Thread by @ekverstania

People who SAY they care about nonspeaking autistic people can't be judged merely on how much they talk about it. They can work with nonspeakers, have a nonspeaking brother, start an organisation to support parents and research etc. etc.

But...

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1352613141516070913

Are they advancing nonspeaking autistic people's rights?

Communication is a human right.

Listen to what nonspeaking autistic people are saying helps them communicate, so that others can be helped too.

Oralism strangles communication.

Limiting vocabulary strangles communication.

Let me add something into the mix here.

Most of my SPEAKING autistic friends were abused by their parents when they were little. Most of them.

Now, you wanna tell me that the nonspeaking autistic people I come across were generally NOT abused by anyone? Not by a mother, teacher, therapist, school bully, rapey cousin?

If all the nonspeaking autistic people you ever met could suddenly communicate fluently and freely, what would they say about your level of respect for them?

Many nonspeaking autists do write politely about their parents' prior terrible and misguided therapy choices. Niko Boskovic, Amy Sequenzia, Ido Kedar, Akha Khumalo, Emma Zurcher-Long, those are a few that come to mind offhand.

Peyton Goddard also writes about sexual assault.

I wonder with tender fear what nonspeaking autist David Gerslowitz would say about the day his mother tried to murder him and left him slumped on the kitchen floor -- and the many years of torturous ABA before and after that.

All the members of the NCSA (the National Council on Severe Autism) with whom I have tried to have a conversation are vehemently insistent on ABA and vehemently opposed to nonspeaking people who type against ABA.

Yuval Leventhal supports the NCSA.

He refuses to listen to what ACTUAL nonspeaking autistic people say they need.

He will listen to those who have been given a pictogram vocabulary of ten words.

He deliberately and vandalistically silences nonspeaking autistic people.

So when you get a compliment from Yuval, consider where it's coming from.

Not every crime against humanity is illegal yet. ABA is still legal. Silencing nonspeaking autistic people is still legal EVEN THOUGH COMMUNICATION IS A HUMAN RIGHT.

Yuval Leventhal supports these crimes.

For people who are new to this subject matter, I will add links to provide context to who all these people are, to what ABA is, and so on.

This article talks about ABA and mentions the murder attempt I spoke of earlier.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1333811534494007296?s=19

Yuval Leventhal and his band of vandals are behind this.

They claim to want to help people with 'severe autism', but they are out to destroy anything that 'severely autistic' people say.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1165593126700036096?s=19

They did this.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1274724280031490048?s=19

What is 'severe autism'? Damon Kirsebom has been described as having 'severe autism'. I'll let him explain. Many people who have been given this label has the same problems that Damon describes.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1330231916985987073?s=19

Why am I suddenly talking about Yuval again? Because he's at it again. He's speaking over nonspeaking autistic people, pretending to care about them.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1352220136313384962?s=19

There are a handful of so-called high-functioning autistic people who do this too, and usually I'd ignore them.

But Sia has thanked him for his message of encouragement, and I'm pretty sure she has no idea of his crimes against nonspeaking people.

When a criminal is allowed to have a platform because a celeb unwittingly gives him that platform, it is our duty to fight for the rights of the people whose lives and rights are endangered by what he does.

Yuval has chosen to align with the ABA crowd, who are notorious for silencing nonspeakers. If you fight these people, they will fight back.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1333798307034923014?s=19

Remember the goal though: the end-goal is not to take down Sia, or even Yuval. Yuval and his ilk are just in the way.

What IS the goal, then? We are here to help nonspeaking autistic people exercise their rights.

Communication is a human right.

So here's what I am doing and I encourage you to do the same: Flood your timeline with the words of nonspeaking autistic people.

Do this regularly.

Here's a thread of about 70 nonspeaking autistic people's artefacts. Tell the world.

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1312542821384060928?s=19

This works.

I keep meeting families of autistic people in my country who have been given access to communication as a result of my activism, and they are people I haven't even heard of before.

So it is working. Be part of what I am doing. Change nonspeaking people's lives.

Here are some specific actions you can take to support communication access for nonspeaking autistic people. (It's a thread.) #istandwithnonspeakers

https://twitter.com/ekverstania/status/1352908204922052608?s=19