On the Oppression Olympics.
Aug. 15th, 2011 01:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
catsidheThere is a place for news on Autism at about.com. Recently, the lady who runs this blog noted that everyone who talks about Autism is talking about children, and she requested stories and essays from adult Autists.
I submitted an essay, which was well received. (It was tweeted by such luminaries of whom you've never heard as Steve Silberman.)
Alas, some others were not so well received.
There is a strong tendency for some parents of Autistic children to dismiss the words of Autistic Adults, in a massive display of Catch-22: If you're communicative enough to have anything to say about Autism, then you're not autistic enough to count as autistic, so just shut the hell up and listen to me tell you what your experience is and how wonderful Autism Speaks is and how Chelation and Gluten-free diet and ABA training is the only thing stopping my poor children from being uncommunicative locked-in vegetables!
Some, by no means all, but they're very loud, and they're very angry.
I wonder sometimes how those children will react when they're adults, what with being told that they are basically and fundamentally broken, and it was only the unstinting love and devotion and tens of thousands of dollars spent by their parents which has enabled them to be as functional as they are, not that they'll ever be capable of having a real job, and mummy and daddy will speak on your behalf in public, darling, but we really do love you and think you're wonderful, even if Autism stole the child we should have had.
Don't get me wrong; I don't doubt that these people really, truly, deeply love their children. But I also wonder if the way they're expressing it is causing their children harm.
This is the reason for Aspie/Autie spaces: it's not to be deliberately clannish and isolationist, it's to protect ourselves from the people who like go all Four Yorkshiremen, and tell us that their child is autistic, so how dare we claim that it's not always that bad? How dare we claim that some people can be autistic, and live normal lives? How dare we not concede that they have the right to speak on our behalf, and we don't?
I submitted an essay, which was well received. (It was tweeted by such luminaries of whom you've never heard as Steve Silberman.)
Alas, some others were not so well received.
There is a strong tendency for some parents of Autistic children to dismiss the words of Autistic Adults, in a massive display of Catch-22: If you're communicative enough to have anything to say about Autism, then you're not autistic enough to count as autistic, so just shut the hell up and listen to me tell you what your experience is and how wonderful Autism Speaks is and how Chelation and Gluten-free diet and ABA training is the only thing stopping my poor children from being uncommunicative locked-in vegetables!
Some, by no means all, but they're very loud, and they're very angry.
I wonder sometimes how those children will react when they're adults, what with being told that they are basically and fundamentally broken, and it was only the unstinting love and devotion and tens of thousands of dollars spent by their parents which has enabled them to be as functional as they are, not that they'll ever be capable of having a real job, and mummy and daddy will speak on your behalf in public, darling, but we really do love you and think you're wonderful, even if Autism stole the child we should have had.
Don't get me wrong; I don't doubt that these people really, truly, deeply love their children. But I also wonder if the way they're expressing it is causing their children harm.
This is the reason for Aspie/Autie spaces: it's not to be deliberately clannish and isolationist, it's to protect ourselves from the people who like go all Four Yorkshiremen, and tell us that their child is autistic, so how dare we claim that it's not always that bad? How dare we claim that some people can be autistic, and live normal lives? How dare we not concede that they have the right to speak on our behalf, and we don't?
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-15 09:34 am (UTC)