”autistic people don’t do [ extremely common higher support need , higher level autistic trait / symptom ] , that just stereotype”
you need include us too : you need include childish autistic person , you need include nonverbal autistic person , you need include autistic person who drool , you need include autistic people with intellectual disability , you need include autistic person with loud messy public meltdowns .
can not hide behind “it just stereotype” because that not true . there are many people very disabled by autism , you need remember us and include us .
i think some of you forget that autistic people will display symptoms of autism that affect their daily life, especially us with higher support needs. that’s like common sense i fear
hating on picky eaters, sensitive people, socially awkward people, weird kids etc. doesn’t make you morally superior
Hey, you, autistic person talking about how autistics were called names and demonized and bullied but I need you to understand that you are talking about a privileged perspective of the autistic community during that time and so many of you are participating in a trend of ignoring what happened to severely disabled and especially high support needs autistics before autism was understood and I also need you to know that if we don’t talk about marginalized and erased history then it will disappear and be repeated, right?
People saying they are "higher needs" when you point out harmful and misinformation that they are spreading about higher needs autism.
I have noticed this quite often, it is definitely not uncommon. When you are being called out about misinformation it's much easier to say that you are a part of that community as a "free pass" to validate anything you say than come forward that you were wrong and maybe reflect a little bit about what you have said.
Whenever people say "levels are ableist", "levels are stereotyping us" and I point out that this perspective is very low needs centered and it's usually late-diagnosed, low needs people that spread this kind of information that is incorrect and harmful people always, always end up saying "I am higher needs too", "I am level 2/3" and this makes me so incredibly upset.
First, if the person is being honest about their level, which honestly you just have to believe they are and hope for the best, since a lot of people seem to be self-diagnosing with "higher needs", which I absolutely do not agree with, that doesn't make them exempt from having typically "low needs/late-diagnosed actions". Being higher needs does not make you immune to saying bullshit and to ignoring other higher needs autistics. Being autistic also doesn't exempt you from being ableist, from being an Aspie Supremacist, being part of a community does not make you immune to being ableist to your own community. The biggest example of this is how often gay men are homophobic towards their own LGBTQ+ community, how often they can be transphobic, lesbophobic etc.
So, if someone is pointing out that what you are saying goes against the majority of the higher needs autism community, you do not get to say "I am higher needs" to validate what you are saying. I never, ever assume someone's needs over the internet and to call you out for harmful misinformation about levels and the general higher needs autistic activism is not assuming your level. If I tell you that what you are saying goes against what the majority of higher needs autistics talk about, I am not assuming you aren't higher needs. I am simply pointing out that you are being harmful to higher needs autistics, whether you are or not one of us.
Second, I am honestly very surprised to see people claiming they are higher needs while clearly not participating in higher needs activism and discussions. It's clear to all of us here, as far as I am aware, that levels are needed and that they are not ableist. All of my online "friends" (I call you all friends, because I remember your usernames and always check to see what you've been posting, even if we don't really interact) are fighting to get low needs/late-diagnosed people to understand our perspective and to understand that some of us do have more needs than others and that's fine. And very honestly, if one of us, who truly knows what we go through in the autistic community, keeps spreading this type of misinformation, this makes me so incredibly sad and I honestly am unable to understand why they would do that.
And I honestly assume (I know it's not really okay to assume, but be patient with me, we're all trying our bests and a lot of us are just tired with the backlash from the mainstream autistic community), by the things these people usually say that they really do not engage in our activism and do not truly understand what we try to fight for within the autistic community. So I do not know if they are late-diagnosed higher needs and therefore do not know about us, if they aren't higher needs, if they are higher needs yet refuse to participate in our activism, if they self-diagnosed higher needs... I don't know. Anyways, in any of these cases, telling you to keep up with actual higher needs activism (like what we do here, over at Reddit etc) is not, in any way, assuming you are not higher needs. It's telling you that you are clearly not listening to higher needs autism activism.
I always try to be nice and end up being blocked because people within the autistic community cannot take any criticism, ever. Just happened right now. I put so much effort into my words (which is much harder when you have a language impairment) to try to educate people, to be nice and let them know what they are saying is incorrect and people just assume I am either attacking them, being "ableist" or any other kind of misinterpretation of my words. Sometimes I think I will lose my mind over activism. I feel so left out, I feel like I am screaming at no one. I am so done with mainstream autism activism and I am so done being ignored. I think sometimes that I need to distance myself from activism because this is so hard to cope with emotionally. But at the same time I cannot because I cannot see misinformation and ignore, misinformation makes me furious, injustice against people like me and my friends here makes me absolutely mad. I cannot ignore. Maybe this is a symptom of my own autism, I don't know, if anyone does feel free to let me know. I can't ignore this. Anyways, this post was a vent. I am always very opened to criticism and civil discussions as long as long don't keep your arguments to impact phrases(+) everyone is done listening and as long as you don't block me when I am trying to have a civil discussion.
+ I am not sure if "impact phrases" is the correct word to what I am saying, I had to google this on translator because I don't know how to say this in English. By "impact phrases" I mean very used things without any meaningful thought like "levels are ableist", "levels divide us", "levels are new functioning labels". If you actually believe these things, I am also opened to explain why I (and a lot of higher needs and allies) think this is incorrect.
many autistic people need people use simpler words when talking to them
many autistic people need tasks broken into tiny steps to understand how do something
many autistic people need positive feedback in way that other think condescending
many autistic people childish and have childish interests
many autistic people have to always be supervised never alone because of risk of hurt self or get in dangerous situations
many autistic people have violent messy big meltdown, even in public
many autistic people struggle with speech always will maybe rest of life (non verbal, semi verbal, demi verbal etc.)
AND most of these autistic people higher support needs + level 2 & 3 autism, don’t forget or ignore us. can’t say “that not true just stereotypes” when it just symptom and sign of higher support needs higher level autism.
you want to raise awareness for lower support needs level 1 autism and yes good ok!!!! but not this way where throw HrSN level 2+3 autistic under bus.
hate when i say “i can’t do [thing] because of my autism” and hear (usually lower support needs) autistics say “well i’m forced to do [thing] so i have to” in response.
there will be autistics who never can do [thing] no matter how forced, no matter how punished, no matter how anything.
i can’t force myself to do [thing] i can’t do. not ever.
many autistics like me.
especially hate hearing autistics say “well if i didn’t do [thing] i would get abused” as if we autistics also didn’t get abused, except we still couldn’t do [thing].
you are dismissing higher support needs autistic who are or have been abused.
* [thing] here can be literally anything, doing chores, eye contact, speaking, socialising, get good grades in school etc.
