferation of harmful and exclusionary narratives, and the way they create division from the community. The things that are often most helpful in understanding one’s neurodivergence is a consistent and inclusive idea of what that means. We have often discussed the trauma that Autistic people experience, could the narratives around PDA be contributing to that?

If the professionals who are trying to control the positioning around what is PDA can not even agree without arbitrarily excluding people, maybe they should back away. Where is the voice of PDA individuals in the development of research and guidance? The Autistic community as a whole tends to do far better at defining and explaining Autistic experience than any observational model, we can see this in the leaps we have taken in research. It’s time that PDA individuals were offered the same privilege.

Learn from past mistakes, in an effort to not repeat them. So in answer to the question “if a tree falls in the woods and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” YES. It does. Does PDA exist within intellectually disabled and non-speaking communities? Just because researchers haven’t decided that it’s worth looking at doesn’t mean the answer is no.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
May 8 2023
Mask on, Mask off: How the common understanding of Autistic masking is creating another mask

This post was authored by Tanya Adkin

Over the years I’ve been privileged enough to play a part in the discovery journey of what must be hundreds of Autistic people. One of the questions I am frequently asked about masking is “how do I unmask?”, as if there is a more authentic version of themselves that exists below the layers of neuronormative conditioning and the traumas that come with that.

My answer is often received as quite shocking. You don’t unmask. Not consciously, at least.

Masking tends to be commonly understood (thanks to some really interesting literature) as a choice. Almost as if when somebody suggests that we are Autistic, or we come to that realisation, we can begin to remove parts of ourselves that we deem “inauthentic” or “forced”, but where is the roadmap that tells us which parts are inauthentic or forced? How do we know what is the mask and what is us?

Autistic masking (also referred to in the literature as camouflaging, compensation, and most recently “adaptive morphing”) is the conscious or unconscious suppression of natural responses and adoption of alternatives across a range of domains including social interaction, sensory experience, cognition, movement, and behavior.

Pearson & Rose, 2021

To sum up the above quote, while we can consciously choose to conceal authentic Autistic expression as a way to avoid stigma; masking is also an unconscious projection of acceptability in an effort to avoid traumatic situations that arise from our differences. Projecting acceptability does not just mean pretending to appear more neurotypical.

Much like water, we take the shape of our container. To put it another way, we don’t choose the form that our masking takes, the environments we exist within often choose it for us. This is why many Autistic people experience internalised ableism, the environment of neuronormative society teaches us that we are broken and unworthy.

These attitudes are taught to us from the moment we commence education. Schools that give out attendance rewards, and punish children and families that struggle to engage, usually because of unmet needs or disability.

Gray-Hammond & Adkin, 2021

This feeds back into Beardon’s Golden equation:

Autism + Environment = Outcome

It stands to reason then that if you have been unconsciously masking for a significant amount of time in order to protect yourself due to previously traumatic experiences, you may not even be aware of the ways in which you conceal yourself. Traumatic experiences for an Autistic person are unavoidable (Gray-Hammond & Adkin, 2021), therefore an unconscious response to said trauma in the form of projecting acceptability is also unavoidable.

50% of Autistic people are alexithymic (Kinnaird et al, 2019). Which means that we have difficulties reading, interpreting, or even feeling our emotions. Emotions are an internal sense, this sense is called interoception. When we talk about alexithymia what we are talking about is interoceptive differences specifically related to our experiences of emotion. If we have interoceptive differences, how are we supposed to know which internal authentic expressions we are unconsciously masking?

I posit that masking is one of the most authentically Autistic expressions. It’s been argued that not all Autistic people mask, what we actually know is that all people mask, regardless of their neurology. This has been called many different things, from “using a telelphone voice” to code switching. All of us mask, it’s a human experience. For monotropic people, who cannot perform neurotypicality as comfortably as a polytropic person might, the taxation on one’s attentional resources can be huge. This then leads to monotropic split (Adkin, 2022), burnout, potential suicidality, and mental health concerns.

If all humans mask to some degree then so do all Autistic people. We need to get rid of the notion that masking is appearing more neurotypical. This may not be achievable for everyone. There are often phrases thrown around such as “high-masking” or “unable to mask”. To me this is repackaging of functioning labels. Truth be told if we are basing our analysis of somebody’s ability to mask on how neurotypical they appear, we are missing the entire point of an unconscious trauma response.

If cognitively privileged Autistic people are unable to articulate the beginnings and ends of an unconscious mask, then who are we to impose our own unconscious masking onto another. We are reinforcing neuronormative and ableist stereotypes by assuming that all masking is about performing neurotypicality, and that neurotypicality is something we should emulate.

When we discover our Autistic identity, our environment changes. The vessel in which we exist is changing shape, so therefore so are we. This could be the literature, the information absorbed in google searches, the attitudes around us (such as those of Autistic advocates). It could reinforce negative views of ourselves.

What people are really asking is not how to unmask, but “how do I behave more Autistically?”

The unconscious masking is so ingrained into us that the assumption is often “if I behave Autistically, things will be better”. Which in its own way is a conscious expression of masking in order to avoid the traumas which masking created in the first place. It follows a cycle of imposter sydrome. Doubting one’s identity, because you don’t flap your hands, or because you are considered “sociable”. I am not ashamed to admit that I have been formally identified twice because of this.

We share commonality but when you’ve met one Autistic person, you have met one Autistic person. Our life experiences (like it or not) shape who we are. The concept of unmasking can oftentimes (in my experience) create somewhat of a secondary identity crisis. You unconsciously consider yourself not neurotypical enough, but also not Autistic enough. Further from this, we can see exaggerated expressions of the Autistic Self as a way to project acceptability within the new environment in which we now exist. Also, as a way to deter potentially harmful environmental interference.

We become angry, and rightfully so. We may notice that we have been too passive, we are given a licence to lean into stereotypical Autistic expression. There is nothing wrong with that. One could say that we try on the Autistic mask because this is how we have been conditioned to behave.

It is still very much an unconscious projection of acceptability in order to keep oneself safe. So therefore, we do not unmask in the way that many think we do; we do not peel of our face to leave by the bedside at night time. You are already authentically Autistic.

It takes time, but what we can do is become more aware of our environments and reframe our own experiences thus far, which eventually, hopefully, leads us to exist in a way that is least taxing on our internal resources but also keeps us safe.

References

Adkin, T (2022) What is monotropic split? Emergent Divergence. emergentdivergence.com

Gray-Hammond, D & Adkin, T (2021) Creating Autistic Suffering: Ableism and Discrimination. Emergent Divergence. emergentdivergence.com

Kinnaird, E., Stewart, C., & Tchanturia, K. (2019). Investigating alexithymia in autism: A systematic review and meta-analysis. European Psychiatry, 55, 80-89.

Pearson, A., & Rose, K. (2021). A conceptual analysis of autistic masking: Understanding the narrative of stigma and the illusion of choice. Autism in Adulthood, 3(1), 52-60.

Tanya Adkin 1 Comments
Mar 31 2023
The reality of how cure culture interrupts the neurodiversity movement
Scene from X-Men Rogue enters and says "Is it true professor, they can cure us?" Professor X answers "Yes, Rogue. It appears to be true" Storm intersects "No, Professor. They can't cure us. You wanna know why? Because there's nothing to cure, nothing wrong with you. Or any of us, for that matter".
Scene from X-men

The above scene is quite poinient to the topic of this article. Here we have Rogue, a mutant who kills everything she touches, and Storm, who can control the weather.

One might be forgiven for not necessarily seeing the connection between this and Autistic experience, but it is in fact a very good allegory for the battle between the normative violence of cure culture, and the neuroqueering approach of a lot of the Autistic community. Rogue and storm disagree on the benefits of a cure because they both have different profiles of how they embody their Self and experience the world.

In much the same way, Autistic people who support cure culture are ostracised and spoken poorly of. I’m going to let you in on something, I used to be one of then. I longed for someone to make me “normal”. I was tired of being the outsider. I, of course, was lucky enough to discover the Autistic community. I learned how to co-exist with my particular profile of traits and intersections. I was taught how to make the best of being a marginalised person, and came to see the harmfulness of cure culture.

Not everyone has had the access to the community I have had.

There in lies the crux of the matter. The cult of normality, peddlers of normative oppression, face less scrutiny while our energies are spent fighting amongst ourselves. While hearing the harmful views of those who are yet to dismantle their internalised ableism is difficult, we need to give them the space to learn and grow with us. If we are fighting each other, we are not fighting the system.

This isn’t to say that we should excuse or accept harmful words or behaviour, more a commentary on the idea that everyone is at a different stage on their journey of discovery and growth. Much as we were brought in from the harsh cold of society, we need to create a space where those with less knowledge and self-acceptance are willing to listen to us and grow alongside us.

Cure culture has done so much harm. From the children being fed bleach, to the trauma Autistics experience hearing those stories, to the civil wars in our own communities. We need to find a way of showing that we understand.

This is what we need to understand; all of us have our own unique experience of being Autistic. Much as Rogue and Storm has vastly different experiences of being mutants, not every Autistic person has a profile of traits and intersections that is congruent with our own. Some of us have been so traumatised that we can not come to terms with our Self. We need to help people come to love who they are, even if that person has more negative experiences than we do.

We need to consider how we create a world that truly accommodates diversity, and not just the pretty, idealistic version of diversity that sells t-shirts and pays lip service during company diversity campaigns.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Feb 14 2023
The infantilisation of Autistic people and the future of our blossoming culture

I would be lying if I said I was not somewhat inspired by the fact that it is Valentine’s day today. It’s a day that gets mixed responses from the Autistic community. Relationships are often a touchy subject for us. We live in a world that fights hard to keep us at the fringes. This, of course, led me to a talking point that has been considered time and again. Autistic people are not perpetual children. We do become Autistic adults, and we engage in adult relationships. You might think that this is all that needs to be said, but actually, there is a deeper conversation to be had about the infantilisation of our community and how this impacts our growing culture.

Wider society views us as “less than”. This is not a debatable point. It’s a fact. When you consider the history of autism and neurodiversity as a whole; we have been relegated to a lower rung of the social ladder than those who can successfully perform neurotypicality. We are treated as though we are child-like, and at times as though we aren’t even human. I have genuinely heard people say that having sex with an Autistic adult should be criminalised. It is assumed that we lack the capacity to make those sorts of choices for ourselves.

Let me pause their for a minute. Yes, it is true that there are Autistic people who lack the capacity to make decisions around romantic and sexual partners. There are Autistic people who are very vulnerable, whom predators wait to take advantage of. I do not want to take away from this. What I want to highlight is that Autistic people, in general, are more than capable of deciding they want to engage in an adult relationship or sex.

So now, we are left with this uncomfortable fact; we are seen as perpetual children. What purpose does it actually serve for those in power and privilege to allow the perpetuation of an idea that is so incredibly incorrect and harmful?

Autistic people are finding new ways to connect and organise. This has resulted in us having our own dialect, forms of socialisation, social rules, and collective hopes and dreams for the future. The growth of the online neurodiversity movement has empowered Autistic people beyond the point of activism. At this point, we are an emerging counter-culture. This is an important distinction to make.

By centring our existence as an identity and culture, we are disempowering medical and diagnostic models of neurodiversity. Normative systems have relied on the framing of autism as a condition of asociality and a lack of meaningful personhood. If we are emerging as a culture, clearly, we are more than a tick box exercise that can be used to fuel a captialist medical industrial complex. The claim that we lack sociality and personhood is fundamentally dismantled when we show the world that we are capable of not just building a culture but building one that diametrically opposes existing oppressive structures.

The quickest way to conquer your cognitive dissonance in this scenario is to assume we are incompetent. This incompetence comes on the form of infantilisation, which itself is rooted in childism and the assumption that all child-like people lack full personhood.

This is why, for the sake of our communities future, we need to crush infantilisation. We need to demonstrate not just our personhood but the reality of Autistic adulthood. We need to build the taboo nature of adult pursuits into our culture. This has been all-the-more important to me in my work with Autistic drug users. So many times have I seen Autistic people denied support because “Autistic people don’t use drugs”. Infantilisation is more insidious than invalidation of out culture, it is life-threatening.

If we want to move into a future where being Autistic can be more than an identity in a hidden counter-culture, we need to start by disproving the idea that we lack competence. We need to take a stand and demonstrate that we will not tolerate being treated as children.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Jan 8 2023
Cure culture and normative attitudes towards Autistic people

Nothing sickens me more than people who believe that being Autistic requires intervention. The idea that we have to “improve” an Autistic person’s “skills” is in inherently ableist. Where does this ableism come from?

The truth of the matter is that as we edge closer and closer to a post-normal society, those who have succumbed to normativity fight hard to preserve the world that they believe is “right”. We have been taught that deviation from cultural norms is a disorder, but this is an abject lie.

Society has been built upon a foundation of bigotry and oppression of minorities. When we subscribe to the idea that Autistic people are suffering or in need of intervention, we further that belief. We have centred our own normative ideas into disabled people and made our internalised bigotry their problem.

When we can recognise that the problem is not the Autistic person, we are then able to externalise the issue into the environment. If you want to know why Autistic people are suffering, look no further than their experiences of the wider world and their immediate environment.

The responsibility is not on Autistic people to assimilate into society. The responsibility lies with society to make space for the inclusion of Autistic people.

Every time you empower the curists, you set a blockade on our path to progress. If you are reading this thinking “but you’re not like my child” I would respond with this-

No, I am not, I am an adult. I would ask you to consider why you believe your child is abnormal, where you learned your standards of normalcy from, and why you believe normality to be so important. We have a right to grow and change into whoever we wish to be. No one should be trying to control our expression of the Self, or the way we think and relate to the world.

I ask only one thing of my readers. Please step away from the concept of normal. Recognise that all normality measures is how comfortably we can serve a society that doesn’t give a damn about us.

If we can’t operate at the right level of productivity, without causing a nuisance to other people, we are written off. This is the world that curists want us to fit into, a world that would sooner destroy us than make space for us to exist as whole people.

We have a write to our Self.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Dec 29 2022
Spectrum 10k is still not acceptable, here are three reasons why

It is perhaps fitting that Spectrum 10k has reappeared during the dark months of the year. Much like the cryptids of antiquity, it inspires fear in our community, and obscures itself from the sight of all who attempt to quantify it’s nature.

There are no “versions” of the truth. Truth is a singular point, constructed from a collective of subjective experiences. So when the collective experience of the Autistic community tells you that S10k is the wolf among the lambs, we beg you to take heed.

There are three points I want you to consider before handing your DNA over to these malefactors:

1. There is no acceptable version of this study in it’s current form.

Regardless of how they dress it up, no matter how much they polish this particular turd, this is still the starting point of a eugenics program. They want to find the genetic root of autism, and by doing so, open the door to pre-natal testing. If you don’t realise what this means, please Google the amniocentesis test for down-syndrome, and how it has decimated the right of this minority to exist.

2. They are exploiting Autistic people to conduct the newly required “consultations”.

The people conducting these consultations want Autistic people to rehash our concerns for them, concerns that were so important to them that they didn’t take the time to listen the first time. Not only do they want us to repeat ourselves, I very much doubt this traumatic experience will come with any recompense. They also want us to do this without shouting them down. Perhaps, if they don’t want to be shouted down by Autistics, they should stop running projects that could lead to our eradication.

3. They are using token Autistics to manipulate us into engaging.

The fact that they are employing Autistic people to lead consultations is not an accident. It is a direct attempt to tug on our heart strings, and present an air of acceptability to the project. It is my belief that they hope we will believe that they’ve changed, and that it’s different this time, and that we will be more willing to engage with them.

The truth is that they are still using the same misdirection and subterfuge that they always have. Just because the nice man offers you candy, doesn’t mean you should get into the windowless van.

We as a community need to boycott not just this project, but all projects by those involved in the future. If we can show people that their careers are in jeopardy, they will be less likely to make this attempt in the future.

You may feel my words are hyperbolic in nature, but the Autistic community is my chosen family, and when someone threatens my family, I will use my words as weapons. Autistic people have a right to exist, and this flagrant example of ableism and disdain for our existence will become a significant part of our history.

It’s up to you to decide which side of that history you want to be on.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Dec 13 2022
Neuroqueer: Dismantling our internalised ableism

This article was co-authored by David Gray-Hammond and Katie Munday

Trigger Warning: This article contains references to systemic and structural oppression, multiple marginalisation, and negative wellbeing and identity.

Ableism is prevalent in the wider world, but something that we often don’t consider is the ableist views we hold about ourselves. It is inevitable that after spending our lives surrounded by normative culture, we become conditioned to view ourselves as broken, deficient, or less than. Despite being able to share compassion with others, we still harbour overtly bigoted views towards ourselves.

We internalise the harmful things said to us by our peers and professionals – sometimes even partners and friends. We take them all in and think less of ourselves and we begin to believe that there is something wrong with us.

It is clear that our interactions with other people play a significant role in the development of our sense of Self. Our identity is constructed by interactions with people in our environment, as noted in the golden equation from Luke Beardon:

Autism + Environment = Outcome

When Autistic people are in an environment that constantly belittles and mistreats us for our Autistic embodiment, the materials that we can access to construct ourselves are often self-deprecating.

How does one dismantle a lifetime of criticism and negative views arising from those experiences? First we have to understand the impact that said criticism has had on our psychological wellbeing. We have to recognise the neutrality of human thought, we have to learn that not all thoughts we have are reflective of who we are. It is possible to have negative thoughts without judging them as an indictment on our character. Once we begin to do this we are able to replace the criticisms with authenticity; a refusal to be ashamed of our embodiment. Perhaps, then, this is where neuroqueering comes into play.

It’s important to note the privilege at play when people are safe to queer their neurology. Authentic embodiment of Autistic experience can cost people their lives and their freedom in the wrong environment. Whether we care to admit it or not, not all Autistics are born equal in this society. Many Autistic people are multiply marginalised, and experience more than “just” disability discrimination.

One might ask whether or not neuroqueering is a physical act, or something that can be achieved in the mind. Many of us are at peace with ourselves whilst not openly confessing our Autistic experience. This reflects more on the environments that we inhabit than how we feel about ourselves. We can be proudly Autistic whilst understanding that not all environments are safe to authentically embody those experiences.

We also have to consider the role that the pathology paradigm plays in the existence of neuroqueering. The pathologisation and medicalisation of Autistic experience is the driving force behind most (if not all) of the ableism that we experience day-to-day. The idea that people who do not fit cultural standards of “normal” are broken, has not only created the mistreatment we experience; it also necessitated the existence of a counter-culture- neuroqueering.

How does neuroqueering change our perception of ourselves?

Neuroqueering can involve leaning into our weirdness, regardless of other’s opinions. It can also be radical self-acceptance and showing love to the parts of our Self that others have mistreated and abused. Not only does this allow us to reclaim the narrative surrounding our existence, it also gives us permission to take up the space that we have been conditioned to believe we are not entitled to.

Neuroqueer theory teaches us that assimilation denies us access to ourselves, and thus, denies access to the communities (or environments) that will help us meet our need for connection. Only by being our authentic selves can we find similar others and share in reciprocal validation. Neuroqueering dismantles internalised ableism, and the oppressive structures that have been built in our minds by others. It is a practice which champions diversity whilst appreciating that many of us still need support.

Neuroqueering politicises the nature of disability, centering us as the individuals in control of our own lives. Control that many of us are denied for being authentically Autistic. It allows us to appreciate the aforementioned neutrality of our existence through the lens of pride, and the refusal to be ashamed. It recognises that reduced wellbeing is the result of systemic oppression, and a chronic lack of access.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Dec 12 2022
Has TikTok become a modern day version of the freak show?

If you are active in disability communities, you have almost inevitably come across disability TikTok. Providing brief insights into the lives of disabled people, it is the fastest growing platform available for the dissemination of information, but is there a darker side to the virality of video’s relating to disability?

From Autism, to ADHD, to Tourettes. We are giving people our emotional label to see the world through our neurodivergent eyes; for no longer than 10 minutes at a time.

For many of us, it is a place to relate to one another and feel less alone, but what of those that watch us as “entertainment”? I myself use TikTok, and have been surprised at the number of people who clearly aren’t there to learn. I stay for those who are, but itakes me uncomfortable.

Our lives are not your entertainment.

We are real, human people, worthy of dignity and respect. Our attempts to show you this should not be fetishized and mocked. If you come to disabled TikTok purely to laugh at us; you are the problem.

I don’t exist purely to make you feel better about you’re own identity. I’m not your inspiration, and I’m not a museum exhibit in a cabinet of curiosities. My life has value, a value that can’t be measured in the monetisation of followers, or the number of people that use my struggles to inflate their sense of superiority.

No.

If you come into disabled spaces sans disability, you need to be willing to sit and listen. My struggles are not an invitation for you to voice how grateful you are that you are not me. My strengths are not a source of income, or fuel for your secret desire that superheroes exist.

I’m not the concept of disability that you have in your head. I’m not a fucking concept at all. I’m a real person with a real life.

If you can’t treat me with dignity, then kindly stay out of our spaces.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Jul 6 2022
Autism “cure” culture and normative violence

TRIGGER WARNING: This article contains detailed discussion of harmful “cures”. It also mentions ABA, MMS, Chelation, and has in depth discussion around normative society and the murder of Autistic people.

For as long as I have been an advocate, many of my fellow Autistics have spoken out against cure culture. From Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA) to Miracle Mineral Solution (MMS), there are myriad “treatments” that claim to purge the autism from autistic people. I could speak at length about the direct harm that these quack interventions inflict, but there is a deeper level of conversation to be had.

We are engaged, at present, in a culture war. On the one hand, we have Autistic culture which teaches us to be neurologically queer in every sense of the words. Be ourselves, connect with the self and express it in a way that honors our neurocognitice style. On the other hand, is cure culture.

Cure culture teaches us that who we are is broken, deficient, unrelentingly burdensome. Curists would have you believe that our lives are empty, broken, that we are trapped in a living death. Alive but somehow non-existent. The discourse around autism “cures” is dominated by non-autistic people who believe they are performing acts of mercy by pouring bleach solutions down our throats, and chelation drugs into our veins.

All of these things are a form of violence against a minority group that simply wants to live in peace. A minority group that intersects with many other oppressed demographics.

This is why Autistics get angry, this is why our lives revolve around our Autistic identity. Not only do we have to be Autistic in a world that desires normativity, we have to justify why we shouldn’t be tortured and murdered by people that are often (incorrectly) described as “well-meaning”. We constantly have to justify our existence. We are begging to be allowed to live while the world at large seeks to destroy us.

And yes, my Autistic self is defined by that which they seek to remove. Remove the autism, and you remove the person. Autism doesn’t even exist, only the Autistic-self exists. I am Autistic, not a person with a fucking carry-on bag where I store my quirks.

Do you want to know why pretty much every Autistic person you meet is at some level of burnout? It’s because we are dealing with this bullshit every second, of every minute. Every hour, of every day. By their nature, our lives require us to educate people on why we should be allowed to carry on existing. Have you tried to every account while teaching literally everyone you meet why being Autistic is not something to be grieved and/or corrected? It’s exhausting.

This is the culture war that we are fighting. We have no choice but to join the frontlines. We have to raise our voices above those who would speak over us.

After all, isn’t the whole point to leave a better world for our progeny?

David Gray-Hammond 5 Comments
Apr 2 2022
Shifting the paradigm on world autism day

April 2nd.

It’s a day that so many of us dread. For as long as “world autism day” has existed, it is a day where (much like every other day) adherents of the pathology paradigm do their best to drown out the voices of those that proudly display their Autistic selves.

Why are we so loud about our experiences as Autistic people? It’s not because we’re trying to take away access to support services for Autistic children, as a certain type of parent will have you believe. It’s because we want to make sure that Autistic people receive support that is not only accessible, but of good quality.

But is this far enough?

Truthfully, no.

Yes, in the current world, we need access to that support. We live in a world that disables us with it’s oppressive nature. The higher your support needs, the more our world seeks to dehumanise you. Should we not be aiming higher than supporting people in a world that treats us like a phenomenon to be studied and experimented on?

Imagine, for a moment, a world where everyone is treated equally. Imagine a world where no one has privilege over another, and no group is marginalised. Imagine a world where being Autistic is no longer a medical issue that requires diagnosis.

This is the world we should be aiming for.

Sadly, societal neuronormativity makes such a world feel impossible. Even the most neurologically queer of us have been raised and indoctrinated into a type of groupthink that makes the act of queering oneself away from said normativity feel like an extreme sport

For some of us, being true to ourselves means putting our life at risk.

In order to move beyond our current society , we must do more than queer the self. We must dismantle the system in which we live and rebuild it. For the new system to work, terms like “neurotypical” and “neurodivergent” must become irrelevant. We need a societal divergence towards a new normal, one in which normal no longer exists.

For this to work, we need to move away from discussion around “disorders” and “conditions” and towards a world in which identity and culture take centre stage. A world where no one needs supporting because society works for everyone, rather than a select few.

This world autism day, we must step forward with a renewed fervour for not just the destruction of ableism, but the belief that a better world is possible. Let April 2nd 2022 be the day that we choose the neurodiversity paradigm.

Perhaps, this time next year, we can wake up to a society that’s just a little bit more accepting than the one we’re in today.

One day, trauma won’t be the collective experience of our autistic culture.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
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