Neuroqueering
TRIGGER WARNING: This article contains detailed discussion of harmful "cures". It also mentions ABA, MMS, Chelation, and has in depth discussion around normative society and the murder of Autistic people. For as long as I have been an advocate, many of my fellow Autistics have spoken out against
Neuroqueer Theory
For as long as I have been part of the online Autistic community, we have spoken out against and educated on the topic of the harms of Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA). While I could discuss the real world trauma and attitudes that proceed and preceed ABA respectively, today I'
Autistic Community
As you may have noticed from my most recent blog post, I am somewhat down a rabbit hole at the moment. In my previous article I discussed Zeno's paradox of plurality and how it applies to the dehumanisation of Autistic people and the double empathy problem. Today I
disability
This was inspired by the book "Authoring Autism: On Rhetoric and Neurological Queerness" by Remi Yergeau. The double empathy problem, so named, is the title given to the seeming appearance of deficits in communication in Autistic people. The double empathy problem states that Autistic people do not have
Neurodiversity
This article was co-authored by David Gray-Hammond and Tanya Adkin Trigger Warning: Injustice, professionals, Autistic suffering, mentions of theory of mind, weak central coherence, and older autism theory. We often sit and have conversations about our work. We never cease to be astounded at the lack of basic autism knowledge
Neurodiversity
This article was co-authored between David Gray-Hammond and Tanya Adkin Trigger Warning: Injustice, mental health, systemic oppression, minority stress, fabricated and induced illness, stigma. "The state creates the rules and dictates the processes to be followed: processes that fragment, silo, and compartmentalise, and in doing so, generate the complexity
Autistic Community
Why do interventions such as Applied Behavioural Analysis and Positive Behavioural Support exist? Why is it that our world uses neurotypicality as the standard from which neuronormativity is drawn? Fundamentally, I believe that it comes down to the double empathy problem. Autistic people have a different style of communications to
disability
Today I am 6 years sober from addiction. During those six years I have learnt many lessons, but in this reflection I would like to consider something that has played on my mind for the past three years of my advocacy work. Inspiration. While not overtly a bad thing, it
Autistic Rights
April 2nd. It's a day that so many of us dread. For as long as "world autism day" has existed, it is a day where (much like every other day) adherents of the pathology paradigm do their best to drown out the voices of those that
Autistic Rights
Being Autistic is not inherently good or bad, it just is. That's not to say that I am not proud of who I am, and I am most certainly not denying the obstacles I have had to over come. While being Autistic is an inseparable part of my
Autistic Rights
Functioning labels have long been hated in the Autistic community. Not only are they wildly inaccurate, but they do not take the dynamic nature of our disability into account. Despite this, many professionals and laypeople continue to use them, or variations on them. Arguments about the inaccuracy of functioning labels
Mental Health Treatment Rights
This article was co-authored by David Gray-Hammond and Tanya Adkin Trigger Warning: This article contains strong language and discussions of fabricated or induced illness, ableism, discrimination, bigotry, child abuse, medical abuse, systemic abuse, institutionalised bullying. Fabricated or Induced Illness (FII) is defined by a set of "alerting signs"