#stim discourse

[normal-with-adhd-is-a-joke]

I don't trust stimblogs with no dni. Like everyone's allowed to interact? Everyone? Everyone on this hellsite is allowed to get their grubby little bastard hands all over your precious stimboards? Idk about everyone else but stimboards are super hard for me to make and I would be absolutely pissed to see them being appreciated by Nazis and TERFs. Like no bitch, that's not for you, you don't get to profit from the work I did.

[anarchist-pug]

honestly the “truscum don’t interact” banners on stim blogs have always baffled me, like...you don’t own that content? that isn’t your slime. those aren’t your hands. you didn’t record that. that’s someone else’s video that you made a two second gif of. it’s not your right or your place to decide who is and isn’t allowed to consume someone else’s content that you just reposted. if you want to gatekeep people from content just for disagreeing with you, then maybe make your own content? 

[chaoszgod]

hey, uh, unless you yourself created the content on your stim blog (im talking all the videos and gifs are ORIGINAL, not taken from someone else) then you have no right to say who can and cant interact with it. thats that on that. that content isnt yours, you dont hold any rights to it, and anyone can interact with it. thank you, goodnight.

[jadedreality]

That Autistic Feel When...

you’re at school working quietly and you and some other kids in the room have fidget spinners; they’re spinning theirs but you are just holding yours. All of a sudden, the teacher decides that everyone HAS to put their spinners away NOW because “they are getting annoying”. You are slow to react because you’re unsure as to whether this instruction applies to you; logically, fidget spinners could be considered ‘annoying’ because of the sound they make while spinning, but you are holding yours STILL UNDER THE DESK.

Then the teacher calls you out in front of the whole class because you didn’t react quickly enough for their liking. Now your spinner feels Wrong and Not Allowed.

This same teacher, then goes on to say that she doesn’t like everyone thinking they need fidget spinners, but they are great for a relative of theirs who has autism and ADD; he should use them all the time.

Then you go home and end up crying because you were on the verge of a panic attack and meltdown for the rest of the day, and you’re f***ing sick of people assuming your, (and others), neurotype given how how hard you worked for so many years to do well in school and act NT, but also how people have been calling you weird for your whole life and how hard you had to work to get diagnosed; only to have no one believe you.

Context: This happened in the Special Educational Needs department (!!! 😠), (most of the people there probably were probably neurodivergent or mentally ill, the teacher doesn’t know/hasn’t asked). You were there because you were, (and are still), so completely burned out from last year’s 'finals’, (I guess that’s what they’d be called in the US, idk), from about a year ago that you stopped going to school for weeks and weeks, and then had to drop half of your subjects.

TLDR: The way stimming is treated; even in self-proclaimed 'inclusive’ schools is exclusionary and just plain terrible.

P.S.: sorry I didn’t put this under a cut; not sure how to do it on mobile.

[themintycupcake]

Also apparently people are getting hassled because stim blogs are "all slime and sand and glitter" but... That's kind of the nature of visual stimming? You're exposing yourself to stimulation that's visually pleasing, which doesn't necessarily have to be slime or sand or glitter, but those just seem to be the most common. With body stimming, like bouncing, flapping, and chewing, it's more like you're expelling energy. At least that's how it goes for me. It's me performing an action with my own body. It's not stimulating for me to watch someone else do it. I'm sure there are people out there who do find it stimulating, but for many of us it's just not? I get that the idea of posting videos of it is to do away with the stigma associated with body stimming, but acting like everyone who posts slime and sand and glitter is some neurotypical co-opting the aesthetics of stimming is extremely disingenuous and downright harmful since most of the damage is done to actual ND's who run these blogs. Also, it's not like visual stimming or playing with sand and slime is this fully non-stigmatized activity, either. I can't exactly bring my slime out in public or to work and just casually play with it without getting weird looks and comments. Even with videos a lot of NT's think they're weird and pointless. So before you attack a blog for only posting "cute" visual stimming, ask yourself: is this blog run by an ND person? Does this person actively make fun of body stims and other less "cute" forms of stimming? Or am I just making assumptions and jumping to conclusions? If you answer "yes" to the third question, then maybe leave the blog alone.

[date-a-cluster-c]

Hi Hi! Stimming anon here! I really appreciate your responses, it really helped me get a better look on the discourse, as I've never heard anyone else's opinions on it! Thank you guys!

Yes of course! Feel free to ask anything! :>

-Mod Lulu

[themintycupcake]

While I find discourse in the stim community kind of baffling, I'm not surprised that it happens. My biggest frustration right now is the fact that exclusionary discourse such as ace discourse has been thrown into the mess, even though it shouldn't have anything to do with stimming? How the Hell did this even happen? For what purpose? The only discourse post that exists on my stim blog is just a post of me confirming that I'm a-spec friendly. I made it because of posts and asks I've seen of a-specs feeling unsafe or unwelcome in the stim community and wishing that more blogs were easier to search and check. Outside of that and some explanations of why I might block someone in my "who can interact" section on my "About" page, that's it. I don't even like to acknowledge that discourse is a thing on that blog, which is why I'm making this post here on my main. I definitely don't have a problem with stim blog owners being opinionated. I just wish it was more common etiquette to keep discourse discussions on separate blogs away from the stim blogs themselves. Discourse can make people anxious, which kind of defeats the purpose of visual stimming.

[brachot-and-boobies]

Why of all the parts of tumblr is the stim side full of drama

Stimming should be joyful. 

Why we gotta fight?