Most autists…

Most autists (people who are autistic) face a range of difficulties in social situations. But almost every social situation that autists face is with allists (non-autistic people). In social situations where the ratio of autists and allists is reversed, it’s the allists , not autists who face a similar range of difficulties.

Most autism “experts” (allists who study autists from an allistic perspective) have concluded that autists lack empathy. Autists are more likely to hyper empathetic or hypo empathetic than allists, but what sets autists apart is how we express our empathy.

Most autists avoid eye contact. Most autism “experts” will tell you it’s because autists lack an understanding of the importance of eye contact in social interactions. In other words, autists lack theory of mind. Most autists who avoid eye contact will tell you they do so because making eye contact presents a sensation ranging from “icky” to having the “soul exposed” to being physically painful. In my own case, I can, with some effort, consciously make eye contact even though I find it very unpleasant, or I can listen to what you are saying. I can’t do both.

Most autists don’t have prosopagnosia (face blindness), but it’s more common amongst autists than amongst allists. However most people with prosopagnosia are allists. I have prosopagnosia.

Most autists don’t have alexithymia (emotional blindness), but it’s more common amongst autists than amongst allists. However most people with alexithymia are allists. I have alexithymia

Most autists can communicate by speaking, but non-speakers are more common amongst autists than amongst allists. However most non-speakers are allists.

Most autists are straight, but autists are more likely to be homosexual, or bisexual than are allists. However most gays, lesbians and bi’s are allists.

Most autists have a sex drive, but autists are more likely to be asexual than are allists. However most asexual people allists.

Most autists are cis gendered but autists are more likely to be trans than are allists. However most transgender people are allists.

Most autists identify with a specific gender, but autists are more likely to be gender diverse or not identify with any gender than are allists. However, most gender diverse and agender/nongender people are allists. I view myself as agendered, but for reasons of safety (learnt the hard way in the 1950s – 1970s) present male.

Most autists do not suffer from migraines, but autists are more likely to be migraineurs than are allists. However most migraineurs are allists. I suffer from chronic migraines.

Most autists do not suffer from epilepsy, but autists are more likely to have epilepsy than are allists. However most epileptics are allists.

Most autists are employable, but it’s also true that most autists are unemployed or under employed. The cause is how allists perceive autists and/or refusing to accommodate the needs of autists. I was forced into early retirement, at the age of 50, due to burnout, although it would take another 10 years before I discovered it was caused through being an undiagnosed autist.

[TW: self harm, suicide] Most autists do not commit suicide but autists are nine times more likely to commit suicide than are allists. In America, autistic females are 37 times more likely than allistic females to attempt suicide.

Most autists experience meltdowns, shutdowns and/or burnout at some stage of their lives. Most allists perceive these to be wilful acts by autists in order get their own way or to gain attention. They are not. They are caused by emotional and/or sensory overload, over which the autist has little or no control. In the case of meltdowns or shutdowns, the best an autist can do is learn to avoid situations that might cause an overload (easier said than done) or learn how to be out of view of others when it occurs (also easier said than done). While burnout ( as a result of long term stress) is quite common for autists, it is especially common when they are unaware that they are autistic. In fact burnout can often lead to the discovery of being autistic as it eventually was in my case.

Most autists who undergo ABA therapy (known as conversion therapy when applied to other conditions) develop PTSD. Most allists are convinced ABA helps autists become more like their allist peers. Most autists view ABA as a form of torture that teaches autistic children that their needs and wants are less important than those around them, that compliance is more important than autonomy, and that they must pretend to be allists, otherwise known as masking. ABA does not make an autist less autistic.

So what’s my point? Autists are not the sum of our deficits. Yet we are collectively still perceived as somewhat less than fully human – inferior to allists. No, we are not. We are different, true. But that difference is primarily in how we experience the world around us, and as a consequence, how we respond to it. Current allistic understanding of autism and how allists respond to that understanding dehumanises us to such an extent that when an Autist is a victim of a “mercy killing”, the public and the media often empathise with the perpetrator rather than the victim, whereas if the victim had been born blind, or without legs , public and media empathy will be strongly in the victim’s favour with zero shown to the perpetrator.

Over the next few weeks, or months (you all know how irregular my posts can be) I intend to write a series of articles on how current medical and social understanding of Autism from an allist perspective causes Autists more harm than good and perpetuates the myth we are defective humans desperately in need of a cure, or failing that being eliminated from the human gene pool.

Watch this space (but don’t hold your breath).

Autism “awareness”

Ngā kaipānui kia ora

When I tell people about Autistic Pride they say, “how can you be proud of something that you have no control over? That doesn’t make sense? How can you be proud of being Autistic?”

Lyric Holmans, Neurodivergent Rebel

April is Autism Awareness month, and today, Saturday 2^nd April is World Autism Awareness Day. It’s a time when many autistic people “go into hiding”. Why? Because autism is still portrayed as a bogeyman – something that is undesirable, that destroys families, causes misery to “sufferers”, that needs to be eliminated. No it’s not. From my perspective, autism describes a way of perceiving and experiencing the world that is different from the way the majority of the population perceives and experiences the world. It’s not so much about deficits and disabilities, it’s about an alternate way of being. The bogeyman, if there is one, is that the non-autistic world writes of the autistic world as something undesirable.

So back to the question “How can you be proud of being Autistic?” I’d answer by saying “In the same way one can be proud of being gay or black or trans or Māori or Native American or…”. It’s a way of saying “Even though society devalues me for being who I am, and puts obstacles in my path that limits my ability to develop to my potential, I deserve to be recognised as a worthy and valuable member of society, and my rights and needs are no less important than the rights and needs of anyone else”.

I object to having an Autism Awareness month for the same reason I’d object to a Gay Awareness month of a Māori Awareness month. Look at it this way: there isn’t anyone who isn’t aware of there being gay people, trans people or people of colour, but that does not prevent the likes of racists, homophobes and transphobes from spreading hate and disinformation about them. It doesn’t prevent normal, intelligent people from failing to appreciate the social barriers that are placed in the way of individuals who are members of minority groups – in other words intentional and unintentional discrimination.

Likewise, I doubt that today there is a single person who isn’t aware of autism. For goodness sake, in some quarters, there’s panic about an “autism epidemic” being accelerated by vaccines or 5G or plastics or the New World Order or GMOs or… something. In fact it’s nothing more that a growing realisation within the health sector of what autism actually is. What is sad is if they had consulted with actually autistic people instead of making lab rats of us, they would have had that “Ah ha” moment long ago.

What we need is not awareness, but acceptance at a minimum. Better yet would be valuing the alternative perspectives that autistics and other other forms of neurodiversity bring to society. Because Autistic people perceive and experience society and the world differently, we express our experiences and understandings differently. Accept that our differences are not deficits, but are a valuable and important part of the diversity that makes the human species what it is.

Embrace diversity!

STOP Autism Research (There’s a BETTER Way)

The video says it all. There’s nothing more I need say. (Turn on closed captions if you have a hearing disability)

Not knowing what you don’t know.

Lyric Holmans has released a Youtube clip explaining why she finds people overwhelming. You can view the clip and read a transcription on her blog. Like her, I find people can be overwhelming, and the reasons are similar – non-vocal communications.

While humans may be the only species to have developed a language, all vertebrates and many invertebrates communicate in various ways with their own species, and to a lesser extent other species. And while non-vocal communication may take second place to spoken (or written) communication in humans, it remains an important factor in our everyday communications.

For the first 60 years of my life, I was totally unaware that language (spoken or written) was complemented by other forms of communication, namely body language and facial expressions. I’m not alone. Many people don’t realise that body language exists, but nevertheless, they use it and read it every day. It’s instinctive to them. For many autistics, including myself, its not. Hence the title of this article.

During those first 60 years, I was able to read body language in domestic pets – better than most people in fact – in babies and to a lesser extent, toddlers. But apart from the way lips form with a smile or laughter I was unaware that the face, especially the eyes, can convey a whole raft of emotions and ideas. Even so, I was unable to distinguish between a grin and a grimace. I was completely unaware that humans also used posture, movement of body and hands, even vocal pitch and volume to supplement the words they use.

Now that I do know that a significant part of human communication is non-vocal, I’m able to look for it, and that in itself can be overwhelming. In the first place, making a conscious effort to look for non-vocal communication requires effort, so much so, that sometimes I forget to listen to the actual words being spoken. And then I’m always asking myself whether or not a particular facial or body movement is indeed intended (intentionally or not) to communicate something. And if it is intended to communicate something, what exactly?

I managed to survive the first sixty years of my life, more or less intact, not knowing that body language and facial expressions play a vital role in interpersonal communications. I’m yet to be persuaded that knowing it exits at all, let alone its importance, makes my communication with others, as individuals or groups, any less overwhelming. In my case it might actually make it more so. Group dynamics is another mystery to me (Lyric touches on it in the post linked to above), but that’s a topic for another day.

ABA Therapy and PTSD

Think about it: almost half of all autistic people who undergo ABA “therapy” suffer from PTSD. As a follow up to yesterday’s post on the abusive nature of ABA, I recommend reading the following article:

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The “New ABA” is still all about compliance.

I was called “unethical” by a professional colleague today.

The reason may surprise you—I said “ABA is abuse”.  My peer was naturally taken aback because they are an SLP-BCBA and “would never dream of abusing a child.” I always find this rebuttal interesting because we usually don’t hear about people walking around admitting to abusing people; even overt predators somehow convince themselves that they are helping their victim. The sanctimonious SLP-BCBA told me that it was the “old ABA” and not “new ABA” that was harmful, and then only a small fraction of the time.  She accused me of “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” (I still don’t really understand how this idiomatic expression applies here) and she further went on to insist that there is “no way ABA could cause PTSD in people with Autism.” (She really meant “Autistic people,” I am sure.)

Humans have an amazing innate response to survive when they are faced with a threat or danger, fight, flight, or freeze. This is an automatic nervous system response. The fight and flight responses are triggered by the sympathetic nervous system, and the freeze response is triggered by the parasympathetic nervous system. Both of these systems combined make up the autonomic nervous system (ANS). When one of the responses is dispatched the human body simultaneously releases adrenaline and cortisol. If the ANA is only triggered once, for example maybe you almost rear-end someone while driving, your body would typically return to a calm state in 20-30 minutes. But, when the ANS is repeatedly triggered without time to regulate and return cortisol levels to a manageable level, what results is trauma-induced post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  (Cleveland Clinic, 2019)

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Visit the Therapist Neurodiversity Collective website to view the rest of the article

Autism: How to be normal (and why not to be)

This being autism awareness month, you’ll probably see me posting more articles about autism than normal. I make no apologies for doing so.

The following heartfelt Youtube video is from a TEDx presentation by a fellow autistic, Jolene Stockman. Her experiences very much parallel my own, apart from learning to drive (I found it easy and enjoyable) and the age at which being autistic was discovered (60 in my case).