so much of the problem with psychology and diagnostic labels to me is the fact that symptoms are often defined through outsiders and what they see from you, not what you experience internally. sure, NPD has symptoms that are like "you're entitled" and "you exploit people," but these are things that would be hard to be introspective about if you have a disorder that is literally known for making that difficult. all these symptoms come from what a doctor would potentially see from you, which makes it even more subject to personal bias and interpretation of what you must be feeling rather than what you actually are. hence why a woman might be more likely to get diagnosed with BPD or HPD but the man right next to her gets diagnosed with NPD or ASPD, despite both often having the same symptoms. or white people are more likely to be diagnosed with major depression or GAD, where a black person with the same symptoms will get diagnosed with OCD or bipolar. because it's all subject to bias and assumption from the outside, not internal experience from the actual person with the disorder
Autism Representation written by an allistic: My name is John Autism and I like the designated autistic interests
unintentionally autistic character written by the creator who hasn't really thought about whether or not theyre autistic: I wish I could be human like the way everyone else is but I know they can tell I'm not. And I know they're right
The reason why so many of y'all's feminism sucks is because you still believe deep down in your hearts that there are only two kinds of people in the world: precious, ethereal, fragile dollthings called "women", and violent, lustful, rage-fueled apes called "men". Until you throw that idea away, 3rd-grade-tier "girls rule boys drool, girls are princesses and boys are stinky :(" is as feminist as we'll ever get-- and I hope it's obvious that that's lightyears away from the bare minimum of where we need to be.
I don't know how I'm supposed to explain to ostensibly trans-friendly feminists that "women are beautiful soft things made of glass, men are obsessed with violence and sex" is exactly what the patriarchy wants you to believe. Patriarchy wants you to believe that being a woman and/or having a vagina (patriarchy generally believes those two things are synonymous) makes one shatter on impact with reality. It makes you easier to control if you are scared shitless of the other half of the population, and it makes you more compliant with your lot in life if you believe it is in the nature of the other half of the population to rape and kill rather than realise those were choices those individual rapists and murderers made. There is no way to make gender essentialism progressive and feminist, because it is one of patriarchy's tools of subjugation. Stop trying to make it progressive.
And I can scream all of that from the rooftops over and over again, and what I hear in reply is "Trans men really are men because no woman would ever decide to become an inherently evil repugnant rapist ape", and "You're so right. Trans women are women because they too are pretty delicate little objects I can fuck", and "You're non-binary? So are you fucktoy non-binary or sexpest non-binary?", and my patience runs ever thinner.
Please stop trigger tagging with #epilepsy tw/cw/warning/etc.
I need every single person to understand how horrible tumblrâs tagging system is
I go into the tag for epilepsy and its all flashing lights. We canât use our own tag because people without epilepsy fill it up with improper warnings.
Use âflashingâ in place of âepilepsyâ in your tags. You arenât warning people of epileptics, youâre warning us of flashing lights. Please please tag properly. Epileptics say this endlessly and constantly and itâs ignored. You are risking lives by doing this.
Hereâs proof of what I mean:
THIS POST IS 100% OKAY TO REBLOG, I ENCOURAGE PEOPLE WITHOUT EPILEPSY TO ESPECIALLY DO SO!
Let's talk about the term "Autism [Parent]" (mom,dad,etc.)
Is it just me or does it feel weird when allistic parents call themselves âautism parentsâ?
Like⌠something about that wording just gives me the ick.
Your child is autistic. Thatâs their lived experience. Their brain, their sensory world, their communication, their identity.
You are involved in their life; yes you support them, advocate for them, raise them, but you are not the one experiencing autism.
So why are you labeling yourself with it?
It starts to feel like youâre centering yourself in something that isnât yours to hold.
And what really gets me is when itâs the same people who say âtheir autism doesnât define themâ... but then turn around and define themselves by their childâs autism.
Like which is it?? Because that contradiction is loud.
If autism âdoesnât define them,â why is it defining you?
It comes off less like support and more like identity borrowing.
It's like taking something that impacts your childâs entire existence and turning it into a label for yourself; one that gets you community, attention, or authority in conversations that should be led by autistic people.
Yeah, parents deserve support spaces. Raising a disabled child can come with real challenges.
But thereâs a difference between:
âIâm a parent of an autistic kidâ
and
âIâm an autism parentâ
One keeps the focus where it belongs. The other kind of...shifts it.
Autistic people already get talked over enough; especially Autistic POC and HSN & MSN Autistics. Their experiences get filtered, explained, and often overwritten by the people around them.
So when even the language parents use starts pulling that focus away, it doesnât feel harmless, it feels like part of the same pattern.
Like just⌠support your kid. Advocate for them. Learn. Listen.
But you donât need to make their autism your identity to do that.
Please let me know your thoughts in the comments.
Do not talk over autistic people here.
Do not talk over POC or MSN/HSN autistic people either.
If youâre allistic or otherwise not part of those groups, this is a space to listen, not dominate the conversation. You can contribute and ask questions, but you are not the focus here.
Autistic voices,especially those who are most marginalized, should come first.
And fuck the jigsaw puzzle imagery advanced by the eugenicists at Autism Speaks. Weâre not a âpuzzleâ to be âsolvedâ
Half of all people killed by cops have a disability, because cops arenât trained to recognize or deal with people with disabilities and very few places have people who are trained for those situations easily accessible during emergencies. So the cops come in and do what theyâre paid to do - murder anyone whoâs inconvenient to the state
Privilege is when you lack barriers another person faces due to your identity (or perceived identity!) and social position, and it's often unnoticeable that you're experiencing it until someone points it out.
An example: I have privilege over my POC friends because I am perceived as white. My man friends have privilege over me because I am perceived as a woman. So my Puerto Rican man friend and I have privilege over each other in different ways, him because he doesn't face sexism and misogyny the way I do, and me because I don't face racism the way he does.
Relative Privilege is when one person with the same identity as another experiences discrimination or barriers to a lesser degree than the other.
An example: My friend and I are both Autistic, and we both experience discrimination due to that. Our autism presents differently, and (generally speaking!), I am more disabled by it than he is. Thus, he holds relative privilege over me. He is still discriminated against more than an allistic person is, but he is discriminated against for his autism less than I am for mine. This is relative privilege. This can also be applied more broadly, for example, I hold relative privilege over many disabled people who are not Autistic but are also otherwise disabled, because they experience more barriers than I do.
Also please note that privilege, because it's given or denied from larger social structures, is often more about how people perceive your identities than your actual identities! For example, I am not a woman, but I am perceived as a woman, and thus experience discrimination based on that.
Experiencing privilege is not a morally bad thing, and experiencing discrimination is not a morally high thing. It's easy to fall into the identity olympics, but it's not helpful. Where you have privilege, use it to lift the voices of those who don't. You are essential. Where you don't have privilege, learn your history, find your community, and embrace yourself. You are essential.
i really need healthy, able-bodied people to understand that there are many illnesses that cannot be cured and which, in many cases, don't even have effective treatments
and that constantly putting the onus on the people who have to live with these illnesses to simply "get better" is an incredibly shitty thing to do
and that it's not "toxic" for chronically ill and disabled people to feel down, and occasionally talk about how down they feel, in a world which continually disregards their suffering and makes their lives much more difficult than they need to be, sometimes deliberately
and that telling these people that they continue to be ill only because they haven't tried a certain exercise, supplement, therapy or diet will only further damage their health by causing them stress
and that doctors are not only not infallible magic-workers, but are very often actively prejudiced against their patients; especially female patients and patients who belong to marginalised and minority groups
please just understand this and accept that the chronically-ill and disabled people you speak to know more about their health and their limitations and what works or doesn't work for them than you ever could
it's sad to me that cis people never apply their "loved one with a wanted-pregnancy" script to medical transition. like cis people often indicate they don't know how to react to hearing about medical transition, but a huge portion of that social script is directly applicable.
tell someone "congratulations!" tell them "I'm so happy for you. I know you've been trying for a really long time." ask them "do you need help with anything?" throw them a party with loved ones where you all give them some gifts in acknowledgement of how expensive it is. celebrate how far along they are. take photos with them so they have a record of being loved while their body changes. allow them to voice fears and doubts and anxieties about how it'll go, and reassure them that they'll get through the intense medical procedure coming up & you'll be there for support no matter what. let them tell you about the gross parts and laugh together. really listen to them when they talk about how amazing and profound it is that the human body can do this. share in their excitement for beginning a new stage of their life.
If there are complications, comfort them and help them navigate what's next. If they lose access suddenly due to finances or criminalization, treat it like a miscarriage and hold them while they grieve.
Here is your friendly reminder not to mess with autistic peoples spaces or stuff without asking, it can cause meltdowns which can be debilitating. Note that by asking here I mean actually directly asking, not interpreting a different interaction as permission.
not interpreting a different interaction as permission.
That last part is especially key.
If you try to decide you've been "given permission" based on a random facial expression, tone of voice, or whatever, you are no better than those guys who go "but she smiled at me!" to justify their creepy advances on women.
You are violating consent just as much as those guys are.
I am once again begging people to realize that AI checker doesnât work. itâs never worked. itâs notoriously known to have flagged human-made works as AI and AI-generated works as human-made. and by feeding it peopleâs works, you are feeding more works to AI, because apparently the machine itself is AI.
the only thing AI checker does is harm genuine artists and people in general too.
I remember watching this TikTok from this Autism Mom who was crying about how her Autistic kid is ruining her life by pouring all her dish soap down the drain and another laundry list of supposed godawful things.
Meanwhile the whole time I'm thinking "this is literally shit any allistic kid can and would do. Why the fuck are you blaming your kid's Autism?"
autistic education @autistic-efu - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
