How to change the world

It’s all too common for autistic people to be victimised, which is an extremely bad thing, but how to change it? Autistic people can be total prats ourselves, and we’re capable of bigotry and just as many bad things as any other human. So it’s not that we’re poor little people who need the world to look after us like helpless children. It’s easy to get very angry about the ways in which the world is cruel to people who are different and that anger can be absolutely right. But anger may not be the best way to change things right now.

I get very angry about a lot of things – including how my fellow autistics get treated all too often. But in order to change that I (we) need to persuade the world to see us as fully human. Boring, normal and ordinary. And shouting angrily at people may not be the most persuasive way to do that. We’re approaching the season of the Christian year when people thing about how their lives could and should be better: the season of Lent. It’s a big trait in Christian thinking that rather than telling other people off, you should sort yourself out first. Being an example of how the world ought to be is more effective than wagging a finger. And I’m fully aware that Christians are not always particularly good at doing that and self-righteously wagging a finger at other people is sooo much more fun than being a better person yourself. So much, so human.

Why did You make me broken?

It’s a weird moment when you face that you’re disabled if you have religious faith – or at least it was for me. Getting my autism diagnosis was hugely liberating in that I could stop blaming myself for the autistic behaviours I have. Up until them I’d regarded them as moral failings such that, for example, failing to make eye contact was being selfish. If I did it, it was my fault, it meant I was a bad person, and should try harder. The diagnosis took that guilt away but it also meant that – with my Christian hat on – I had to confront why God would have chosen (in His Infinite Wisdom) to make me autistic. When He could have put a bit more effort in and got my brain wired up “correctly” in the womb which would have saved me a whole lot of trouble. I write frivolously, but you can see the issue.

Why did You make me broken?

It’s a weird moment when you face that you’re disabled if you have religious faith – or at least it was for me. Getting my autism diagnosis was hugely liberating in that I could stop blaming myself for the autistic behaviours I have. Up until them I’d regarded them as moral failings such that, for example, failing to make eye contact was being selfish. If I did it, it was my fault, it meant I was a bad person, and should try harder. The diagnosis took that guilt away but it also meant that – with my Christian hat on – I had to confront why God would have chosen (in His Infinite Wisdom) to make me autistic. When He could have put a bit more effort in and got my brain wired up “correctly” in the womb which would have saved me a whole lot of trouble. I write frivolously, but you can see the issue.

“Why can you not let it go?!”

A lot of life depends on knowing when to let things go. You see the phenomenon quite often on social media – a person (who may well not actually be autistic) worrying away like a dog at a bone at an issue long after it would have been much more sensible just to step away. When two people are worrying away at the same issue from opposite perspectives, you have the ideal recipe for a flame war and very little chance of resolution or agreement. Polarisation quickly follows and we autistics are quite as capable of being horrible or bigoted as anyone else.

Today is Shrove Tuesday, the day before Lent starts on Ash Wednesday. The name comes from the old word “shrive” which means to confess and get forgiveness for your sins. Christians would use the day before Lent to get their spiritual lives in a good state before starting the Lenten fast. In modern times Shrove Tuesday is more often known as Pancake Day. That’s still about Christianity and Lent though, as pancakes are a good way of using up the “fat” ingredients in the pantry before giving them (or some other food) up in Lent.

Accordingly, I intend to get my total inability-to-let-things-go out of my system before behaving myself for Lent tomorrow…

Nothing without love

It’s all too common for autistic people to be victimised, which is an extremely bad thing, but how to change it? Autistic people can be total prats ourselves, and we’re capable of bigotry and just as many bad things as any other human. So it’s not that we’re poor little people who need the world to look after us like helpless children. It’s easy to get very angry about the ways in which the world is cruel to people who are different and that anger can be absolutely right. But anger may not be the best way to change things right now.

I get very angry about a lot of things – including how my fellow autistics get treated all too often. But in order to change that I (we) need to persuade the world to see us as fully human. Boring, normal and ordinary. And shouting angrily at people may not be the most persuasive way to do that. We’re approaching the season of the Christian year when people thing about how their lives could and should be better: the season of Lent. It’s a big trait in Christian thinking that rather than telling other people off, you should sort yourself out first. Being an example of how the world ought to be is more effective than wagging a finger. And I’m fully aware that Christians are not always particularly good at doing that and self-righteously wagging a finger at other people is sooo much more fun than being a better person yourself. So much, so human.

Love it!

The stereotype that autistics have no empathy leads on to the stereotype that we are incapable of romantic love, which is definitely not the case. It might be that an autistic seeking a partner is more likely to find them at a club or interest group than a pub or a nightclub (both of which can be overwhelming to the senses) but there’s absolutely no reason why they shouldn’t find one.

Being socially clumsy, or literal, can make romantic love more problematic but not impossible. My own experience has been that the difficulty in picking up hints (or telling the difference between honesty and manipulation) sets you up for humiliation, but if you’re sufficiently determined that can be overcome. The autistic tendency to be very all or nothing can also add challenges – if you see things in extremes (you see people you know as wholly good or wholly bad, for example) then as soon as the beloved does something even slightly wrong they fall off their pedestal into the “wholly bad” category. So if you’re the kind of autistic who is looking for perfection and will settle for nothing less, your chances of success butt up against human reality. Relationships depend on compromise and flexibility and those are not automatically autistic strengths. Nonetheless, although it may well be more difficult for an autistic person to find and keep a partner than a neurotypical person, many succeed and are very happy.