Some of Us Like Being Autistic

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That's exactly what most of us autistics do: a "grand act." We're playing the ultimate role: another species. Our brains are different and we have to pretend to be another animal because of it, just because they're the majority and we're the minority. It's sad that this act becomes a part of who we are over time. We've conditioned ourselves so much to NT society that we're almost NT ourselves, save for the occasional stim or autistic thought-pattern.

That's why I don't want to act anymore. I can play NT when at work, or at some gathering, but any other time I refuse to integrate myself into a society that doesn't even try to understand me. "I think, therefore I am," said Descartes. Or, later in a revised quote, "I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am." My mind, as well as all autistics, are just biologically brilliant enough to truly think and break free from the script given to NTs. We aren't just some character in a story; we are all narrators of our own story, and can change the script at will. We thinkers shouldn't have to put on the veil of NT act anymore. It's just no fun.

I need to rock and fidget when I think about a problem at work. That's why I wear headphones (and half the time there is no music). Because then people assume I am just "rocking out" instead of just rocking.

there

The problem is, will the autistic community ever be able to stop acting? If this discussion was happening IRL, and we all decided, "You know what, screw putting on the NT face, let's just act as we would as ourselves."
The question is, if we all disrobed our outer NT selves, would we really be able to communicate with our AS selves? As this syndrome differs slightly from one person to the next, will self-actualization as an aspie be possible, and will group actualization be possible?

Hartzofspace: I applaud you for your bravery.

That's why we still need some level of behavioral modification and social conditioning to be properly functioning. But entrusting those personality-altering programs in the hands of NT "professionals" is a mistake. We've all read about schools for autistics where stimming, OCD, and other harmless behaviors are reprimanded to the point of dissapearance from the child. This is unacceptable.

I'm entirely against socialization into the NT norm, but not against integration. This is an NT planet, and until we build a rocketship and set up the colony world autos we have to live as the NTs want us. We need to function the best we can to make a living, but I will not submit to giving up who I am just do make money.

Think of the Jews. The Jews have been discriminated and antagonized for thousands of years. They have never been entirely accepted and likely never will. The most common public-memory of anti-semitism is the Holocaust. Everyone knows that millions were massacred to wipe out the supposed "inferior race." But Hitler and the Nazi government failed. Not only do Jews still exist, but they thrive. The Holocaust banded them together and created an identity so strong that they created a nation.

Now think of Napoleon. Does the military genius strike you as anti-semitic? That's because he took a different approach to kill off the Jews: integration. Unlike most other countries of the time, Napoleon passed laws granting Jews full citizenship, travel privelages, equal education, and the right to buy. This sounds like a very enlightened thing to do. But scholars point out that Napoleon in his writings used this as a means to destroy the Jews. By making them equal with the rest of society, he divided their cause and began the process of integrating them into the non-Jewish norm. The Jews were beginning to lose their identity as a people.

I do not want that. Do we sit idly by and wait until genetic research catches up with us? How long will we do nothing when genetic screening leads to "correction" of the genes that cause autism, or, even worse, the election of parents to abort their autistic babies? Designer babies are around the corner and I see the pogram that will happen when autism is wiped out save for a few divided autistic-rights parents. We are a diversity. We are people. Think of redheads. Red hair is caused by a mutation on the sixteenth chromosome. Is that mutation harmful? Will the designers elect to correct this mutation, and wipe out all redheads, too?

This is a possible future. And if we don't start some campaign now to combat Autism Speaks, and educate the masses of who we are, the public will be perfectly ok with our genocide. Look at Katherine McCarron. People are defending her for killing her three-year-old autistic daughter. Personally, I don't think any level of stress merits murder.

Right on for you for speaking up for how you feel. I agree, "insidious" was a bad choice of words.
But as far as a "person with autism" versus "autistic person", goes.
I am confused.
I thought it is respectful and appropriate to say the person first?
Help me out here.
What should a person say?

Toby in Oregon...

"Person with autism" was the editor's choice of words, while the writer of the letter said "with autism." Either way, it denotes us as "having" something. It's like saying "person with AIDs."

Last edited by Redstar on 15 Nov 2007, 10:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.

We seriously need to get that phrase on a T-shirt.

It's pretty insidious over here.

Just FYI and all, I'd say that 30% of those with autism don't even know what the word "insidious" means; it's not a funky disorder for everyone.

Go to Cafepress, Threadless, or anyone of the many other self-sell websites. You can make your own t-shirts and sell them on there, if you can just get an artist to make the image first. Personally I like "Autism Speaks doesn't speak for me."

Insidious doesn't sound so bad until you think of the synonyms, which include menacing, sinister, and dangerous.

I am not "a person with maleness"; I am a man.

I am not "a person with baldness"; I am bald.

I am not "a person with autism"; I am autistic.

and I have seen his pic, he is definitely a person with baldness!

Merle

in·sid·i·ous (ĭn-sĭd'ē-əs)
adj.
Working or spreading harmfully in a subtle or stealthy manner: insidious rumors; an insidious disease.
Intended to entrap; treacherous: insidious misinformation.
Beguiling but harmful; alluring: insidious pleasures.

Wow! that was great! good job!

Nice definitions.

Im just saying I wish I have Aspergers. It would help to know that all the things that have happened to me are because I was born with this not because I am the weirdest person out there. And yes I dont ever want to be cured. I love being the way I am even the ocd. Sometimes the ocd is hard but I love being obsessive in tons of other things.