Published on 12, July, 2020
All her life my daughter has fought the stigma that being Autistic was defined as, first a "learning disabilty" and now a "disability". It has destroyed her life, made her feel inferior and sapped her self confidence. Then to see the BBC describe autism as a "lifelong disability" made me furious. Then to find that the source of this bigotry is the definition on the NAS website makes me incandescent with rage. I too am Autistic. The NAS does not represent me or my daughter. The challenges which Autistic poeple face are not what we are but how we are misunderstood. For the NAS to insist on perpetuating these myths makes you part of the problem. I can only presume your definition of Autism was written and approved by a bunch of, perhaps well-meaning, poeple who suffer from Autism Deficiency Syndrome and who lack the flexibility of thought that Autism gives us and we, in turn, have given the world the technology which I am using to write this.
Being classed as disabled gives an autistic person important and fundamental rights under disability discrimination laws, such as the Equality Act 2010. They are essential in order for us to be able to function in a world that is not designed for us. For example reasonable adjustments which are necessary in order to be able to function in the workplace.
A definition of disability (from Wikipedia):
"Disability is the experience of any condition that makes it more difficult for a person to do certain activities or have equitable access within a given society."
The challenges that autistic people face mean that we certainly find some things more difficult and can be discriminated against at every stage in life. It is lifelong. So many people wrongly believe that autism is something that only affects children. I even had a GP say that once
I'm all for the social model of autism, as opposed to the pathological one, but I'm not convinced that different is any less stigmatizing than disabled. Until the social model gains enough traction we need that protection against discrimination.
I hope that in the future being neurodivergent will become a specific protected characteristic under discrimination laws. Maybe that's the kind of thing NAS could be campaigning for. In the meantime we have to make the best of what exists now.
What really annoyed me was that NAS concentrate on the negative aspects of Autism. Surely they could highlight the positive traits that autistic poeple have. As is said elsewhere, the real problem is employment. Employers are really missing out on excellent staff because they think job interviews will tell them something about whether the candidate can do the job. What they actually get is poeple who like to gossip all day.
BTW
I just had to fill in a DWP form labelled "Capability for Work Assessment" which only asked what we can't do. In fact the questions were identical to those on earlier forms for "Incapacity".
VLD said:What really annoyed me was that NAS concentrate on the negative aspects of Autism. Surely they could highlight the positive traits that autistic poeple have
I completely agree, there is no mention of our unique autistic culture or autistic joy! There is not sufficient information about the power of dedicated interests or our own community for our mental health. I think this is because NAS is a non autistic led organisation which therefore means they write observations about us. I love this online community run by NAS but I don’t agree or relate to the majority of the information they write about us. I much prefer autistic led organisations such as Aucademy.
What would you like the NAS to write about us instead?
Yes of course!
https://aucademy.co.uk/Aucademy YouTube channel:
The point of the queer sub-culture is something that I’ve only vaguely heard of
Do you have a link for Aucademy?
I don't think those things are really shared though. We have different interests and few of them are unique to us as a community. We don't all stim and we certainly don't all info dump (my stims are quite subtle and hard to see and I don't info dump at all). And I don't think those things are big enough to count as a culture. (I think British culture is about a lot more than tea or small talk.)
Yes definitely it makes us as a group of autistic people recognised just like you might associate afternoon tea or small talk with British culture.
Are any of them culture? I suppose it depends what you mean by culture.
Luftmentsch said:unique autistic culture
What I mean by this is the ideas and beliefs we have as a community which includes things like not using eye contact, our dedicated interests, sharing stims and info dumping.
I think the only things that distinguish us are the problems we face which are necessary to be diagnosed as autistic I.e triad of impairments (differences?) and hypersensitivity but even there different autistic people are sensitive to different things. None of these qualify as culture.