What I don’t want to hear…

I talk about autism carrying a lot of stigma but I don’t often spell out what that means and I realise I probably should. There are lots of turns of phrase in our language that aren’t great for autistic people ranging from the well-intentioned mistake to fairly naked prejudice. What follows is a collection of ones I’ve personally encountered in the last five years in a range of settings. These are the kinds of things I really don’t want to hear.

What I don’t want to hear…

I talk about autism carrying a lot of stigma but I don’t often spell out what that means and I realise I probably should. There are lots of turns of phrase in our language that aren’t great for autistic people ranging from the well-intentioned mistake to fairly naked prejudice. What follows is a collection of ones I’ve personally encountered in the last five years in a range of settings. These are the kinds of things I really don’t want to hear.

“But lots of them are autistic!”

Autistic people aren’t children. We have our own minds and opinions, and we don’t need neurotypicals to tell us what to think. I certainly make use of friends’ and colleagues’ neurotypical brains to help me work out what I’m missing in the world, but I don’t need them to guide me as if I were a child. I’m not a gullible idiot: or if I am, it’s all on my own account and not a result of autism. But “the person saying that is autistic” is still used as a reason to dismiss an opinion, and that’s actually really hurtful as well as unfair. This is a difficult blog to write because what sparked it is deeply emotionally resonant to me and also in a way not my issue at all – a very complex combo. Let me attempt to explain.