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Jun 18 2023
Today is Autistic Pride Day: Let’s celebrate our diversity

I have been active in the Autistic community for some years now. I have come to realise that autism as a diagnosis has been somewhat of a failed experiment. Diagnostic models have failed to capture the intricacies of what they dub “autism spectrum disorder”. A lot of the issues with the diagnostic process itself come back to racial and socioeconomic bias in research literature; there are also significant issues with people gendering autism, creating exclusion by denial of gender and sexually diverse experiences.

The Autistic community is diverse. While autism itself is an abstract concept, the very real Autistic people that exist come from all parts of the tapestry of life. One might hope that the days of autism being a diagnosis of middle-class white males is coming to an end, but there is still significant disparity. This article highlights the significant gulf in diagnostic rates in the US alone. It is clear that BIPOC people are being ignored despite the countless voices from their communities speaking up.

I also recently wrote about queerness and being Autistic. Gender diversity and sexualities that do not fit into perceived heteronormativity account for a great deal of the Autistic community. Again, these groups may have a harder time getting a diagnosis due to ideas that position autism as something that is only observed between cis-gendered males. It is clear that if you don’t fit the historical research, diagnosticians will deny you exist.

But you do exist, like all of us. You have the same strengths and struggles, plus other struggles that I can not know as a person with the privileges I have.

When we speak of Autistic pride, I think many view it as cute little get togethers, spending time amongst our own people. That’s not entirely wrong, but Autistic pride, much like any pride, is so much more than celebrating. We are protesting. We are refusing to be ashamed, and what we need to stand against moving forward is the bigoted gatekeeping of the few who believe that multiply marginalised communities should be targeted and minimised.

Autistic pride requires us to root out the bigotry in not just wider society but also our own community. If there is even one person who can not celebrate their Autistic pride, then none of us can. Autistic people are a diverse people, and our fight will not succeed if we are not also fighting for our neurokin who exist at the intersections.

So today, and for all days to come. If someone asks you what Autistic pride is; tell them it is our fight to make sure the world has a place for all Autistic people, not just the select few who fit into the world normative standards. Let’s build a world together where intersectional communities can feel safe to express their experiences without fear of backlash or risk to wellbeing and life.

There is no Autistic liberation while any one of us is being oppressed.

David Gray-Hammond 7 Comments
Feb 4 2023
Neuroqueering religion and the liberation of human spirituality

When considering normative violence and the oppression of marginalised people, there are no greater perpetrators than the Christian Church. Allow me to put this in perspective. My mother is a priest, I was raised devoutly Christian, and until my mid-twenties, I had a strong relationship with the Christian idea of God. Sadly, my step away from Christianity was an inevitability. I had never understood their disdain for other cultures, religions, and gender and sexual identities. As a person who had never fit in, the exclusionary doctrine of the church felt very alienating for me.

Christianity is based on the teachings of Jesus Christ, who is platformed as the Son of God in Christianity. Through western, colonial, misappropriation of his teachings, eurocentric cultures have come to view Jesus as a passive, meek, and mild-mannered man. The idea of “love thy neighbour” is displayed as a call for passive acceptance of the world, rather than the fight to liberate all humans from what was, and still is, an oppressive system of normative bias.

Christians don’t like it when you point out that Jesus was a man who flipped tables and casually intervened in public executions.

So how does this fit into neuroqueering?

Neuroqueer theory teaches us that it is possible to subvert normative cultural standards. In the case of Christianity, those standards are passive indifference or overt displays of bigotry. For me, this cannot be allowed.

If I believe in any God, it is a God who created us all equal. Read that again. They created us ALL equal. That is if there was any intentionality in our existence before.

Since all religion is socially constructed, arising from human perception of what they believe to be the word of God, or Gods, this means that there is no invalid form of spirituality. There should be no one-size-fits-all approach to how we practice that spirituality.

Take the bits that work for you. Combine them and shape them. Mould them. If you want to be a Christian who celebrates Samhain and Solstice, go for it. Perhaps you have your own entirely unique spirituality? That’s fine, too. Build a spirituality that works for you without hurting others. Do as ye will, an it harm none. Explore culture and faith. Break free of the constraints of organised religion. Enter a world where humans can express and body their spiritual lives in infinite ways.

This is vital. If we are going to liberate the oppressed from the systemic violence of a normative world, all parts of human culture must be liberated. While any single one of us, while any aspect of our lives, is imprisoned by normativity, none of us are free. Allow your mind to explore itself. Embrace the Chaotic Self, and parlé your spirit into physical form through exploration and expression of your unique mind.

There are infinite variations of the human mind, meaning that there are infinite versions of human spirituality. Any attempt to confine us into a prefabricated spiritual reality is a terrible thing.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Jan 5 2023
How “mental illness” disempowers the average person

Over the past decade or so, we have seen a surge in the awareness of so-called “mental illness”.

While the concept of telling people you are struggling has served a good purpose, the concept of “illness” has actually disempowered people who have these particular neurodivergences and the people around them.

Human suffering, as it stands, is a heavily medicalised field of study. It has become the realm of doctors and nurses, and this is where we become disempowered. When we experience suffering, we believe that only doctors have the responsibility to remedy that. The average person is made to feel as though they are “out of their depth”.

In fact, the responsibility for reducing human suffering is on all of us. Medication can take the edge off, but to see a true reduction in trauma that litters our society, we all have to do work. Doctors are not responsible for the environments and people we grow up with, and yet we assume they are the answer when we experience suffering as a result of those things.

Society is structured in such a way that we are likely to encounter trauma throughout our lives. It is important to move beyond normative standards of trauma and recognise the subjective nature of this abstraction. What is traumatic for me may not be traumatic for you. It does not make it any less valid.

This is why we need to listen to minorities about minority experiences, ot allows us to root out the traumatic experiences occurring in society, and not just those which we recognise. When we invalidate another person’s experience, we are contributing to the immense suffering that is currently happening in our world.

Perhaps then, it is pertinent for us to take responsibility for the role we each take in the suffering of others and ensure that we are doing good with the limited time we have on earth.

Our psychological well-being is far from being solely the realm of medics. We each play a significant role in other people’s worlds.

David Gray-Hammond 8 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
Oct 23 2022
Social constructivism and the making of ethical decisions in Autistic lives

TRIGGER WARNING: Mention of Do Not Resuscitate directives and the pandemic

Autistic people are subject to countless rules that are seemingly arbitrary in nature while having a huge impact on our wellbeing. It has been a source of much contention in our relationships with the non-Autistic people in our lives; and our questioning of these rules is used to label us as disordered and defective in a neuronormative society. When it comes to ethical decision making, I believe that Autistic people have a unique insight into the current state of society thanks to the recognition of the arbitrary nature of normative morality.

In the Autistic community, ethics and morality are based on community consensus, rather than the word of an individual or limited group. While we have no laws to recognise, I should at this point acknowledge that there are unwritten rules (although increasingly they are being written down through self-exploration in the form of writing). The ethics of our current unwritten rules are a further conversation to be had.

What I find particularly interesting is that the Autistic community takes a social constructivist approach to ethics and morality. We acknowledge the existence of normative social rules, but write our own based on the knowledge generated within our community. This has pro’s and con’s; the discourse in the Autistic community is dominated by privilege, I should acknowledge that I am far from the only cis-gendered white male to be publishing his opinion in this community.

Despite this, Autistic people seem to be in a unique position to recognise that ‘one-size-fits-all’ approaches to morality tend to fail marginalised groups. It could be argued that we recognise this due to our own marginalised status, but also because we have a strong sense of justice.

What is important about social constructivism is that it recognises that all ethics and morality is subjective. What is just and fair to one individual or group may infringe upon the rights of another. A good example of this was the implementation of ‘Do Not Attempt Resuscitation’ directives imposed upon the disabled during the pandemic. While it allowed for more resources to be freed up in medical settings, it was a direct middle finger to our communities right to life.

This is one of the biggest issues in socially constructed morality and ethics. Different people have different privileges, and we have been effectively taught that “more rights for the marginalised means less for the privileged”. This is abjectly incorrect; it is inconsequential to the privileged if the marginalised are treated equitably, they will still retain their rights.

Thus we have to recognise that morality in our own community is not an objective truth. There are many things that are considered morally right by consensus, that still fail to ensure the protection of marginalised rights. Many of us do not have Autistic as our only marginalised identity. The vast majority of us are in fact multiply marginalised.

We must identify how the subjectivity of our community ethics ignore the privileges that give rise to them. Until we do this, there will be imbalance in the ethics of the Autistic community.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Jun 28 2022
More on Zeno’s Paradoxes and the issues with Autistic to non-Autistic communication

As you may have noticed from my most recent blog post, I am somewhat down a rabbit hole at the moment. In my previous article I discussed Zeno’s paradox of plurality and how it applies to the dehumanisation of Autistic people and the double empathy problem.

Today I would like to consider another of Zeno’s paradoxes and how it applies to the double empathy problem.

This particular paradox was known as the Dichotomy Paradox. Essentially, it explains that when travelling from point A to point B, one must first travel to the halfway point between the two. To then travel from that point to the destination, you must travel half way again. This continues infinitely when travelling towards a fixed destination and thus Zeno argued that you can never reach point B.

When considering communication across different neurocognitive styles, one must also consider what the goal is. If we presume that the goal is “successful communication” then the double empathy problem tells us that this is very difficult due to the different styles of communication. Despite this, Autistic people are always expected to be the ones to put the emotional labour into communicating. This has been discussed by Rachel Cullen, a recording of a livestream with Aucademy featuring them can be found here and here).

We then encounter the dichotomy paradox. Neurotypicals remain a fixed point in the goal of successful communication, while we as Autistics are constantly expected to move towards the goal by accommodating their preferred communication styles. It is as if we are constantly reaching the halfway point, and never reaching our destination. No matter how well we accommodate neurotypical preferences, we are caught in an infinite regression of distance, not achieving the aim.

This to me, highlights the deeper issue of dehumanisation and objectification of Autistics. Neurotypicals (perhaps subconsciously, sometimes consciously) consider themselves the pinnacle of humanity, a goal that all should be striving for. We know from the existence of the various compliance based behavioural interventions, that Neurotypicals do believe this in many cases. Evidenced by the fact that it is considered “gold-standard” to teach Autistic people to hide their Autistic nature.

As Dr. Monique Botha mentioned in their recent seminar, there is a reason why researchers and professionals insist on person-first language. “I want to eradicate autism” sounds much less like genocide than “I want to eradicate Autistic people”. However, both of those statements mean the same thing. This is justified because whether or not they overtly see it, neurologically queer behaviour and experience is seen as non-human. Remi Yergeau argued this dehumanisation was due (at least in part) to a perceived lack of rhetoricity in their book Authoring Autism.

Autistic people are viewed as husks, mindlessly performing nothing, controlled by an abstract spectre called autism. This then is perhaps why so many neurotypical people insist on person-first language, and ignore our preference of identity -first language. Why would they take a step towards the all consuming spectre? Surely it is better to leave such a thing trapped in that infinite journey towards a goal that is never to be reached.

This, then, is the appeal of neuroqueering to me. When I embrace my neuroqueer self, I no longer have to be trapped in the infinite journey towards performative neurotypicality. I escape the dichotomy paradox by abandoning societal expectations, and being true to myself. True to what nature intended for me. I am Autistic, I am divergent, and that divergence is a thing of beauty.

We need to raise up our fellow Autistics, high above the dichotomy of neurotypicality and neurodivergence. We need to embrace a world in which these words are redundant in meaning because no one group has the power to oppress another; and when our fellow Autistics are lost in the dark, we need to shine our own light, and guide them back to the daylight.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Apr 7 2022
Addiction advocacy and the inspiration paradox: A reflection at 6 years sober

Today I am 6 years sober from addiction. During those six years I have learnt many lessons, but in this reflection I would like to consider something that has played on my mind for the past three years of my advocacy work.

Inspiration.

While not overtly a bad thing, it is often misused to infantilise and minimise the achievements of disabled people while hiding behind a mask of feigned respect. This phenomenon is known as “inspiration porn”.

A good (hypothetical) example of such a thing would be a video of a disabled person doing something completely mundane, like dancing, but they would be dancing with a non-disabled person. The video would centre the non-disabled as some kind of saviour to the disabled person for doing something as basic as treating them like a human being. The implication of the video, albeit in subtext, would be “Look at the amazing things that disabled people can achieve when an abled person rescues them from their shameful existence”.

It’s dehumanising and wrong.

So, addiction advocacy.

As a recovering addict in the public eye, I do what I do because I want to help others overcome similar challenges to my own, and help reduce their suffering. This does in fact require inspiring people. If it weren’t for the sober addict who showed me kindness during my first stretch on a psychiatric ward, I might not have chosen recovery.

The fact that they had turned their life around, and become someone I wanted to look up to was inspiring, and that isn’t a bad thing.

What would be bad would be if people like myself are allowed to become another source of inspiration porn. It’s a difficult line to walk. I want people to have what I have found, not get off on the tragedies that have formed who I am.

Contrary to popular belief, addicts are people. We are not burdens, we don’t deserve our suffering. Regardless of whether or not we are in recovery, we deserve food, housing, health care, support, and kindness.

This is what I want to inspire in people.

So please, don’t look at me and think it’s a miracle that I recovered. My recovery shouldn’t be the inspiration. I was privileged to have a loving and supportive set of family and friends. I had good key workers (although the services they came from were woefully ill-equipped). I was in a place where I was ready to enter recovery.

What I want to inspire in you is the idea that all addicts deserve recovery. I want to inspire you to challenge the systems that keep people like me trapped in a world of suffering.

I want you to know that those with less privilege than myself need us to get in the trenches and help them fight this war.

If that is what I inspire in people, then I am happy with what I am doing. If, however, you look at me and see a walking miracle, then I have not gone far enough.

The tragedies and traumas of my life should not be celebrated. They should be wielded as weapons to dismantle the masters house, and rebuild it into something where we can all coexist and thrive.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Nov 29 2021
Marginalisation, discrimination, and the fear of being a hashtag

We’ve seen it happen countless times in recent years. A person from a marginalised demographic (usually BIPOC, disabled, or a combination of the two) is murdered by a figure of authority.

Usually the police, a teacher, or carer. They take lives with impunity.

The Internet is rightly outraged. Protests and riots occur. Online campaigns are started. Just like that, a persons identity is reduced to a hashtag.

This isn’t the fault of the outraged, the victimised, the disheartened. This is the fault of the perpetrator. Hashtag campaigns have shone lights into places that are often ignored. But still, the marginalised live in fear.

Fear of being killed.

Fear of being erased.

Fear of becoming another twitter trend.

No human being should have to live like this. Every human being has a fundamental right to life. In fact we have 30 human rights. I can’t name them all, no one ever taught them to me. It’s fundamentally wrong.

Marginalised groups are treated as disposable in a system that values eurocentric, able, capitalistic humans over all else. For me as a disabled person, I live every day acutely aware of societies disdain for me. Every part of the system is built in a way that says “you are not welcome here”.

I have a level of privilege thanks to my skin colour. I still face risks as a disabled person. I would hope that my chances of becoming a hashtag are reduced, but they are still more than my non-disabled peers.

When an entire life can be reduced to a hashtag, something is very wrong. We are all born with potential, more potential than capitalist society would have you believe. That potential can so easily be snuffed out and become just a name on the internet.

We need to dismantle not just the prejudice in the system, but the prejudice in ourselves that holds up a system that discriminates by design. Each of us harbours prejudice. To fix society, we first have to fix ourselves.

People complain about world governments like they are the sole perpetrators of a broken system. The system isn’t broken, it was built that way.

All the time that system exists, no government in the world will fix this situation.

David Gray-Hammond 1 Comments
Apr 20 2021
Autism, disability, accommodations, and the status quo

Let me start this piece with a massive shout out to Lyric Holmans (Neurodivergent Rebel). Their recent livestream with Aucademy provided a huge deal of inspiration for me to write this, and I can’t go ahead without giving credit where credit is due.

Autism. Is it a disability, or not? That question will have different answers depending on who you ask. The prevailing opinion is that, yes, it is a disability, but under the social model of disability. To define that in a nutshell, autism is a disability because society is not designed for autistic people.

So, why make accommodations?

By adapting the environment to be more comfortable for autistic people, autistic people feel less disabled. Our world is full of sensory bombardment, requirements for neurotypical time management skills, and things that need our attention. All of these things can be distressing to autistic people, and it is when an autistic person is distressed that they are at their most disabled.

But Lyric also illustrated a flip side to this. When we make the environment more comfortable for neurodivergent people, we generally make it more comfortable for everyone. When people in charge respond with “But everyone wants that!”, that’s the point. Make the environment comfortable for EVERYONE. No one group should get special treatment, neurotypical or neurodivergent.

This also feeds into “cure” culture. I am yet to see a “cure” or behavioural intervention that doesn’t increase an autistic person’s distress. However, making accommodations, in general, reduces distress. Lyric Spoke of square pegs being forced into round holes, why not adapt the hole to fit any shape of peg?

It is the status quo in society that makes autism a disability. That’s literally what the social model tells us. What we need is to rethink society to be inclusive of everyone, not just to have special designated spaces where autistic and otherwise neurodivergent individuals can feel comfortable. This applies to Autistics of any age.

Until we liberate society from its neuronormative approach to inclusion, many autistic people will continue to be disabled. It’s on all of us to create a world where anyone, regardless of disability, can enjoy a society free of ableism and truly inclusive of all.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Mar 19 2021
Filming addicts in crisis is a form of violence

I remember some years ago when the drug known as “spice” was sweeping through my country. Not only were the tabloids having a field day, and not only were people filming addicts on the street under the influence, I was using it.

It was a relatively common sight in some cities. Individuals helplessly and mindlessly stumbling around in a zombie like fashion, people screaming curses, refusing to see the suffering of those of us who were hooked on the stuff.

But what I really want to focus in on are the people who were filming us. They were the worst kind of people, and sadly, they still exist.

The people holding the cameras often claimed that they were “spreading awareness”. In fact what they did, was post the video to social media, and embark upon discussions of how people like me were scum, how we deserved to die, how our suffering was our own fault.

They weren’t spreading awareness, they were spreading hate. It was an act of violence against a group of people that are already significantly marginalised by society. It was the moral model of addiction running at full tilt.

When a person is suffering in such a way, filming them and posting it to Facebook is perhaps one of the most humiliating things you can do. Unfortunately, humiliation is what these people go for. People speak words and carry out acts of violence against addicts eith great regularity. Often without ever raising a fist.

I hope dearly that none of my followers have ever done such a thing. And if you have, I hope you have come to feel remorse about it. By doing such things, you are actively helping to kill addicts.

If it sounds like I am using strong words, then take heed. This is not a harmless matter. Imagine trying to rebuild your life from addiction while videos of you in the thick of it circulate on social media. The Internet is forever.

If you ever see a person suffering in such a way, please extend compassion. Make sure they are safe, call for any help that may be appropriate. You can also help protect opioid addicts by receiving naloxone training. The dawn of naloxone has saved many, many lives.

Addicts are human beings with emotions, hopes, and dreams. We are often traumatised children. Extend compassion where you can.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
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