As I'm sure many of you are aware,
next month is Autism Awareness Month. As such, I'm bracing myself for
the flurry of Autism-related posts flooding my social media feeds
over the next 60 days or so. In the past, I've been fortunate enough
to be surrounded by people who have been very supportive of
Neurodiversity and not thought less of me for having Aspergers. Sure,
I've come across ableist comments (which as you can imagine I have
quickly crushed), but in general, I've always been able to look at
April and consider it “Neurodiversity Month” because of the
positive humans I seem to have surrounded myself with.
Except it isn't Neurodiversity Month.
Not really.
I came to this realization a few
nights ago while talking to my friend, fellow Aspergian, and fellow
Neurodiversity blogger Steph Diorio on Facebook (check out her
awesome blog here at http://aspergersillustrated.blogspot.ca/).
She had shared a video about how best to support the Aspies in one's
life during a hard month such as April. It brought up the very real
fact that Autism Awareness Month isn't about us; its an ableist
attempt to talk about cures and eradication of the 'awful tragedy'
that is Autism. Frankly, its insulting, and not long after watching
this video, I experienced all of this myself first hand. I had to
interview my aunt for my book, and while I gained lots of useful
information, I also experienced ableist condescension in the process.
During my conversation with her, she implied that I was too stubborn
and immature for my age, commented on how far I had come and how well
I had done (while conveniently leaving out “for someone with
Aspergers”), and asked if I shouldn't maybe seek professional help
to assist me in managing my “disorder” in adulthood. Nevermind
the fact that I'm employed, have a social life, and have earned three
university degrees. Needless to say, I was livid, and my temper
flared. It took all my strength to keep it contained within until I
followed the obligatory social protocols and promptly left her house.
The funny thing about this experience
though, is that while yes, I was and am angry, it also led me to
remember exactly why I bother with all of this Neurodiversity stuff
to begin with. You see, in a way, organizations like Autism Speaks
and people with attitudes like those expressed by my aunt are only
symptoms of a larger problem; institutionalized ableism and
discrimination against those deemed “disordered” by the rest of
society. Until society itself changes its attitudes, we will always
have ableist discrimination against those on the Autism Spectrum and
anyone else who dares to be different from the norm. People like my
aunt are part of the problem, and they are the very reason why I
started this blog, why I'm writing my book and why myself and
countless others continue to care about changing all of this. As with
feminism's battle against patriarchy, however, opposing people individually would be akin to
cutting off a tentacle, when what we need to do is take down the
whole evil boss monster. (+1000 XP if we do!)
So this is why I fight. I fight to
make the world a better place for those who are neurodivergent. I
fight to end institutionalized ableism against those who are
different. I fight to challenge the pathologizing of personality
types and the medical model of psychiatry. I fight for those who are
nonverbal and cannot fight for themselves. Most importantly, I fight
for the right (for myself and others) to exist free of condescension,
pity, judgment, and loathing by those who refuse to see our common
humanity.
And until we have truly accomplished
our goals and banished all of those things in favour of building a
more compassionate world? I'm not, nor will I be, to quote the Dixie
Chicks, “ready to make nice.”
As always, yours in diversity,
Adam Michael
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