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Let’s talk about the astounding similarities between cats and autistic people, and how we should make them the official autism mascot instead of that godawful puzzle piece

neurowonderful

Oh man, now you’ve got me going!

Firstly, cats stim. They purr, swish their tails and knead their paws against pillows, blankets, and other soft things. Many cats actively seek out sensory experiences, like listening to birds singing, lying in a sunbeam, rolling against the grass, etc.

Cats have sensory sensitivities— many of them dislike walking on certain flooring, touching certain textures, and certain smells or sounds may make them anxious. Their fur is very sensitive, they can sense the lightest touch, or speck of lint, or dust and their skin will quiver until they can lick or rub it off. When they become overstimulated cats retreat into a small, dark place to recover.

Cats love routine. Many cats know the exact time that their owners wake up in the morning and will wake them. A cat with a routine is a happy cat— they love to have their meals or soft food on a schedule and will learn their owner’s schedule. Cats will become anxious when the schedule is disrupted or if their owner doesn’t follow their usual routine.

In the same vein cats are very wary and/or anxious when it comes to the introduction of new things or people into their environment. Cats require time and patience to get used to anything or anyone newly introduced. Cats also feel anxious when existing furniture is rearranged or when a new smell (like an air freshener) is introduced into the home.

Cats often have “special interests”, a particular activity or thing that they love and can spend hours enjoying. It could be playing with a particular toy, chewing on something, listening to the radio, or watching the clothes in the washing machine. My cat Kitty has a certain ball that she fixates on and will happily enjoy and obsess over for hours.

Finally, cats have a very distinct and subtle body language. The difference is particularly evident when compared with the exuberant, unsubtle dog. The slightest twitch of a tail or turn of the ears, the frequency and timing of blinks, and the positioning of the tail in relation to the body are all little movements that can express much. To the untrained eye it may appear as if a cat is bored, aloof, or unaware of its surroundings. But once you learn to recognize cat body language and understand cat communication, you’ll be amazed at the depth of emotion and how expressive your cat really is.

Yes, I think that cats have a lot in common with autistic people. And that’s wonderful!

jaspurr

also can I add to this:

cats like to show their affection just by sharing the same space. a cat will generally want to be in the same space as you, even if you’re not really interacting and are half way across the room. still hanging out!

they don’t always want to be touched, and can be easily overstimulated by physical affection.

they don’t like to make eye contact.

their body language is often misinterpreted- and then they are blamed for it, or have negative motivations ascribed to it. a cat following you around is stalking you instead of wanting to hang out. a cat that doesn’t want to make eye contact with you is ignoring you instead of being polite. a cat that lashes out because it’s over stimulated, or you ignored their body language telling you to leave them alone is suddenly an asshole who hurt you for no reason.

vivapinatawiki-deactivated20250

I had this book as a child and I’m glad to see the comparison is so widely recognized too

neurodivergent-crow

I KEEP SAYING ALL CATS ARE AUTISTIC IM SO HAPPY THIS POST EXISTS PLEASE SOMEONE ARTISTIC MAKE A CAT WITH THE NEURODIVERGENT SYMBOL ON IT FOR AUTISM MASCOT :D

moved-to-jammotarts

Her name is hope, her breed is highlander and she’s precious.

neurowonderful

[Image: A very cute digital illustration of a small bipedal cat person in a cartoon style. She is light gray with darker gray stripes, and lighter areas of colour on her tummy, paws, face, and upright ears. She has gold amber eyes and is looking to the right and smiling. She is standing with her arms out at her sides and is wearing an off-the-shoulder short sleeved shirt with a rainbow neurodiversity/autism mobius on the front. Rainbow text credits the image to @DimensionFiend]

gryffon

was driving with my girlfriend and spotted a vulture with a broken wing standing on the side of the road. there was an animal hospital nearby with a wildlife unit so we pulled over and picked it up and drove it to tufts. i think its got a good chance at survival and it feels good to have been able to make the call and help an injured wild animal out

gryffon

the funniest part of this was showing up at the Tufts emergency room with all these average folks with their dogs sitting politely on leashes in the waiting room and us being two very sweaty, disheveled haggy dykes who are bursting in and nearly running up to the desk holding a vulture in nothing but our bare hands and the look of extreme shock and horror on everybody’s face

atomic-darth

Gay culture is bursting into an animal clinic looking to get medical treatment for a carrion bird

danielkanhai

how many muggle born kids showed up at hogwarts like, “i get you’re into magic and don’t get me wrong, magic is awesome, but please don’t try and tell me quills and inkwells make more sense than pencils. i realize you have an aesthetic going, but admit it’s that. admit it’s just for looks.”

baronessbamf

Imagine how many muggles parents looked at the supply list and went “Parchment? Quills? INKWELLS? Fuck this we’re going to staples.”

judedeluca

And then imagine if the muggle parents start getting into arguments with the teachers when they start getting messages telling them their kids aren’t using the proper materials.

“Okay look we can accept working with frog livers, turning mice into fine china, and whatever the fuck ‘arithmancy’ is but we’re not going to let you shame our kids just because they choose to use a bic pen instead of this ‘ye old inkwell’ bullshit. Also. it’s called a spiral notebook and I’m not gonna make my Abby drag around five hundred feet of loose parchment just because you people have a theme going.”

lordblackfang-deactivated202408

Aesthetic or death

ollieofthebeholder

I’ve got to wonder, though, how much of the school supply list at Hogwarts is based on aesthetic and how much is based on what the Muggle world was like when wizards retreated into secrecy. Like, how many wizards who haven’t taken Muggle Studies are aware that nobody uses inkwells and quill pens anymore? And I bet the Muggle parents over the years have always just assumed “well there must be some reason for all this, it must work better with these supplies, there must be something inherently magical in parchment” and just went with it.

Give me the story of the Muggle-born witch whose parents can’t afford all the fancy school supplies, who literally cringe when they’re told about the fund for “underprivileged students” because they’re not POOR but they’ve got four other children and two of them need special care, who scrimp and save and scrape together until they can afford the school supply list even if most of it’s secondhand, but they start at the top of the list with the things that HAVE to be bought in Diagon Alley and go from there, and when they get towards the end of the list they start making do.

On September 1, in this big crowd of ickle firsties, there’s one who stands out because her robes don’t look quite right but no one can quite pinpoint why, until an older student asks her the next day and she shyly admits that her mother made them for her out of some fabric she’s had lying around for a while. She gets to her first class and sits in the back because she’s a little embarrassed and pulls out the battered secondhand textbook and her wand and everything else she needs, prepared to take notes, and everything’s going along just fine until Professor Flitwick suddenly stops in the middle of his lecture and asks what she’s doing, and she just freezes but manages to stammer out that she’s just taking notes, Professor.

Flitwick is suddenly at her side, how did he get there so quickly, and examining her cheap retractable pen and the packet of looseleaf paper in a flimsy three-ring binder where the center ring is already out of alignment, and the other Muggle-borns and half-bloods in the class are snickering because look at this loser who didn’t know you need parchment and quills for this, who ever heard of doing magic with a biro, but Flitwick is fascinated and asks if he can try one, and maybe she tells him to keep that one because she has more (even though she only has a couple more, but she can make do with pencils, and surely somebody around here will loan her a little bit of ink to refill one of her pens if she needs to, I mean, it can’t be that hard to fill up the little ink sticks inside of them, can it?) and he beams at her like she’s just given him the House Cup and goes back to teaching like nothing has happened.

And then all of her teachers are asking her about these things, and maybe a few of the other Muggle-born students tentatively help her answer them, and when McGonagall presses her she admits that her parents couldn’t afford to get her everything she needed and it was a lot cheaper to go to the shop on the corner and pick up a half-dozen packs of looseleaf and a packet of pens than it was to buy the quill and parchment and honestly, Professor, I didn’t think it would matter, and McGonagall smiles because she remembers her own father and says it doesn’t.

The next year the school supply list says only ink-based writing utensils and parchment or lined paper and a few of the more traditionalist pureblood families insist on only sending their children with quills and inkwells, but there are other students–a lot of other students–with retractables and stick pens and a couple of the older Muggle-born students come in with really nice quality fountain pens and there’s a whole black market (or at least grey market) going on with regards to the buying and selling and trading of glitter gel pens and a lot of debates over whether fine-tipped pens or the broader ones are better and there’s at least one kid who’s got one of those gigantic foot-long novelty click pens because what, you said it had to be ink-based, so what if it’s an inch thick and hot pink with Disney princesses all over it, it’s still a pen, and within a few years nobody can remember why there was such an issue with them in the first place.

Nobody has the slightest idea what to do the first time a student shows up with his grandfather’s typewriter, though.

deerinspotlight

I feel like the reason certain dog-lovers insist cats are evil is because they read their body language as if they were dogs. So here’s a very basic guide to common “mean” things cats do that actually aren’t mean at all if you know what they’re thinking.

Rolling and exposing belly- attacks you when touched Does not mean: Give belly rubs! - haha I tricked you! Actually means: I’m playful! If you reach for my belly I’ll grab your arm and bite it because I think we’re playfighting!

Lazily exposing belly - still attacks when touched Does not mean: tricked you again! Actually means: I’m showing you my belly because I trust you. Please don’t break that trust by invading my personal space. I might accept a belly rub if I’m not ticklish and I know you well. Snapping at you while being pet Does not mean: I suddenly decided I dislike you! Actually means: You’re petting me in a way that gives me too much restless energy. Please focus on petting my head and shoulders instead of stroking the full length of my back next time.

Is in the same room but makes no attempt to interact Does not mean: I’m ignoring you Actually means: We’re hanging out! I’m being respectful by giving you space while still enjoying your company. Slapping/scratching your hand when you try to pet them Does not mean: I hate you! Actually means: You’ve failed to establish that we’re not playing, or the way you’re approaching me scares me. Be calmer, speak more gently, make eye-contact and blink slowly at me before you try again.

squeakykins

I love this post omg, thank you so much. As a lifelong cat person, dogs perplex me because they’re so completely different behaviourally.

calleo

This is also why people assume “cats and dogs don’t get along.”

Their body language is totally different; a dog’s play posture is a cat’s hunting or aggression posture, depending on the situation.

Tail wagging is not a friendly, “HELLO! I am pleased to see you” with cats the way it often is with dogs, it’s more of an, “I’m annoyed, please go away.” if it’s outside the realm of playing/stalking behavior.

DOGS misinterpret cat body language and often assume a cat is friendly and wanting to play when the cat is displaying, “I’m uncomfortable and will either run away or attack you if you don’t stop.”

Cats also misinterpret dog body language; the tail wag and ears are two big ones. A dog with its ears back (assuming it’s the type of dog that can put its ears back) and tail wagging is often relaxed, but to a cat, that’s a pretty aggressive set of anger body language, so a dog that approaches a cat with tail wagging and potentially ears back is not often seen as a friendly hello.

Cats and dogs also play in different ways that don’t often mesh unless or until a cat and dog have had several months to get used to each other and figure it out.