What I want for Christmas

I wanted to write about something really special for Christmas and the most special thing I can think of is my dream of how I want the world to be. And what I want is for autism to stop being special and rare (like Christmas) and start being boring. I want autism to be accepted as a day-to-day thing in the same way that many other characteristics have come to be over the years. Not interesting at all and certainly not worthy of comment. If I may, I’ll illustrate with some examples.

At some point in the eighteenth-century Samuel Johnson said: “Sir, a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.” Bless his feminist little heart [note sarcasm]. Clearly at that point the whole “women should keep silent in churches” thing had eased off a bit such that women did occasionally preach, but it was something unusual that was commented on if observed. Nowadays, by contrast, women preaching is an entirely normal thing. The Bishop of London is a woman. There are certainly bits of the world where women having leadership roles in the church remains controversial but by and large the concept “women preaching” has gone from weird, unusual and worthy of comment to kind of boring in the last two hundred years.

As another example, when Benjamin Disraeli became Prime Minister in 1874, it was a big deal to many people that he had Jewish heritage. Other UK heads of government until that time had been “White British” (whatever we mean by those words). In contrast now every major office of UK government has been held, or is being held, by a Person of Colour. The Prime Minister is a Hindu of Indian descent. But – importantly – that’s scarcely the most important thing anyone thinks of when they consider Mr Sunak. They might comment on his policies, his leadership of the Conservative party, or how he presents himself in the media, before they thought about his religion and heritage. Although some people are still racist and prejudiced, the idea of a Prime Minister whose family background is not White British is a heck of a lot smaller of a deal than it was in the nineteenth-century.

As a final example think back to the 1980s, if you’re old enough. The hugely respected Shakespearean actor Ian McKellen came out publicly and it was a huge deal. At the time being gay was controversial and a source of fear in society (fear as in “homophobia”). Not many public figures were openly gay, because they feared the public reaction. Nowadays, Sir Ian McKellen is an undisputed national treasure, having starred as Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings films and in Panto as Mother Goose. I have no idea how many actors are openly gay but it’s going to be a large number. Some people are still homophobic, but broadly speaking, actors being gay is no longer a big deal.

There are other minorities who are on this journey, and they are all at different stages. I would say we autistics are currently at the “women preaching/dog hind legs” stage. There are prominent autistics in public life, but it’s a “thing” that they’re autistic that’s worthy of comment. If we do a job, it’s interesting not because we do it well, but because we do it at all. Most people probably know an autistic or several, but they might be a bit embarrassed about having one in the family. I imagine that society feels autistic people are probably OK so long as they don’t make too much of a fuss and make some effort to blend in.

When I started talking openly about my autism a couple of years ago it was a Big Deal. I knew it could affect my career and it got me some funny looks from people who hadn’t expected to see an autistic in a professional job. Lots of people contacted me because autistic role models were very scarce. I had people reaching out from all around the world, even. In the two years since, things have improved. I now know quite a few autistic senior professionals and I have autistic contacts in most UK government departments. I’ve noticed with joy that parents of autistic kids talk to me less about their children’s problems and more about their ambitions. Autistic people are becoming less of a phenomenon and more just a part of humanity.

When autistics have become boring and no longer special, it won’t be particularly interesting that someone is (or isn’t) autistic unless they want it to be. If parents have an autistic child the autism won’t be a source of pride or shame (although the child will be!) A tweet from Susan Calman has stuck in my memory because it makes this “boring” point so well. She said:

Text from my wife

“I’m buying us some collapsible Tupperware”

Gay marriage is just so dangerous perverted dull.

That’s the dullness I want for autism. An autistic in work shouldn’t be interesting, we should be “meh”.

My Christmas wish is that autism should stop being “for Christmas” as it were, and start being “for life”. It’s part of humanity, it’s common in the population, and autistic people are just people. We’re all different, we don’t have superpowers, and nor are we helpless victims. The change is coming – I’ve seen it already in my lifetime and accelerating over the last few years. If you’re autistic, the joy of being normal and boring is coming into the world.

And I couldn’t be happier. Merry Christmas!