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Feb 19 2023
Bigots keep trying to tell us the meaning of words, I have bad news for them

I have repeatedly seen bigots use the “correct” meaning of words in order to try and invalidate and oppress minority groups. An immediate example is the use of singular “they/them” pronouns. Ignoring the fact that the singular use of these pronouns outdates the use of the word “you“, there is further discussion that needs to be had.

The bigots are going to hate this.

Language, at an essential level, is the use of non-verbal symbols and organised sounds. We have, ad a society, decided that particular shapes, sounds, body movements, facial expressions, and actions mean things. The meaning of these things has arisen from our collective agreement. To put it another way, language is a social construct.

Because language is socially constructed, even if words have prior meanings, we can collectively choose a new meaning for those words. This has happened many times throughout history, and in some cases, we have invented entirely new linguistic conventions where prior ones have not been able to convey what we need them to.

The fun thing about language is that you can repurpose it with very few negative consequences. Don’t like a change? Don’t use it. These changes can have huge positive impacts when made in the right spirit.

Language is the biggest social endeavour in history. It is a work of art, and each of us is the artist. By experimenting with language and altering it, we can create new images that we never thought possible. Language is the social construct that controls all other constructs because without it, we can not convey information. This is why we need to honour the words that describe a person’s identity. They are using language as a tool to dismantle normativity. Each time a person uses the words that feel right to then, and not the words they’ve been told to use, the weaker the chains of normative oppression become.

The people who are so attached to their understanding of words that they can not fathom new uses are not the future of the human race. In order to meet the future, we must first cut loose the chains of the past. Normative thinking has so conditioned the bigots that they react with fear at the suggestion of making even the smallest of changes. Mankind can not survive with such aversion to change, and we need to recognise that growth, like many changes, is not always a matter of personal comfort.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Jan 22 2023
Spectrum 10k researchers have given up on hiding their eugenics agenda

CW: Termination of pregnancies, amniocentesis, pre-natal testing, eugenics

Edit: This is just a focus group at this point, but it is terrifying none-the-less.

Spectrum 10k is being run by a team from the Autism Research Centre (ARC) attached to the University of Cambridge. The scandalous research project has been a source of contention for a couple of years now, with researchers showing their flagrant disregard for the wishes and wellbeing of Autistic people in overt ways. Despite their claims that this project has no ties to eugenics, a leaked communication from ARC has now confirmed their intentions.

Find images below

The above images detail a project that will use amniocentesis to investigate hormone levels during pregnancy and how that relates to the development of autism in infants. This is troubling for a number of reasons.

You have probably heard of amniocentesis if you have had a child. It’s a test that involves taking a sample of amniotic fluid from the womb. Typically, this is used to test for Down Syndrome. If a pregnancy is found to test positive, the mother is offered the opportunity to terminate the pregnancy. Regardless of the complex reasons why someone might choose this, it is still eugenics.

Amniocentesis represents a huge ethical issue in medicine. Not only does it put the viability of a pregnancy at risk, it also provides parents with the opportunity to abort disabled children. It raises questions about quality of life, and right to life. Many people have this test, it is an everyday occurrence. Unfortunately, most people are not active in disability communities and can not conceive of why such practices are harmful and upsetting to our community.

In fact, doctors and midwives can be very pushy about amniocentesis. I have heard stories of mothers being tricked into consenting to the test. It highlights an issue where disabled people are viewed as less-than human and as a drain on resources and parental wellbeing. We ate told it is a kindness to prevent the birth of disabled people because we have been conditioned into believing that disability is a tragedy.

So why is it significant that the ARC is running this study?

It has one logical conclusion. The development of a pre-natal test for autism, that will allow for the termination of Autistic pregnancies. When you consider this alongside the Spectrum 10k project, it really shows just how desperate this research centre are to end the existence of Autistic people.

This sort of research comes from the twisted “ethics” of people who are so unaware of their own privilege that they are unable to conceive of Autistic people’s humanity. These people do not care for Autistic people. They only care about eradicating us. Neuronormativity in society has reached a terminal point, where we are willing to end the lives of people who are unlikely to conform to cultural norms.

If you threaten the status quo, they threaten your right to life.

Simon Baron-Cohen and his team are eugenicists. There isn’t any question about it. The research that has come from them over the years has been harmful (to say the least), but now the future of the Autistic community is in jeopardy. All Autistic people have a right to life, no matter how inconvenient it is for others.

I ask any of you who are approached to join this project to refuse. Tell them why they are harmful. Tell them why we will not stand for this flagrant disregard for the sanctity of Autistic lives.

We owe it to the Autistic people yet to come to make this kind of research unviable. It needs to have career ending ramifications for anyone who tries to end us.

David Gray-Hammond 3 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
Jan 2 2023
10,000 to midnight: Spectrum 10k and the struggle to exist

Spectrum 10k has been part of a world for over a year at this point, and it’s existence has taught us a great deal about our place in wider society; something we may forget if we do not step outside of Autistic circles all that often.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists runs a blog which houses something known as the dooms day clock. This metaphorical clock counts down to midnight, with midnight being the point in time when society comes to an end. It has been edging closer and closer to that point over the last few year. At the time of writing, the clock is set at 100 seconds to midnight.

The Autistic community, similarly, is facing it’s own collapse, and yet we are not as worried as we should be. For me, Spectrum 10k represents the beginning of the end. This is a study that could be a turning point in both the push to remove Autistic people from the human gene pool, or it could be the moment when people realise that we have a right to exist, and we will fight for that.

Currently, all that stands between us and the turning of the tide is 10,000 samples of DNA. Those 10,000 samples have the power to undermine our existence in a way that we are not yet fully comprehending. I doubt if even the scientists conducting the study are aware of the ramifications of their work; if they were, they might well pick a narrative and stick to it.

Autistic people have struggled to exist in perpetuity. Not because we are Autistic, but because the society we live in is supported by a structure built from oppresive normativity, colonialism, and bigotry. We have to tear down these structures, not just at the surface where projects such as S10k exist, but also at the root, where the coneptualisation of our personhood is misshapen and grotesque. Autistic people are not some sideshow exhibit, we do not exist to shock and astound you. There is beauty in our existence.

So, again we take up our arms, and prepare to fight the rising waters of normativity manifest in eugenics. Again we fight for our right to exist. Again we fight to have a peaceful and fulfilled life.

Those malefactors for whom the eradication of difference is a priority, will come to regret the side of history that they have chosen. We have drawn our line in the sand, we have declared our right to this space. Now we must defend it.

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
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