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Should autistic people campaign for recognition as a distinct part of humanity rather than be labelled as disabled?

NAS71674

I have stories previously of other groups of people such as Irish gypsies successfully campaigning to be recognised as a distinct subgroup of humanity. Irish gypsies do have a distinct culture (they are wonderful people if you knew them) but they are quite a bit closer to most other people than autistic people are. So rather than be classified as a disability (excluding comorbidity like learning disability, depression etc) should autistic people, who generally have a unique way of approaching life (that is common across most autistic people) campaign for the same thing? In my opinion I don't consider us to have a disability, I think we are really just a very different type of human being with a common identity among all of us who share the so called disability. What are your thoughts?

Parents

  • Before I was even aware of a Spectrum, I had thought I fit into the Jungian archetype of the INTJ. That Myers Briggs personality type was my first encounter with being made aware humans have different motives for engaging with the world around Them. It made sense, for the most part. Except that I was still running into problems fitting in, and then not too long ago, it became frowned upon to add these personality types to a CV because the implication of some humans being "superior" to others. Sigh.

    I have researched and read whatever I can find to try and work out how to navigate society even the 48 Laws of Power. Which is a horrendous book and is somewhat this very dark NT 'bible'. But it made me aware that some humans even used an outward appearance of connexion and kindness to dominate others. I now had to rethink how I phrased everything. 

    When it comes to legal matters, I feel an incredible amount of empathy and heartbreak for autistic individuals who are falsely accused and robbed of agency. This issue is worth discussion. 

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  • Before I was even aware of a Spectrum, I had thought I fit into the Jungian archetype of the INTJ. That Myers Briggs personality type was my first encounter with being made aware humans have different motives for engaging with the world around Them. It made sense, for the most part. Except that I was still running into problems fitting in, and then not too long ago, it became frowned upon to add these personality types to a CV because the implication of some humans being "superior" to others. Sigh.

    I have researched and read whatever I can find to try and work out how to navigate society even the 48 Laws of Power. Which is a horrendous book and is somewhat this very dark NT 'bible'. But it made me aware that some humans even used an outward appearance of connexion and kindness to dominate others. I now had to rethink how I phrased everything. 

    When it comes to legal matters, I feel an incredible amount of empathy and heartbreak for autistic individuals who are falsely accused and robbed of agency. This issue is worth discussion. 

Children