Thread by @Jenny_Trout

I'm torn between doing a thread on the stuff on my mind and not doing it because my hands hurt. But if I don't thread about it, I'm gonna be pissed when I can't remember it later. So. Here we go.

Let's talk about how autism helps people spot manipulation.

One of the things I feel ABA robbed me of for a long time was the ability to tell when someone really was "bad" or "mean" or if they were "good" and I was just overreacting.

As a result, for years, I walked around giving people the benefit of the doubt on EVERYTHING. Did that girl just spit ice cream in my hair and slap me? What about MY behavior caused that? Because I know from therapy that people aren't supposed to do that.

But I also know from therapy that people get angry at Little Jenny because of HER behavior and therapy has drilled it into my head that you have to give EVERYONE the benefit of the doubt.

The benefit of the doubt, however, is never given to you as an autistic child (especially when you're a "girl" and "girls don't get autism, you have a behavioral problem"). Whatever you do, however you react to anything, you're told that YOU have total control.

You're trained to approach every single situation from the standpoint that the actions of others are never wrong and your reactions are always wrong.

You're not disappointed, you're a brat.
You're not hurt, you're too sensitive and dramatic
You're not nice, you won't let people be mean to you behind a veneer of nice.

So, you grow up going:

"The lady behind the counter said to go fill out an application from a different store and bring it to her because they were out. Sounds weird but it's probably just me because I don't understand the world."

I didn't get that was a brush-off, returned to the store with the filled out application from the other store, and the people who worked there laughed at me. I went home upset AT MYSELF because I couldn't figure out how I didn't manage the interaction correctly.

Now, here's the thing: if I had still been in therapy with that same specialist, do you know what I would have heard?

"How do you know they were laughing at you? How did you know they weren't really out of applications?"

Because autistic people are NEVER trusted to judge any situation. We are always told we MUST give the benefit of the doubt to neurotypicals.

Now, after, you know, having a total mental breakdown and getting treatment for the C-PTSD that ABA therapy CAUSED, I get really fucking outraged when I see people behave badly and other people tell me to give them the benefit of the doubt.

The mini-breakdown I had at the beginning of 2019, for example, was literally caused by having some of the loudest voices in *landia speaking about a situation that directly impacted me as if I were not available for comment or unable to view things objectively enough.

(objectively enough meaning, not giving the benefit of the doubt to a person who has demonstrably built a very successful career off the backs of multiple other authors)

I often say that I'm Cassandra; after so many bad experiences with ill-intentioned, manipulative people to whom I extended the benefit of the doubt, I can see them coming from a mile away.

So, way, way, way back when I said, "hey, this person in our industry is a terrible person," and everyone insisted I was wrong, crazy, jealous, and overreacting, boy howdy did it make me angry when now, years later, she's an open and proud maga and qanon supporter.

Everybody wants to act shocked. Oh, I never saw that coming!

Well, I did. Maybe you need to make more autistic friends because I guarantee they would have spotted it out of the gate.

Because while our parents and educators dog train us to not be an inconvenience to them, we're having to study people and build our own understanding off how they work and we notice patterns. It's how we survive.

So, anytime I'm on here watching some terrible person do some terrible shit and everyone is like, "GIVE THEM THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT! CODDLE THEM!" all I can think of is how often I've seen that benefit applied or denied based on ableism, racism, sexism, homophobia...

And people really need to just listen, just take this advice, okay?

If an autistic person says, hey, that person is openly manipulative and terrible, they ARE being objective. Because they're basing it on hard data they've stored, again, as a survival mechanism.

Neurotypicals, I'm telling you, you wouldn't get stabbed in the back so fucking much if you'd just ask an autistic person, "hey, what do you think of this person..."

(and I want to add to this particular tweet to say, the breakdown was triggered by that gaslighting; if you were around for it, you probably saw how many times i apologized for being too sensitive and how i was wrong and mean and somehow bullying someone with a huge following)

(gaslighting and ABA are closely entwined, because ABA teaches kids to gaslight themselves anyway. the second enough people said i was overreacting, i felt ashamed. i dissociated so badly i was convinced i didn't really EXIST.)