I fear that some of ya'll need to remember that intellectually disabled adults with high support needs can still be allosexual allolibidoist. Like. A lot of them still want to masturbate, consume sexual content, and have sex. I'm seeing an uptick lately in purism directed towards people with IDDs, and its worrying me.
I understand being concerned about ableists taking advantage of people with IDDs, I really do, and I know its a horrible thing that happens to them a lot.
But you also need to keep in mind that this is a group of adults who suffer from severe infantilization from the general public, and are treated as solely incapable of understanding their surroundings.
And yes, not all people with IDDs are aware enough of what is happening to consent to sex (still, these people may masturbate or consume sexual content! And they still shouldn't be infantilized, they're still adults!) But many people with IDDs are more than aware.
IDDs do not make a person asexual non-libidoist. People with IDDs can be acespec or on the hypolibidoist spectrum, but they aren't inherently that way.
(IDDs also don't make a person non-partnering - a lot of people with IDDs want to have partnerships, whether theyre sexual, romantic, or nonrose!)
(1/2) If you have/had difficulty with school specifically related to your neurodivergence, do you feel like you've ever had enough support/accommodations in school?
Yes, I've had plenty of support for most/all of my time in school
Yes, I've had plenty of support at some point, but it wasn't consistent
No, I've had some support for most/all of my time in school, but never enough
No, I've had some support at some point, but not consistent and not enough
No, I've never had support in school for issues related to my neurodivergence
I'm neurodivergent but didn't have any issues in school related to that
Neurotypical
Other
Voting ended onJan 30
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Hearing constantly about gifted autistic kids and people seeing it as THEE autistic trait has completely disregarded those who arenāt gifted and made a HUGE divide in the community. Seeing constantly āyeah autistic people are usually giftedā is so annoying because a VERY large chunk of autistic people, arenāt actually gifted and media has just put the gifted people at the front because theyāre more palatable. The āautistic gifted kid burnoutā has become more so a trend than anything and Iāve seen a lot of people assume theyāre autistic because they are the āgifted kid burnout personā when that isnāt even a requirement for an autism diagnosis. You donāt have to be gifted to be autistic. You donāt have to be!!
Start putting the people who struggle more in the spotlight. Those with intellectual disabilities, those with learning disabilities, those with cognitive disabilities, those who are just generally stereotypically ādumbā and embrace it!
We need to have a very big discussion about this as a community and it needs to start today.
I recently started my clinical working with very high support needs autistic kids. This is not the first time Iāve worked with disabled students, but this is the first time Iāve worked so in-depth with them. Iām interacting with them for 7+ hours a day, constantly talking to them, helping them learn and develop new skills, taking them to gym and art and all sorts of other things. And this has really solidified the belief I have that 99% of neurotypical who think they know the first thing about autism do not know a damn thing about it.
There are so many people who are literally raging hate campaigns against literal children just because theyāre autistic. āYou just donāt get what itās like having to parent them,ā ātheyāre so difficult,ā āthey can never learn,ā āthey canāt contribute anything to society,ā ātheyāre missing something inside.ā
None of that is true in the fucking slightest. I knew this before, but it has become INFINITELY more apparent. My heart hurts for these kids because itās so obvious sometimes that people have never even tried to get to know or understand them. They think thereās nothing going on in their heads, that theyāre incapable of love, that they canāt learn, meanwhile these are some of the smartest, kindest, and most caring kids Iāve ever been around.
Yes, HSN autism has its challenges. Yes, it can be hard to parent or teach a child with profound needs. Yes, they often need much more attention and care and need help with things their allistic peers do not need help with. But to say that they are incapable of love or learning or that they are āmissing somethingā is completely fucking untrue.
If they are incapable of showing love, then why do they notice when the teachers are upset? Why do they hug us? Why do they offer us their snacks or their treasured toys or stuffed animals? Why do they become distressed when other students are crying and try to help them? Why do they run to us in the mornings and cry at dismissal?
If they are incapable of learning, then how did they learn to use felt boards and AAC devices and sign language? Why are we constantly updating their learning goals because they keep hitting them? Why are they able to learn all the routines we have in the classroom?
I feel so much empathy for these kids because I know lifeās been hard to them. I can see it on their faces, in their body language. I can tell that their boundaries have been repeatedly violated, because they are shocked when we listen to their discomforts and their fears. They expect us to keep pushing on with their lessons even when they are upsetting or cause them pain.
We regularly pause when we notice theyāre distressed or distracted and itās clear that they donāt expect us to. If I could describe to you the shock that one student experienced when they said they wanted to play during a lesson, and we found the time to let them play instead of pushing on and insisting it was learning time. Another student cried while we were brushing their hair and was shocked that we took that as a cue to stop and give them a break and let them play with their comfort toy.
Weāve stopped so many meltdowns just by giving students the chance to communicate what is bothering them. People complain that meltdowns are unavoidable, but then they donāt take the time to give the person the opportunity to communicate or try to figure out whatās bothering them. Iād say we avoid a good 80% of the potential meltdowns in our classroom literally just by understanding that these are kids with complex needs who just want a way to communicate whatās wrong.
It just makes me so mad that people cannot see this and think the autistic label means kids are irreparably damaged or some stupid shit like that. Treating these kids like actual human beings is an alien concept to most people. Weāre not āmiracle workersā or ābreaking through the autismā or whatever other ableist bullshit people try to claim. Weāre just treating these kids like normal fucking people.
This shit pisses me off so bad. Protect autistic kids (AND autistic adults), especially HSN autistics, because they are so so vulnerable and the world hates them for existing.
Twice exceptional is when some is considered academically gifted and has a learning disability (or any other neurodivergence) - and someone in my comments said if you have two neurodivergence it's called thrice exceptional (*vomit emoji*).
This ranks intelligence and implies a higher IQ is better
This implies people with learning disabilities and other neurodivergence cannot/do not normally have high IQs (which is positioned as a negative) and only certain people are (quote unquote) "exceptional".
Also, calling it exceptional gives me the same vibes as someone saying something isn't a disability, it's a superpower.
if you believe in "narcissistic abuse", you are inherently being ableist.
if you believe in "borderline abuse", you are also inherently being ableist
if you use the words "sociopath" and "psychopath" (not in a reclaiming way, only towards others), you are also being ableist.
if you use the r-slur towards others, you are also inherently being ableist.
if you think people with dyscalculia are inherently dumb because of their dyscalculia, you are ALSO being ableist.
if you think anyone with a learning disability is stupid because of their own disability that they CANNOT CONTROL, you are also being ableist.
and uh, other examples.
