Thread by @mykola

I hate that every time some atrocious new autism-hating “autism initiative” kicks off nobody cares, nobody listens to the community that’s begging y’all to see through the bullshit.

They are trying to create a genetic database for autism. WHY DO YOU THINK?! #StopSpectrum10K

The funniest part of this to me is that I suspect they’re barking up the wrong tree anyway.

Autism is the result of contextual drift between an individual and their society, is my theory. That contextual drift is informed but not defined by genetic factors.

But who knows, and who knows what markers they’ll find for individuals predisposed to contextual drift?

What we do know is that they’ll be used to abort autistic fetuses.

Sure. This is something I read on twitter ages ago and integrated into my own thinking so I dunno what’s original and what’s not, but here’s the general idea:

When you share an environment/species/society/neurology with someone, you have a lot of shared context.

https://twitter.com/wiesoauchimmer/status/1430881828957790209

As you lose shared experiences, you lose shared context. Two people in very different environments need to spend a lot more effort to communicate in some ways, etc.

Animals of different species, even moreso, etc.

I suspect that autism is what we call it when someone’s neurotype (and thus their experience of reality) is such an outlier that they fail to cross some threshold of shared context.

Does that make sense? That’s why there are no uniquely autistic traits, it’s a cumulative effect.