In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Identity and Words

Three things:

First: Autistic v. person with autism. Seems somewhat petty an issue to take a stand on, no?
Person first versus identity first language when talking about autistic people is really not important. It seems rather inconsequential, even. Except in all the ways it is important.

Part of the thing is that Autistic people are routinely denied self-determination. And like the Deaf and Blind communities, Autistics went with the idea that you cannot disentangle the person from the autism. See, everything I do is coloured by autism, because autism is pervasive, but not everything (nothing, really) I do is only autism.
And most of us don't care about how others identify. What does raise our hackles is when we get told by others how we are supposed to talk about ourselves. What others telling us to call ourselves mean is This person denies me my right to identify myself. It means This person denies my self-determination.
And this is why we tend to take a stand on it.
Not because it matters, but because it matters.

Secondly: A while back [Anonymus exchanged the awareness of time and scales and movement for the constant awareness of all textures.] there was a short, light hearted discussion among some autistics on tumblr - centering around "I wish more disability communities would do identity first language."  and I have things to say. Not very nice things.
I know that we have good reasons for identity first language. We have arguments, and essays and well thought out responses as to why identity first. We had a discussion and as a community came to the consensus of identity first.
Thing is, so do the communities who prefer person first. They have arguments and essays and well thought out responses. They had a discussion. And their consensus was person first.
And we want our choice of identity first to be respected. We want our self-determination to be respected. We want our self-identification to be upheld.
So do they.
So lets not talk about hypothetical ways in which it would be better for other communities to change how they identify. Instead, lets respect their choice, and keep telling others to respect ours.

Lastly: A lot of "correct" ways to talk about disability is using a language that minimizes non-disabled peoples discomfort. And then I spend a lot of time laughing so that I won't cry.
Who on god's green earth thought it was a good idea to name the self-advocacy curriculum in the special ed. programme:

Difability and Life

?

Difability.
Difability.

I challenge you to attempt to say this out loud and NOT sound as if you are mocking someone with a lisp.

Difability.

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Friendship, Internalised ableism, and also uses the r-word

The reason I'm suddenly producing content here is that I'm back in school-school*, in a field I have no previous experience with, and I am procrastinating doing the reading. Mostly because the reading says "theory" and means "model", "theory" and means "hypothesis", "theory" and means "framework", and "theory" and means "process". This is upsetting to me.

Unrelated to that, [or actually, somewhat related] I'm thinking about dogmatic ideology and internalised ableism.

I have a friend [a friend? Aren't you autistic?], one might even say a best friend.
My best friend is also autistic. Or rather, my best friend happens to be a person with Asperger's, and does identify as "aspie" in relation to accomodations. She will agree that she has ~issues~ and requires accomodation. At times, she -demands- accomodation at the cost of others. [We have quite incompatible access needs, which is why this is annoying to me.] Her accomodations are always judged as more important than mine. [And this goes to the idea that we are all centres of our own universe, that I prioritise myself and she's prioritising herself isn't something strange to me.]

She is an aspie, in that she opposed the removal of the Asperger's Syndrome diagnostic lable from the DSM, and refuse to be refered to, or think of herself as 'autistic', or a 'person with autism', or even 'on the autism spectrum'. Why? Because 'autism' evokes a different image in the mind of society than 'aspie' does.  It is very much "I'm fine, not like those icky autistics" ("but you still need to accomodate me. But you know, I don't drool. I'm not retarded.").
As you might notice, our opinions are very different, and at times directly opposed to eachother.

And I get it. The popular stereotype about autism is not all that flattering. And I'm saying this as someone who does drool, and rocks and sits in corners and infodumps and doesn't do eyecontact and flaps and generally is very visibly disabled. I still don't get coded as autistic though, because most people read me as a woman. Popular opinion is that autistics need to be cured. That we lack self-awareness. That we don't even know that we are different. That we can't communicate, that we don't think.
It's insulting. But I can't help but wonder. Isn't it better to change the popular conception of autism, than to retreat into aspie elitism?

Dogmatic ideology would say that I can't be friends with her. Let alone -best- friends. See, we disagree on something that is very fundamental to me, Autistic pride, Autistic culture and disability activism. She is evil because she has internalised what society thinks about autism, and is now in an attempt to maintain her sense of self distancing herself from the image. She isn't autistic, she has Asperger's.
And to make matters worse, she has internalised the disability activism movements opinions and views. I can't count the number of times disability activists have argued against ableism with "[...] not a retard!". Dammit Jim, I'm a wheelchair user, not a retard.
I'm not surpirsed or confused by the existence of aspie elitism. If the disability rights movement continues to throw I/DD people under the bus because it might give physically disabled people a better life, we'll keep getting aspies that don't want to be considered autistic. Knowing that you have internalised ableism doesn't make you miraculously overcome it. Harmful prejudice in society is insidious. I don't have a point here. I'm just thinking.

Popular discourse makes a point of not giving I/DD people full humanity.
But we are all more than that. Things are more complicated. I love my friend, we have fun together.
We make awesome things happen. I can agree to disagree.
Sometimes.

*As opposed to at-work/placement-in-industry - school, as I usually am.

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Good Intentions and How They Are Not Enough

1.
  It is not “just a bear”. It is “just a bear that, by buying it, you give money to an organisation that thinks me being born was a mistake, and works to make sure no more people with my type of brain are born and believes people with my type of brain are such tragedies to our families that I am something that is being inflicted upon them and our lives have so little worth that when we come to a hospital in need of lifesustaining procedures that are standard, rather small in comparison to everything else, and reversible we should still consider DYING as a valid, preferable, medical alternative.”

2.
  It is truly a very cute bear. BUT IT GIVES MONEY TO A EUGENICS ORGANISATION THAT SUPPORTS TORTURE-AS-THERAPY.

3.
  Yes, it was very sweet of your mother to get a bear for you. You can think that and like the bear, AND be aware that by buying that bear for you, your mother gave money to an organisation that’d rather you didn’t exist.

4.
  How, exactly, does kids learn about autism by being given a blue teddy bear?

5.
 “They did bad things in the past”? Not six weeks ago, but sure. That’s the past.
I’m sure they’ve tidied up their attitudes and their campaigns and their rhetoric since then.

6.
  Most don’t know that A$ wants autistics to no longer exist.
Most don’t know that they don’t really help.
Most don’t know that the “awareness” they promote is a fear rhetoric that gets people killed.
It’s all well and good to want to do something good. PROBLEM IS THAT A$ IS NOT GOOD. And most don’t know it.

7.
  No. It’s not just a bear.

That bear is a gesture within your family that is truly very sweet, with nothing but good intentions and loving gift giving, mother to daughter.

That bear is ALSO an unfortunate monetary donation to an organisation that doesn’t want you to exist.

It’s not just a bear.
Or maybe it is.

Just a bear.

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Awareness and Acceptance and Racism and Hell on Earth.

A couple of days ago me and some friends [Wait, friends? I thought you were-] were talking about traveling, and airports in particular.

I have a long-standing claim that Hell is Terminal 3 at Heathrow Airport [Which started as straight up echolalia from an episode of God Almighty with Hugh Laurie. It's been a couple of years since that now, so it has been modified, but the structure is still the same.*] and it's only gotten worse with the changes in security measures. (And then Gatwick went and decided that they were gonna -automate- the security procedure, which means that Gatwick is now almost as bad as Heathrow.) And talking about flying and Airports and that I was going to the UK next week, this came up.
This made the conversation veer off into invasive-security-searches and racial profiling, in which an aquaintance stated that he didn't mind invasive security searches so long as the airports didn't pretend they were random. As in, he was okay with casual racism provided that the security officials admitted that what they were doing was casual racism. (Although, I'm not sure he was aware of this. He wanted them to be honest about targeting middle easterners for looking like mulims and terrorists and whatnot, and it not being random. If he realised that this is in fact racism is an open question.)

And to say that this irks me a little bit is to be understating it. Both for the racism reason and for the personal reason. I am incapable of getting through an airport (any airport, thus far) with my oral speech intact.
And I move in the way I move, talk the way I talk, communicate the way I communicate. And thus, I am targeted by the same security personel, who think that the way I move is suspicious. The way I talk is suspicious. That I can't always talk to them is suspicious. That I reach for my wallet to get my communication cards is suspicious. I fear for the day I am deemed dangerous.
See, my cards can ask people to slow down, to give me a minute to formulate a response, to provide a pen and paper so that I can write, to please repeat what they were saying as I didn't catch it the first time around [It's not that I can't hear, it's that I hear everything, and then my auditory processing shuts down. There is a reason I think airports are hell.], but they can't stop people from asking where my keeper or caregiver are, they can't impart an immediate understanding of what autism means unto a security official that has already decided that I am suspicous and potentially dangerous and up to no good, they can't make a person -accept- that I need to type, they can't convince someone who thinks I am being contrary that I can't hear what they are saying, that it's not that I won't - it's that I can't.
And here was my friend, saying that targeting people based on prejudice is okay and nothing to get upset about, as long as they were honest about what behaviours and looks and needs would be targeted. I just have to accept to get the 'random' spot-checks because I can't remember the right script to answer the "do you have liquids in your carry-on?". Every time I'm asked this question, I look around, harrumph to myself before catching the fact that I need to say "No.". And this makes me suspicious, despite the fact that they can -see- on the godamn scanner that there are in fact no liquids in my bag. And that is the nice and mild type of targeting of my behaviours at the airport, an environment in which I am on the verge of melting down from luggage drop onwards. Imagine what would happen if I DID melt down. I fear it.
And this is also why I fear Autism Awareness efforts. Because when I hand over the "Autistic" card I need the reaction to be a greater respect for my communications issues, not more fear because everyone knows that people with autism are randomly violent. The first of those is autism acceptance, the second is autism awareness.
Being -aware- of autism means listening to harmful, faulty rhetorics about this disability.
Accepting it means that you realise that not everyone works the same way.
It's not all that difficult.


*I'm not sure people always realise what it means when I say my speech is highly echolalic. This particular episode contains so many phrases I've used for years now. But, point is, when I start out a new phrase, I'm not just repeating it. I'm using the same inflection and stresses as the person who said it first did. It takes time for me to modify phrases.

In which Anonymus Maximus flashblogs about what Autistic People Should... (part 2)

Autistic people should be heard.
Our voices should be listened to. The things we have to say about our own lives respected.
 Popular discourse around autism is focused on the parent, the sibling, the caretaker, the teacher, the therapist, the doctor, and the actually autistic people are left out.
And when we try to make our voices heard, we are silenced with "you are not like my child" [Obviously not. Your child is a child. I am not.], implying that because we can advocate for ourselves and other autistics we are not autistic enough to know anything about the difficulties of our disability.
You can say that I am wrong, thusly I am not autistic enough, low-functioning enough, to have anything of value to say.

Autistic people should be heard.
The actually autistic people are left out of the conversation about our disability.
It is focused on mice "developing autistic behaviours" as if mice could be autistic. (I'm not actually sure, maybe they can be, but I fail to recognise how behaviours that are considered autistic in humans would be the same behaviours a potentially autistic mouse exhibited.) It is focused on pre-natal testing, to make sure autistic children won't be born. It is focused on the great burden it is for a family to have an autistic family member. It is focused on how eye-contact is so very important and absolutely devastating if it isn't done. It is focused on everything but the actually autistic people, and what we have to say.

Autistic people should be heard.
And not just when we say things you agree with. We should be listened to when we say that you are being ableist, we should be listened to when we say that you are wrong, we should be listened to when we say that you are perpetuating stereotypes, we should be listened to when we say that there is hope, we should be listened to when we say that we don't want cures, we should be listened to when we say that we don't want to be Not Autistic, we should be listened to when we say that passing for allistic isn't a good thing. We should be listened to when we are challenging your beliefs, because we speak from a lived experience.

Autistic people should be heard.
I don't care if your brother is autistic, you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you work with autistic children (sorry, children with autism. Nevermind that the autistic community prefer identity first.), you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you have an autistic classmate, you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you have studied autism in school, you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you used to date an autistic person, you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you are the parent of an autistic child, you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you are studying neuroscience, you are not the authority on the autistic experience.
I don't care if you are otherwise neurodivergent, you are not the authority on the autistic experience, just as I'm not the authority on your divergence.
It turns out that the reliable authorities on the autistic experience are the autistic people themselves.

Autistic people should be heard.

In which Anonymus Maximus flashblogs about what Autistic people should...

Autistic people should get to live.

Autistic people should get to lead their lives without fear of violence.

Google search has really rather unfortunate auto-complete for the partial sentence "Autistic people should", and this is text is a part of a larger organized attempt at not getting told that we should be killed.

Autistic people should get to live.

Autistic people should get to lead their lives without fear of violence.

Here and now, today, if a parent murder their child, it is considered a heinous crime.
Here and now, today, if a parent murder their autistic child, it is considered a tragedy. The poor parent. Of course killing is wrong, but it is such a hardship to have an autistic child. It is understandable that they commited a cold blooded murder. Somehow. And people forget that a person lost their life. A person is dead now. And this is not noteworthy, because the person had a different brain.

Autistic people should get to live.

Autistic people shoud get to lead their lives without fear of violence.

I am a person. I am here, I think, I feel, I do, I dream, I love, I learn. And I want to live. I want to be the best me I can be. I want to be happy. I want to bring happiness to others. And I should get to do that, without having to know that most people want me dead.

Autistic people should get to live.
I should get to live. I, an Autistic person, should get to live.
We are here, and we can hear what you are saying about us. You want -people- to be exterminated. Why?
I should get to live.
Autistic people should get to live.


Autistic people should get to lead their lives without fear of violence.
I should get to lead my life withour fear of violence. I, an Autistic person, should get to lead my life without fear of violence.
I am here. And I am forced to lead my life knowing that people would rather I was dead. I am forced to lead my life knowing that parents would rather their child died than being like me. I am here, and I am forced to lead my life knowing that violence against me would be considered justified, and that the person getting the sympathy if I were to be murdered wouldn't be me. It would be my murderer.
Why?
I should get to lead my life without fear of violence.
Autistic people should get to lead their lives without fear of violence.

Autistic people should. Indeed.

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Being a Visitor

I’m remembering, because the past few days have been hard and difficult and confusing. They have been overwhelming and noisy. They have been dangerous and draining.
So very draining.

And then I remember.

1. Heartland.
I remember being little, and tilting my head and observing people. And being told to stop doing that, it was unnerving. I moved out of Uncanny Valley.

Only, I never really moved out of Uncanny Valley. It is still my home. I am a wanderer in a foreign country.

Sometimes the culture shock is too much, and then I shut down.

2. Culture shock.
I remember all the times my movement have been deeply offensive to whomever was watching. I remember being told to “stop screaming - I can’t hear the TV” - after having just a second before fallen and cracked my cranium as a result.
Because when you get to stop my other movements, my other behaviours, you stop thinking about why I do what I do. You just assume your preference takes precedence over mine. I am a visitor in a foreign country.

3. When in Rome…
I remember teachers taking my books. Because children should play and run with their classmates [regardless of how mean those classmates are, because teachers never see], not sit on the staircase and read. And because I move differently, because I talk with bigger words than the other kids, this is okay. I need to learn how to make age appropriate connections with my peers.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and when in Rome…

4. Told to be Roman.
I remember when I stoped stimming where people could see. It was a process.

It was Mother mocking my fingers tapping when having dinner with extended family memebers. It was classmates objecting to being told that they had to include me in those games I was forced to participate in when the teachers took my books because I was weird. It was Teacher forcibly taking my kitch, plastic necklace from my hands, because I should pay attention to the class. It was when Sibling told me, screamed at me, to stop moving your feet at the table. It was every time Father took my bluetack, my thinking putty, my soft eraser, because it was disgusting for him to see me fiddle with it.

I remember stopping to stim where others could see me. Then I stimmed for all that I couldn’t when I was alone. Feeling like I was doing something wrong. Something morally reprehensible.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and when you leave your culture, you hold onto it even harder than you’d do if you were still at home.

5. Invisibility.
I remember that I never really stopped stimming in public. I just became invisible. Smaller movement, less noise, no props.
I gave myself an entire library of stims, rotating them so to the casual observer there was no stereotypy.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and I keep breaking the law.

6. Acceptance.
I remember back when, before Partner and I moved in together. Back when we were sure we were in this for the long haul, but acknowledging that we were in the very beginning of said haul, Partner came over to my place. I was working on the computer, and was fiddling with a stimtoy. I heard Partner outside, and scrambled to put the toy away, before opening the door. Not putting down. Putting it away.

I did, and moved to the door. Halfway there I got so angry with myself, very resolutely turned around, stomped over and got my toy, before letting Partner in. Because if Partner was gonna be my partner, they better accept my weird private behaviours, my weird private movements. Partner didn’t even notice the toy.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and I found a native who is curious about where I am from.

7. Identity.
I remember crying after I saw The Loud Hands Project video. There were people who moved like me.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and I found the expat community.

8. Civil disobediance.
I remember deciding that, you know what? I don’t care about you. I -like- stimming. It doesn’t hurt anything more than your delicate sensibilities. I will stim when I feel like it.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and I proudly engage in civil disobediance.

9. Change.
I remember that not all who wanders are lost. Some are, I’m not.

I am a visitor in a foreign country, and I might like it here.

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Life and Perception

One thing that makes life super hard is the fact that we have to live as unedited versions of ourselves.

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about Mary Sue and her qualities

I heard once that the most common 'negative' characteristic of a Mary Sue is clumsiness.
And then I thought: "Ohmigod. I am a Mary Sue. I am a badly written female character!"
And I have multiple things to say about this.


1.
I will never not find it unintentionally hilarious that we are talking about Mary Sues in a world that has textual works in which the main protagonist is Batman.

2.
Why is Batman a protagonist, but a seemingly female character with the same characteristics is a Mary Sue and should be purged by fire?

3.
Also, Superman?

4.
Exactly what is it that is so objectionable about self-insertion?

5.
How come that these 'clumsy' Mary Sues never actually are clumsy?
I don't know. I am clumsy, and work hard on negating that. And most people around me probably wouldn't describe me as clumsy. But clumsy, isn't that when you use an inappropriate amount of force when handling things? Pulling to hard, not holding on hard enough, constantly pondering if there really is a hole in you chin because you keep spilling your drinks out of your mouth? Somehow requiring more than a year to learn how to get in and out of a specific car gracefully without hitting yourself?

6.
Why is 'clumsy' a character trait that is somehow not negative enough, and therefore the negative character trait of a Mary Sue?

7.
Why can't women be terrifyingly awesome?

8.
I'm going to go about my day and be terrifyingly awesome, thankyouverymuch.
Therefore I am a Mary Sue and a badly written female character.

9.
Also, I am not.
If we're gonna be technical about it I'm not a woman. If you want to force me, your gracious host, your author this evening, to use words, I'd say that I am genderqueer, and that I have the weirdes passing issues.
But.
Because the idea of Mary Sues exist. Because I am a badly written female charater, and because men are the default, I use feminine pronouns about myself, I don't mind [terribly] to be gendered as female by others. Because there is this political implication for me to remain in the fold of the female human on a scale that has opposed and binary genders.

10.
Can people stop being douches?

In which Anonymus Maximus talks about the Meaning of Words (part 2)

Dear Glee Fandom!
Usually I rant about your vaious -isms and how you all fail as allies and how you are a very toxic environment and how I don't understand why you all seem to hate the source material. Actually, no. I usually talk in too much detail about the show that I am seeing, and silently accepting of the idea that we all watch a different show, because we all filter what we see through our own life experiences. And then I tell my partner that I don't understand the fandom. I only rant when someone ends up being particulary offensive. Today, however, we're talking about a Pet Peeve of mine.
A misconception, a fault, something that is wrong and at times strikes me as willfully ignorant, something that is -really- common in the Glee Fandom.

So.

Dear Glee Fandom.
"Drabble" is a word with a specific meaning. Please stop using it as a synonyme to "ficlet" and "snippet".
A drabble is a story that is exactly 100 words long. Exactly!

I know this is rather inconsequential and really not a very big or important part of all the faults and wrongs with this fandom of ours.

But PLEASE!

Drabble means 'story of 100 words'.

Remember that!