Search for:
Reclaiming Neurofuturism: Rhizomatic communities and the Chaotic Self

I have recently begun to explore the idea of the Autistic Rhizome as a futurist ideal of what the Autistic community could look like. In this concept, we explore communities that exist of networks with no single point of origin. They are interlinked but not dependent on one another for their existence.

You can read more about this here and here.

Co-existing with this idea is my concept of The Chaotic Self, which I first discussed in my book A Treatise on Chaos: Embracing the Chaotic Self and the art of neuroqueering. This idea position’s the Self as a fluid entity, constantly changing with each new interaction, making one’s identity as changeable as your hair colour.

What I would like to consider is the interplay between these two concepts.

If we consider the Autistic Rhizome, we are connected to one another either directly or indirectly. We are not independent of each other, but also do not rely on one another for our space in this rhizomatic network. What happens when we queer our neurology and alter our sense of Self?

As the Chaotic Self alters and grows, its relationship with the rest of the rhizome is altered. This affords it a different set of interactions and experiences, which in turn queers the Self further. Due to the interconnected nature of such a rhizomatic network, neuroqueer theory becomes farther reaching than ones own neurology. By queering ourselves, we are queering entire sections of humanity.

One could assume that at a certain degree of separation within the network, our reach is stifled, but as we queer ourselves, the relational change with our immediate environment transfers the process onwards to the rest of our community in somewhat of an u predictable manner.

Perhaps then, the argument could be made that if we want to alter society, we must first alter ourselves. When Walker (2021) tells us to “throw away the masters tools”, we must realise that we are the masters tools. Society has made us complicit in our own imprisonment. To throw away the tools means queering ourselves on a fundamental level. We must become different on an individual level and, in turn, alter the world around us.

As such, to embrace the Chaotic Self requires us to embrace the rhizome. We must recognise that any change to our own embodiment and subsequent relationship with the environment alters more than our inner world, it has knock on effects for the human collective, that itself is an ever-changing, amorphous entity.

Further Reading

Neuroqueer Heresies by Nick Walker

A Treatise on Chaos by David Gray-Hammond

I also recommend becoming familiar with the work of Delueze and Guattari for a broader understanding of some of the motivations behind this post.

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.

Coping with psychiatric medication when Autistic

For many of us, medication is a necessary part of life. For a huge portion of the Autistic population, that medication is prescribed by a psychiatrist.

Psychiatric medication can be a troublesome topic, psychiatry itself is a relatively young discipline, and can often be found to be neuronormative in nature. It relies on the idea that the human mind can become ill and require medicine to fix it, and yet no test can definitively prove the presence of this illness in the body. It seems logically absurd, and yet, mental health issues can cause immense suffering.

One of the most stressful parts of taking these kinds of medications is finding the right one. Each person brings a different neurology to the table, so when using psychiatric medications, which by their nature act on the brain, it is important to remember that there is no “one size fits all” approach. Each person will have a different experience with medication, and this issue is compounded when you consider the Autistic population, for whom little to know research is done on the efficacy and safety of medications.

This moves us neatly onto my next point, which is side effects. Autistic people often experience rare or paradoxical reactions to medications in my experience. A recent medication change for me actually turned the skin on my hands blue! This is why I always ask my psychiatrist to take the harm reduction approach of start low, go slow. In other words, start with the lowest reasonable dose, and very slowly titrate the dose up. I find that for me, this has helped me avoid many of the less tolerable side effects, and better tolerate the ones that I do get.

An interesting point raised by twitter user @lilririah is access to food. Many of these medications rely on the idea that people can eat regular, healthy meals. Something that prescribers should consider is that the world over is experiencing a huge rise in the cost of living which is having a huge impact on the disabled community at large. Telling someone they have to eat when they take their medicine can essentially be the same as telling people that they can not take the medicine. When the world is trying to decide between heating or eating, a life or death decision over important medications is not going to help their anxiety.

Once you have overcome all of this, there is the issue of maintaining the treatment. Medication comes with a lot of stigma that many of us internalise, and some people simply do not want the medication in the first place. While personal choice is important, and should come from an informed position, prescribers need to do more to help people maintain a healthy relationship with their medication. When you consider the Autistic and ADHD bodymind, it is easy to see how remembering to take a set dose at the same time every day could become problematic.

Assuming all of this isn’t an issue, there is one more problem I want to discuss. Sometimes medication just stops working. Sometimes we can be stable for years, and out of the blue, we fall apart. It is the unfortunate truth of psychiatric medication. This is why we have to be willing to go over this battle time and time again to stay balanced. I personally struggle with this part. I often wish for a magic pill that would make my psychosis go away forever, unfortunately, that does not exist. Besides, mental health is part of who we are, good or bad, it plays a role in our experience of the world.

Whether your mental health is in a good or bad place, we all have something to give to the world, we are all important in our own way. It’s easy to lose sight of that when you have grown up Autistic, constantly being invalidated and told that everything about you is wrong. I want to assure you that the world is better for having you in it, and the battle is worth it.

Stay strong.

Verified by MonsterInsights