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The Autisticats

25 Mar, 10 tweets, 3 min read

April is just a week away, which means autistic people everywhere are bracing ourselves for what is known in non-autistic circles as “Autism Awareness Month.”

Here are some things you should know before all of that starts, and misinformation/propaganda start being spread:

1. Autism Speaks (AS or A$) is a corporate, eugenicist group that has done immense harm to autistic people.

They are widely viewed as a hate group by autistic people.

Do not give them your money, no matter how convincing you think their rebranding is. It’s all fake.

2. Autism is not a disease or a tragedy.

It’s a lifelong, genetic developmental disability. And it is also one of many ways of being in this world.

A$ and similar groups will try to profit by manufacturing fear and grief. Don’t fall for their lies.

3. Do not “light it up blue” or use puzzle pieces when discussing autism, especially if you’re not autistic.

This 2017 study found that puzzle pieces (as a symbol for autism) evoke negative associations and should be avoided: researchgate.net/publication/31…

4. Please use the rainbow infinity symbol for autism, and go #RedInstead to counteract the message of A$’ “light it up blue” campaign.

Instead of “awareness,” what autistic people really need is acceptance.

That’s what the #RedInstead campaign is all about.

5. The neurodiversity & autism acceptance movement includes ALL autistic people.

Nonspeaking autistics, intellectually disabled autistics, autistics with high support needs, etc.

Everyone needs to have their full humanity and autonomy respected. Everyone needs acceptance.

6. Seek out information about autism from autistic people ourselves.

Follow us on social media. Read our blogs. Donate to our organizations.

You can start with the ASAN’s website (autisticadvocacy.org) and their additional online resource, autismacceptance.com

7. The overwhelming majority of autistic people prefer to be referred to as “autistic,” not as a “person with autism.”

You should always respect a person’s individual preference.

But when you don’t know their preference, default to identify-first language (“autistic”).

8. Do not speak over autistic people when we tell you how we identify or what symbols & language we want you to use when describing us.

You do not get to tell us how to feel or what to think about who we are.

You don’t “know better” than someone with lived experience.

9. Recognize that if you’re not autistic, there’s probably a lot you don’t know about autism.

Seek out books and resources recommended by the community.

Most importantly: listen to autistic people, not those who claim to speak for us.

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More from @autisticats

The Autisticats

@autisticats

23 Mar

Yesterday I did an interactive experiment in my online psychology textbook. The section was about “concept hierarchies.”

The experiment measured my reaction times when categorizing objects in their superordinate, basic, and subordinate levels.

According to the textbook, most people are faster at categorizing things at the basic level, and slower at the subordinate level.

But when I did the experiment (several times to make sure it wasn’t a fluke) my results were totally reversed for those levels.

My pattern of results seems to be in line with the local processing bias of autistic perception.

Autistic brains tend to process things from the bottom up.

So it makes sense that I would be faster at recognizing things at the subordinate level.

Read 9 tweets

The Autisticats

@autisticats

19 Mar

Hi everyone, I’ve received a lot of feedback on the thread I made the other day with the story about Liza.

I want to apologize to anyone who was upset by it.

A lot of people have been asking for clarification on what I meant, so that’s what I’m going to do here.

I actually agree with all of the critique that the thread received.

There was nothing I read from an autistic respondent to the thread that I thought was untrue.

A lot of people were just responding to things that I wasn’t trying to say. (Hence why I agree with them)

The main issues arose from the fact that Twitter has a strict character limit, and the fact that I hadn’t fully considered how everything I said might be perceived.

I didn’t know what to clarify until people asked, basically.

So that’s what I’m doing now 😅

Read 13 tweets

The Autisticats

@autisticats

19 Mar

Parents of autistic kids: here are some tips on how to better interact with the autistic community.

These are based on observations I’ve made over the past four years doing advocacy work.

If you’ve read my thread from the other day, make sure you read this one too.

1. Remember that the people you’re talking to are autistic, and might have a hard time modulating their “tone.”

If the person talking to you seems blunt, it usually doesn’t mean they’re trying to be rude.

Try to focus on the substance and direct meaning of their words.

2. A lot of the beliefs you have about autism, especially if you’re new to the community, are probably wrong.

That’s not a moral judgment. It’s okay to not know things. You just also have to be willing to learn.

And learning will probably make you uncomfortable sometimes.

Read 10 tweets

The Autisticats

@autisticats

17 Mar

Autistic community: we need to talk about the ways we approach parents of autistic kids.

This is a touchy subject for basically everyone, so I’m going to try my best to articulate myself.

Know that I’m speaking as an autistic person whose parents were not always accepting.

To do this, I’ll describe a common scenario. We have two fictional main characters:

-Jane (a newly diagnosed autistic girl)
-Liza (Jane’s mom)

When Jane was diagnosed last year, the doctors made it sound scary. They said she needed intensive treatment and intervention.

Liza didn’t know anything about autism before Jane was diagnosed.

All she had heard about autism were sad things that came from an organization called Autism Speaks.

She thought they must be a good organization, if they have so much funding and support among other parents.

Read 10 tweets

The Autisticats

@autisticats

15 Mar

When autistic people say we were bullied for being autistic, we usually don’t mean that people heard about our diagnosis and started using it against us.

That does happen, but more often than not, people bully us for our autistic traits.

Because we’re “different.”

The first time I was bullied, I was a 4 year old in preschool. I wasn’t even diagnosed yet.

But my bullies recognized my autistic traits, and then consistently mocked me for being, in their words, “weird.”

If I tried sitting at their table during lunch, they’d yell at me.

I’ve heard from dozens of autistic people who have been physically assaulted by classmates for displaying autistic traits.

People have been punched in the face for flapping their hands on the playground.

People’s gym clothes have been shoved down the toilet.

Read 9 tweets

The Autisticats

@autisticats

13 Feb

Yesterday I made a thread about how the caricature of autistic body language in Sia’s movie is harmful.

Some autistic people said the scenes made them feel ashamed of their own body language.

So I want you to see a few photos of me, and know that I’m not ashamed.

Here’s a photo of me when I was 8 years old. I had an overbite and I would often put my front teeth over my bottom lip as a stim. This is a characteristic that was mimicked in Sia’s movie.

I still put my teeth over my lip.

Here’s another photo of me around the same time period. On a hike with my family, I started flapping my hands while we sat down for a water break.

I still flap my hands.