#it might be blocked since “autistic” could be used as an insult

[lunathewafflelord]

apparently in Corporate Clash you can say "autism" but not "autistic"

I was trying to tell someone I'm autistic (they're in a club called Autism Creatures) and I ended up saying "I am autism"

and "I am autism" sounds very menacing compared to "I am autistic"

[ask-katima]

Welcome to the Master Post of Katima’s Ask Blog!

Warning….. it’s long-/SRS

Projects: Small Companion (on going), Katima comic (Discontinued)

Lucas/Owner: Example of text.

Hello! I am the mod of this ask blog and my oc, Katima! I’ll be mostly talking in the updates, but you might find Katima talking here too, take her words with a bit of salt, but she is like the owner of this blog, since asks are for her!

If you’d like to ask ME something, please make sure to make it clear in your ask, since I’m not a mind reader. I’m also autistic and have ADHD so I might not catch simple clues, you have to write it in bold red letters for me ;p/silly.

Please use He/It/Void pronouns on me! Any other pronouns aren’t really welcomed… so if you use they, I won’t really like it.

I’m comfortable with mostly any topics! However the NSFW or very graphic violence isn’t for me.. I’d rather not see that AT ALL! Sure, I enjoy some romance and a bit of angst, but I’m not that over the top.

Also I’m a silly guy who can’t tell tones, so please use tone tags with me, I’m really timid if I take your comment/words as pretty mad/degrading… so please make it clear to me that you aren’t..

Katima: example of text

(I also use the indented feature for her.)

Heyo! I’m the creation of Lucases wiiiide imagination… yeah I’m self aware…. To the point you’d be probably thinking I’m another human using the internet from your “earth” or something…. But in reality, I just know too much, research and am self reserved about stuff.

My creator just decided that, “Fuck it! If Ink can speak/hear the creators then Katima can hear/speak to me!” Soo, grumble to him bout that I guess, hah.. makes sure to insult him when you do so…./hj.

All asks are assigned to me automatically, if you’d like to ask Lucas make it clear, like he said on the top.

You can use any pronouns on me except “it”… I know I’m just an oc or whatever…. But I still have feelings and I hate being treated as an object/referred to one.

I have the same preference as Lucas.

Please use tone tags with me too, since I’m being puppeteered by Lucas it means that I, too am unable to read tone… but I am able to… if Lucas could-

Rules of the blog, asks and stuff.

1. No NSFW, at all! It can be romantic but… keep it classy and up to code.

1.b No heavy gore!! It can have some injuries nd mention of violence, but keep it to a minimum…

2. Since rule 1 is for roleplaying purposes, asks can have roleplaying text! If you’d like to continue the roleplay beyond the ask, please tell me via a comment or a private message on Tumblr. I’d appreciate that!

3. No slurs. That’s it. Nothing more to say, as soon as you write it and post that, I’m blocking you. And there will be no way out.

4. Fanart is always welcome! I’m not one to say no to some creativity! With that aid, any creative project present with any of my characters I’ll say yes to. You don’t even have to ask. As far as roleplaying goes… make sure you red EVERYTHING I have on Katima, and please make sure not to stray away too far from how she’s represented. Otherwise you’re free to roleplay as her to your hearts content! (And if they ask you who the creator is, make sure to link this blog/post.)

5. Please use common sense and proper grammar. I know it can be hard wording sometimes, you don’t have to send your ask RIGHT AWAY! As if in a race, you can take your sweet ol’ time writing it to perfection! Or even better, you don’t have to send it today! It can be tomorrow when you’re feeling better or something.

6. Be respectful of my time and availability. I won’t respond right away sometimes, either I’m too tired and aware of how bad I would fumble, drawing, roleplaying or sleeping. Please be respectful of this. (I am available from 9 am to 3 am mostly, yes, it’s the whole day. However I live in Europe Slovakia so we have to count on that. GMT + 2.)

7. I’m not a master in anything I’m doing 😅, so if there are any mistakes anywhere or imperfections, please either tell me, give some tips or ignore it. Thank you!

8. Please don’t ask me questions that are too personal/something private. Those asks will go unanswered.

9. This isn’t a rule, mostly a notice. If I’m not feeling up to it, I’ll recycle old drawings for asks. Please don’t be offended or sad, the reason behind that will be: No ideas what to draw, not enough motivation or I simply don’t have time for it currently.

Sites & socials you can find me on:

Discord: lucasisverycool01 •server•

Instagram

Artfight

Tik Tok

YouTube

Devianart

Reddit

Roblox: Sikowow_2 (nickname is Lucas)

Cookie Run Kingdom: Memekingdom001 (Hollyberry server)

Vr Chat: LucasIsVeryCool

Notion

Lucas’s Tumblr (separate content)

Fair warning that I’m not the most acrive on most sites except for here, discord and vr chat… sooo please don’t be mad I don’t recognize you commented something on one of my socials ASAP! Also my Devianart account is mostly there so I know what the artists there are up to and stuffs!

That would be it, have fun asking and observing folks!

[lord-of-fidgets]

Shockwave x Autistic S/O ( Transformers Prime )

( Disclaimer: I am autistic myself but don’t speak for any other autistic person. So there may be things you don’t relate to if you’re also autistic. That’s perfectly fine and I hope you can still enjoy. Also, any ableism in the comments will be blocked/removed. Transformers is one of my special interests.) 

(( Allistics don’t derail )) 

    🧪You know how difficult reading people can be. But when you first met Shockwave, an important detail about his way of communicating stuck out to you - his antennae move subtly and provide a way of expressing emotion/thoughts. This is adorable to you and provides a hint to tell what he’s feeling. 

   🧪You find making “eye contact” with him suprisingly easier when compared to making eye contact with other humans. Shockwave doesn’t care in the sense it’s not required for him to have you make eye contact. In fact, he’s not quite sure why some humans are so adamant about something that has nothing to do with effective listening like they seem to think. He’d never force you to make eye contact. 

   🧪He can empathize with hyperfixation. He’s been known to stay within his lab for days ( or longer ), focusing on whatever interesting projects or experiments have captured his attention. And you’ve been known to do the same; down to frogetting to take care of yourself. “Y/n, have you ( insert basic human need here ), yet? You haven’t moved for some time...” Please - he worries over you. 

   🧪Along these same lines, he’d give reminders. But not as subtly as Soundwave might. Upon learning what you need to live and feel comfortable, he’d be wary you’d forget to take care of yourself if he wasn’t around. He’d point blank ask you and run down the list to make sure you’ve taken care of yourself. If you take medication, he’s doubly careful to make sure you take it when and how you’re supposed to. 

  🧪 Honestly, good luck leaving his lab - or his sight, period. Not that he thinks you incapable of taking care of yourself, but now that he’s here, let him help. He worries even if not vocally. He takes extreme care of his experiments, how much more he looks after you - his Sparkmate!

  🧪 Info-dumping is welcomed! Shockwave takes great interest in what interests you. He’d ask you detailed questions about your Special Interests and commit what you say to memory. You could never bore this patient Decepticon Scientist. You also listen to him as he explains his work to you , and ask him questions.This becomes a favorite pass-time; sometimes you both loose track of time. The vehicons standing guard outside have been known to wonder if you’ve both somehow expired since it’s been some time since they’ve seen either of you emerge. 

 🧪 Watching Shockwave’s methodical work is soothing and at times also provides a visual stim. There are times when a content silence settles over both of you and you two just exist in quiet harmony. The soft beeps and bubbles of his laboratory provide calming white noise. His movements and parts of the experiments act as visual stims. Sometimes he let’s you handle fun substances he’s certain won’t cause harm or sensory problems. Or show you fun science tricks - although an occasional mishap has resulted in a few hilarious memories. 

   🧪When you both - finally - decide to power down, he keeps you cradled on his chest. Sometimes under his hand, tented carefully over you - or sometimes inside the small, cozy place within his chest cavity. The whirl of his spark is soothing and becomes one of your favorite sounds that calms you down when upset or lulls you to sleep. He will often wake before you and lay there until you wake up. This takes discipline, for his active mind wants to test the idea he just had but because he cares for you, he waits. You don’t sleep enough and you have a hard time falling and staying asleep often. 

  🧪When he finds out from you that you’re autistic, at first he isn’t sure what that is, and asks for clarification. You explain it to him and he makes a mental note to do more research later. You wait for the typical remarks you usually face when disclosing that you’re autistic. There is none. Instead he gently scoops you up, places you on his shoulder, and you two go back to your work routine. Occasionally he may ask questions about it. Shockwave doesn’t give two barrings about what others may think or say unless it negatively effects you. Then he gets involved. 

 🧪Upon learning the basics,and always clarifiying what he has learned with you, he asks more questions. “what is your preference for when you are overwhelmed? Should I not touch you or should I relocate you somewhere else? I read experiences are diverse among autistic humans and decided it would be best to ask you for your personal preference.” He’ll ask about your stims, what overwhelms you, what he can do to help to prevent stressful situations, and what to do to assist when things do end up causing a meltdown or shutdown, etc. 

    🧪 If you are non-verbal, semi-verbal, or experience times when you cannot speak in general Shockwave doesn’t mind. His only focus would to be to make sure it wasn’t caused by him, something in the lab, or another Decepticon, or something else. If you’re too overwhelmed to speak, even on a device such as your phone or tablet, that’s fine as well. He’d ask simple yes or no questions - just enough to find out what he can do if it’s because of an overwhelming situation - or because you just don’t have enough spoons to talk currently. 

  🧪Your first meltdown caught him off-guard, which was, as everyone was aware, difficult to do. He stopped everything he was doing to help you. Primus help whatever bot didn’t leave when he said to do so - not that he’d have to raise his voice or anything, because he intimidates them enough without having to. 

  🧪Expect the occasional drive in his vehicle mode. You’d both go far away from any sign of another human or bot. Sometimes you’d ask him to talk -about what it doesn’t matter - just so you could fall asleep in the seat. He isn’t used to all this talking but he finds it easier to do with you. You listen patiently and take interest in his ideas. You act as a sounding board for those ideas and any question you ask is always welcomed - even if to him the answer is “obvious”, he’d never look down on you for not knowing that particular thing. 

    🧪Shockwave is patient and protective. If he hears someone was or is being ableistic towards you, the situation would be addressed, swiftly. Sometimes this spawns that quiet rage he’s been known to show if pushed too far. In this state- good luck stopping him. Logic - what’s the logic in letting someone insignificant insult you? Eventually he calms down. He’s careful to not show such intensity around you, however, he wouldn’t want to distress you. You’re his weak point. 

   (( This may not be the best but I’m trying. I may do a part two for this as well, or add more to this one later. Thank you for reading. )) 

[wasflypaw]

I'm in the mood to open up about shit that's been bothering me today so like.

Hi I'm 21

I Am An Adult

I am an adult that uhhhhh doesnt know how to function like one though. I didnt have very much of a childhood (neglectful mother 😔) n I was taken away at the age of 12

I have special needs/learning disabilities that nobody really... Helped me with. Alongside diagnosed severe anxiety and also selective mutism meaning I was shit at learning, terrified to do Anything, And also was completely nonverbal

I'd get stressed and bite/scratch myself in classes and its safe to say the teachers didnt know what to do LMAO

I failed most of my classes. I went to college (sixth form) and that was also too hard to understand. Failed those. Seriously my anxiety was debilitating one of my classes was Photography and I was too scared to take photos

I'd get yelled at a Lot if I failed to do something which made the anxiety Worse and I'm not joking I came home Every Single Day with the anxiety that I'd be randomly shouted at for something I didnt know I did. Fun. Never learned how to deal w my anxiety

Not Only That but since I didnt know what a hyperfixation was back then or that I was even autistic my interests had taken over my life and they were all i could think about in school. Since that stuff is never taught i never learned how to deal w hyperfixations

I got sent to a special needs college thing that was Supposed to help me learn things like cooking and tidying up and going out by myself n interacting w people. But once again they didnt know how to help me and I was taken out bc they just kinda had me sit in a corner on the internet all day lol

I find politics hard to understand and also maths and geography

I legit dunno how to cook and I learned how to tie a knot a few months ago (...I'd been avoiding it) I never learned how to stop stimming or deal w my hyperfixations

I found out what stimming was at like 19 and I'm like Oh Shit it's Not normal to sit and make weird noises and rapidly flap my hands around??

I have a legal guardian

It doesn't help I'm also very... not grown. I was born Way Too Small. I didnt grow taller than 5'0. People seem to think I'm 12 a lot

That's why I'm so proud of all my analysis recently - I'm still not sure how to word things sometimes and my hyperfixation tends to take over my life and have me post repeatedly on one topic but still,,,,

There are analysis posts on here that I find hard to read and understand like if they use huuuge words and stuff (that's why u shouldnt say stuff like "ppl are too dumb to understand my analysis/ppl who dont understand this lack critical thinking/my takes are too nuanced for you" in ur posts. Dont insult intelligence) I also still dont know Maths i just. Cannot. I think I might have Dyscalculia

I've kinda. Self-taught myself stuff like my art and my vocabulary since I spend all day every day in the house on my phone. I've learned by myself how to tone down hyperfixations and step away if something makes me too uncomfortable and stuff

That's why I tend to look up to the ppl I follow and get really happy when any of them approve or find my posts cool lmao i have my own opinions but I'm scared they're wrong a lot

I admit I get very passionate sometimes but I genuinely enjoy analysing the DSMP - this is also why I dislike direct arguments / why I block on sight if I see an uncomfortable take or why I delete posts if I find out OP is a minor bc. I'd feel like a fool sat here arguing w kids over MC roleplay AJDJFK .. also cause I have a lot of followers and I wouldnt want anyone dogpiling them

I think my age might tie in to why I'm so sympathetic towards c!Tommy and have 0 sympathy for c!Dream. And why I Will say "he's a kid" bc when I was 16-17 I certainly thought I was mature but I really,, wasnt. There's still so much room to grow. And c!Dream is My Age. "c!Dream is a young adult he's still young!" Bitch I barely know how to function and I know right from wrong I have zero sympathy for that man

I dont have a job since I just. Cant get one. I draw cats and sometimes get like £15 out of it sometimes. I'm just Here and Vibing. I literally just exist. I cant leave the house while its sunny bc I'm allergic to sunscreen

I still find it way more comfortable to hang out around ppl my age rather than anyone below say... 18 because I'm Still an adult regardless of my struggles (sorry to any of my mutuals who are minors this is probably why I dont interact w you much ajdjrk)

I'm always so ashamed of this fact like yeah I'm a 21 year old yeah my hobby and also hyperfixation is talking about Minecraft YouTubers bc I dont have a job 😭

I'm the shining example of "these disorders are usually spotted early in kids! - but what if you literally Never help them and just let them grow like that lol"

[drummergirl231-2]

Happy Autism Awareness/Acceptance Day 2020!

To me, true awareness and acceptance go hand-in-hand. I still don’t mind the word “awareness,” since most people, even people who think they’re spreading Autism awareness, aren’t totally aware of what it is or what it’s like. But I also love calling it Autism Acceptance Day, because that’s what we need more than anything. 

To spread some awareness, I’d like to address some misconceptions about Autism and share some other thoughts I wish people knew/understood.

1. Autists/Aspies do not lack empathy. 

I found this thing and it explains it super well so I’ll just leave it here:

Imagine a scenario where you say something totally innocent and it triggers the person you’re talking to. They start flying off the handle at you and you don’t know why. But because they’re angry, you are, too. But since you don’t know why they’re angry, you don’t know why you’re angry, either. It’s crazy overwhelming and confusing. And you want to fix whatever you did because you don’t want this other person to be angry or hurt, but you don’t know how, because their all-consuming rage makes it really hard to think and try to put yourself in their shoes. Also, you’re scared on top of it all.

That’s what having high affective and compassionate empathy and low cognitive empathy is like. It’s not that we don’t care. It’s that we care too much, and all the super specific nuances of socializing are things we have to learn one at a time, through either our mistakes or others’ mistakes. These things don’t come naturally to us, but it’s not like we can’t learn. If I were to compare math to socializing, it’s like you all have calculators or other doohickeys to do all the math for you and we just have paper and a pencil... and no eraser. 

2. Autism is not a mental illness to be “cured.”

Now don’t get me wrong, I am ALL FOR people finding ways to help us be able to deal with the world better, whether that’s a better diet, items to block out sensory stimuli or items that stimulate, or counselling that can help us navigate social situations and talk through anxiety and/or depression. But those things don’t “cure,” us because Autism isn’t a disease or something wrong with us. Autism gives us different challenges, sure, but neutotypicals have their own challenges. 

The symptoms typically associated with “low-functioning,” Autism don’t necessarily have to be a part of Autism. Many non-verbal kids grow up to be verbal. That doesn’t mean they stopped being autistic. There was a celebrity mom years ago who claimed to “cure” her son’s Autism with a gluten-free dairy-free diet. He’d been so trapped in his head, he couldn’t engage with the world around him. She altered his diet and one day he laughed at Spongebob, and that was a turning point. He became able to interact with people and react to things on TV. It was a huge breakthrough. But he was still autistic. If you were to have plopped me down on a rug as a toddler next to a toddler like this celebrity’s son before his altered diet, you wouldn’t think I was autistic at all by comparison. But I was, and I am.

Autism is a different neurological blueprint, and yes, brain-healthy diets and detoxes can do wonders for us because it seems like our brain type does make us more susceptible to negative effects from neurotoxins. But if you think someone has lost their Autism just because “the bad parts,” went away... no. That’s not how it works.

3. Not everyone is “a little autistic.” 

When I was newly diagnosed and trying to process it, someone told me something along the lines of, there there, we’re all a little autistic. But that’s not true. There are a lot of traits associated with this brain type, and yes, a neurotypical person can have a few of them. That doesn’t make them a little autistic. To be considered autistic at all, you’d have to have a large number of quirks plus social delays (not associated with excessive technology use), odd or repetitive behaviors, unusual and intense interests, communication struggles, and unusual sensory processing. Suppose you’re white. If you are white, this should be easy to imagine. Say an African American just told you about some of the challenges they’ve faced, whether it’s race-based bullying in school or racial profiling later on. Would it be appropriate to say, “There there, we’re all a little black?” NO. One, it’s false. Two, while all people struggle with stuff because to be human is to struggle sometimes, the struggles of different groups of people are totally different, and you can’t say you know exactly what it’s like or pretend everyone’s the same. We all have equal dignity and worth, but beyond that, everyone’s different. Don’t pretend differences don’t exist. Just value them.

4. Autism doesn’t have a “look.”

When I tell people I’m autistic, this is usually what I hear: “Wow! I wouldn’t have guessed! You don’t look autistic.”  ...What does that even mean??? Is it supposed to be a compliment? Because if it’s a compliment I “don’t look autistic,” then that’s kind of an insult to other autistic people. Or do they mean it like, “I don’t believe you’re really autistic because I have a preconceived idea of what an autistic person looks like and you don’t fit the bill so I’m not going to give you grace if you act weird?” I don’t know. Y’all say weird things too, sometimes, ya know? But Autism doesn’t have a look. There is a sort of distant intensity in our gaze sometimes... and I can legit see it when Jim Parsons plays Sheldon Cooper, but when I see an interview with him as himself, it’s gone. It’s not a fixed feature of our faces, and a talented NT could totally put it on.

5. Autism presents itself differently in boys and girls.

You know how not a lot of people know the symptoms of heart attacks in women because mainly people only talk about what a heart attack is like for men? It’s kinda like that with Autism, too. Typically when you hear about Autism, you’re hearing about the signs and symptoms in boys. Even most pediatricians only know to look for the way it presents in boys, which is how so many girls don’t get a diagnosis until later in life, if ever.  One difference is that, for whatever reason, girls tend to be better at nonverbal communication and taking hints. We’re mimics. Chameleons. We take on the mannerisms of those around us and who we see on TV as we force ourselves to adapt. Verbal boys might speak at unusual volumes or with an unusual voice, rhythm, or cadence, but verbal girls learn to mimic the speech patterns of others. Our special interests/obsessions aren’t typically seen as strange given our age and sex. For example, a six-year-old autistic boy might be fascinated by WWII. I was interested in fetal development. People thought, “What’s so weird about that? She’s a little girl who loves babies.” We often play with Barbies or other dolls long after our peers have stopped. It helps autistic girls process social situations. When I was shamed out of liking Barbies, I started writing stories in notebooks or in my head. Autistic boys usually struggle with social communication from an early age, but autistic girls usually don’t have any major communication struggles until adolescence, when relationships, platonic or romantic, get way more complicated.  Since little autistic girls can mimic their neurotypical peers, and since some doctors only know how to look for Autism in boys, we tend to fly under the radar, causing that huge gender gap in diagnoses.

6. Mental illness is common with Autism, but NOT part of it.

I read an article by an autist in the UK who struggles to get help for his anxiety or depression because therapists have brushed him off, saying “Well, that’s just part of being Autistic, so it can’t be helped.” NO! Just like neurotypicals can be mentally healthy or unhealthy, Autistic people can be mentally healthy or unhealthy. Just because something is common for us doesn’t mean it’s how it’s supposed to be, or that it’ll always be that way, or that it’s part of who we are and we need to embrace it. People with mental illnesses should be embraced (literally or figuratively, depending on what they’re comfortable with). Mental illnesses should not be embraced. Ever. Because autistic kids and adults often face abuse, bullying, discrimination, and are ostracized, anxiety (especially social anxiety) and depression are common for us. In more serious cases, especially in autistic teens and young adults, dissociative disorders can develop. What’s worse, it doesn’t take much looking to find the dark corners of the internet where people, autistic or not, are encouraged to embrace their developing dissociative thoughts and feelings. I once saw an interview with someone who found healing from a dissociative disorder, and she gets emails every day from others with the same disorder she had who regret some of the things they were talked into doing while living with the condition and  who want to find the healing she did. She said many of them are autistic and under the age of twenty-five. Autistic people with mental illnesses shouldn’t be talked into believing their mental illnesses are a part of them, or not mental illnesses at all, or something to celebrate and cling to. I reject the notion we should have to settle for being ill in any way. We deserve to be as healthy and whole as anyone else, and it makes me sick there are so many internet predators preying on us in this way, and that there are therapists who think Autism and mental illness has to be a packaged deal.

7. If LGBT people were treated the way autistic people are by the media, it’d lead to outrage. But it seems like no one is outraged on our behalf.

We’ve seen the news stories, haven’t we? A couple invites the news over to their house, upsetting their autistic child who then has a meltdown, the meltdown is filmed and aired, and the parents are just like, “This is what our life is like because of Autism. And it sucks. Pity us.”

There was one video I saw... I’m just so enraged by it, even after two years. A mother was praised for her open honesty as she vilified her autistic son and complained about how he ruined her life and how hard it is to go out and have people stare. I’m sorry, hard for WHO??? I don’t even want to go into the details. I know only sharing this much doesn’t make it sound like that bad of a video, it’s just... ugh. Guys. It’d be a whole separate post. I can’t deal with it right now. 

If parents went on the news after their kid came out to them as gay, and wept and begged for pity and said some of the things this woman said of her autistic son (wondering what she did wrong that made her deserve this or that led to this or saying she doesn’t believe in God but finds herself praying anyway that God’ll “fix him”), America would call them the worst parents ever. But parents of autistic kids who do this are praised for their openness and vulnerability as they publicly shame their child.

Another time, after a mass shooting carried out by a teenage boy, the news reported that he was autistic and that might have contributed to the attack (there they go, combining mental illness with Autism as one and the same again).

If a pedophile were arrested, and they said on the news, “And we just got word that he’s gay, so that may be why,” there’d be a riot. But the news can pin autists as mass murderers and no one bats an eye!

All of May last year working at a clothing store, I watched as various departments filled up with pride t-shirts to get ready for June, and I couldn’t help but think,

Where were the Autism acceptance t-shirts in March to get ready for April?

I probably shouldn’t be so surprised with the media painting us as life-ruiners and life-enders. 

I know it’s a vile and disgusting thing for me to be jealous of LGBT people in this way, especially since they have their own struggles, too. I just wish society had our backs and celebrated us instead of wanting us “fixed,” for their own convenience, ya know?

8. Almost all of us hate Autism Speaks, and those who don’t are probably just new. XD

I used to be all “Light it up blue!” as well (even though that seemed weird to me, given blue lights might be overwhelming to some people on the spectrum). But then I read something on their site that made me feel really betrayed, and down the line, I learned most autistic people hate them... some because they saw them say the opposite of what I saw they said. Basically we all have different opinions but Autism Speaks spouts whatever information their donors want them to (sellouts), and that donated money doesn’t go towards helping us, but toward more fundraising or research on how to prevent people with our brain type. I guess they’re not fond of the artistic and scientific advancements we bring to the table. They should change those puzzle pieces from blue or multi-colored to white with black specks because they want a world that’s vanilla. 

9. Some of us still like the puzzle pieces, even if we hate Autism Speaks.

I’ve talked about this in a fanfic, but I’d love it if we could redeem the puzzle pieces, because they’re still a good analogy if you assign a different meaning. Autists and NTs are puzzling to each other, no sense denying that, but the more time we spend together, the more we start to understand each other. Also, Autism does have a lot of pieces, and figuring out I was autistic was like solving the puzzle of my life. The missing pieces came together and things became clearer and made more sense. Also also, some autistic people are really good at puzzles. And then there are autists like me who aren’t necessarily good at puzzles, but get totally absorbed in working on them anyway (my parents have been doing some puzzles during the quarantine lol they’re traps! TRAPS I SAY!!!).

Nevertheless, I understand why other autistis don’t like the puzzle pieces and prefer the rainbow infinity symbol, and I quite like it, too. It’s very pretty, and the way the colors fade together is a nice symbol of how it’s a spectrum.

It’s a sign of the infinite possibilities in our lives when we’re empowered, because we can do and have done good and great things in the world.

[cllynchauthor]

On Aspie Supremacy and the Aspergian

CW: bullying, suicide, aspie supremacy

I feel the need to talk to you guys about what has been happening on autistic twitter lately surrounding the autistic website The Aspergian. I write for The Aspergian. Here are some of my articles:

https://theaspergian.com/2019/05/04/its-a-spectrum-doesnt-mean-what-you-think/

https://theaspergian.com/2019/04/19/person-first/

https://theaspergian.com/2019/04/05/7-cool-aspects-of-autistic-culture/

While I am white, cishet, and speaking, I am in the minority at The Aspergian.

The majority of contributors are mostly either LGBTQIA+, BIPOC, or high support needs.

Here are some of their contributions:

https://theaspergian.com/2019/10/10/stopping-the-stigma-against-people-with-disabilities-interview-with-sbsk/

https://theaspergian.com/2019/09/09/10-signs-i-was-transgender-but-didnt-know-it/

https://theaspergian.com/2019/08/08/the-cage/

Despite this, the name The Aspergian makes many autistic people uncomfortable. Several ASAN members have spoken out condemning the name.

In these days of #AltAutism, the autistic dark web and other aspie supremacists have turned the word Aspergers into a borderline slur.

Aspergers and “Aspergian” are becoming dog whistles for function labels, white supremacy and incels.

The founder of The Aspergian knows that. That’s why she named it The Aspergian.

With every pro-RPM, pro-Neurodiversity, feminist, intersectional article The Aspergian publishes, it gets left wing values all over Aspergers. If you google Aspergian now, all you will find are social justice articles.

And the AltAutism folks HATE IT.

But so do a lot of autistic advocates, for whom “Aspergers” conjures up a lot of trauma.

The founder has trauma from it too, though.

https://twitter.com/theaspergiancom/status/1185068296636375040?s=21

Image Description: screencap of a tweet from @TheAspergianCom reading

When I first told my closest living friend about being autistic, it was the first person I'd told other than my husband. This was her response:

Below is a screencap of a text conversation. The friend is talking about her autistic son saying “at this point I’ll be fucking happy if he ever calls me mom and stops trying to attack me.” Then she says “I think your autism is fucking bullshit.”

Image description: screencaps of more tweets reading:

Though she knew I was going to be tested, she'd continued to use the word Asperger's. I'd been helping her through the process of understanding her son and autism. I loved her deeply. I still do. But she blocked me on social media and told everyone before I was ready to come out.

So instantly all my social media was flooded with all these speculative and veiled comments I could only see portions of, and I was humiliated. I was a new mother struggling and lost my support system. She thought it was sinister I used the same label as her son. Minimizing.

Autism was my diagnosis. She didn't know that I was made to believe I was possessed by demons in my youth or all the hell I'd endured and all the struggles I had like being the last person in my school who learned to read six years late. She knew an articulate adult.

Image description: the next person I told, things went even worse. She outed me in local Facebook groups where I was the admin and parent groups. I had postpartum anxiety and severe breastfeeding aversion but my child wouldn't eat food. So it was BF constantly or a feeding tube. And no meds for me.

So I thought maybe the problem was me saying autism instead of Asperger's. My husband was aspie and always identified that way. I'd been a teacher with largely autistic classes for years. Those with that diagnosis were often intellectually disabled.

Image description: My best friend and one of my oldest and closest friends, both autistic, had committed suicide, and the two living best friends I had blew up my whole social circle. I was afraid to seek help, afraid to go in public, and brutally reframing my whole life and reliving traumas.

I needed help. I joined about 20-30 autistic groups and made the mistake of saying that I was aspie. I didn't want to be insulting and have another incident like what happened the first time I told someone. It didn't go well. I had no idea of the stigma at the time.

And I had no idea why I was being called a supremacist, shiny, a Nazi, ableist, etc. I argued against those claims because I'm definitely not those things. I thought I'd entered a den of extremists. I got booted. Then another group I entered started with, "Oh, there's the Nazi."

In that tweet thread, Terra goes on to say that it occurred to her that her best friend who had recently committed suicide might have sought out the autistic community before he died. And she went to look and found that he had posted and been dogpiled in the same manner. The day before he died.

Terra Vance is desperately anti supremacy. But she is also desperately anti bullying. And she felt that if people couldn’t say “I’m autistic” without losing loved ones and “I’m aspie” without being called a supremacist, then autistic people were being put in a very tight corner.

Especially since Aspergers is still an extant diagnosis pretty much everywhere but North America so people are getting shunned from the autistic community because of their DIAGNOSIS.

That’s why she named it The Aspergian.

And you know what?

The aspie supremacists HATE IT.

They hate that their dog whistle is now a popular and booming hub of Neurodiversity, anti-ABA, and intersectionality.

They hate that The Aspergian is republishing deleted Wikipedia articles of autistic nonspeakers, which the autistic dark web worked hard to get removed.

They hate that we promote FC and RPM and other AAC. They hate that we keep claiming that autism and Aspergers are the same thing.

They don’t want to share space with nonspeakers and black women. They’re a bunch of altright white incels and The Aspergian is getting autism and neurodiversity over their shiny high functioning boots.

Worst of all, we’re reaching PARENTS.

Our most popular articles are not aimed at fellow autistic people. They are aimed at NTs, parents, laymen, trying to educate them about autism.

My article on ABA went viral and made so many ABA therapists angry. It was beautiful.

Imagine description:

“And by some strange magic, we took off suddenly, going from like 100 views per month to over 100k, then 200k, then more and more. We heard a lot of stories that were not being heard. There are parents who read our site to learn about their children posthumously after suicide.

One mother told me that if she had found our site earlier, she would have known that her son's "aspie" diagnosis meant that he was fully autistic. She is filled with regrets. We hear from lots of people who had no idea that they were supposed to have these autistic struggles.

We hear from people in lots of non-white majority countries where autism acceptance and awareness is years/decades behind what a difference our site has made because they had no idea. They weren't reading other blogs and now they are. Now they are understanding autism.”

Understanding autism from a neurodivergent, autism-acceptance, Autism-Speaks-Is-Bad, anti-ABA, pro-AAC website.

The ADW HATE that.

So what do they do?

They stir up shit about the name. The autistic dark web have a bunch of sock accounts which they use to deliberately stir up shit among the #ActuallyAutistic tag on twitter so they can screenshot stuff and repost it out of context to further discredit autistic people.

So they know the ND crowd resent Aspergers. So they deliberately stir up crap about The Aspergian’s name and everybody eats it up.

They also spread lies like that we are racist and don’t have any contributors of colour (they block the BIPOC contributors who argue against this lie).

Image Descriotion:

Tweet from Riah Person (a black autistic advocate) saying

“The .@theAspergianCom has writers

• with I/DD

• that are nonspeaking

• with research background

• that are deaf

• that are blind

• with physically limiting disabilities

• that are autistic BIPOC

• that are autistic LGBTQ+

• with no formal writing skills

The list goes on”

They claim that we plagiarize. But in fact each contributor owns their own content and is free to publish in other places and often they do.

But mostly they bitch about the name.

And I get it. I do. Aspergers brings up a lot of bad feelings and associations, especially since the anti-ND movement started pushing the “Asperger was a Nazi” stuff in order to discredit Steve Silberman’s book Neurotribes.

But we can’t make Asperger’s a slur. It’s still an existing diagnosis all around the world. Happily it IS being removed from the ICD 11 in 2022 but it’s going to take decades to change the assumptions around that word.

Terra wants “Aspergers” to become synonymous with autism. No difference. No barriers. No judgements. Not because she loves or even identifies with Aspergers. Her diagnosis is autistic and she calls herself autistic. But she doesn’t think autistic people should be bullied over a label. It smacks of exclusionism.

The founder of The Aspergian feels that no autistic person should be bullied to the point of death or near-death because of their diagnosis, or because they have been trained to say they have Aspergers so NTs won’t pull the whole “you don’t look autistic” crap.

The autistic community, of ALL communities, should be the most understanding of misunderstanding. We should be the most able to understand that people don’t always mean what it sounds like they mean.

“Aspergers” is not a slur. It is not a supremacist term. At worst it is an outdated functioning label. At best it is a synonym for autism.

And it won’t become a dog whistle. Because The Aspergian won’t allow it.

[shadowkat678]

Holy shit. I’m feeling sick. This is...this is. I don’t even know.

I was looking for a video on YouTube and I couldn’t remember the name, so I just typed in autism, and a video of a mother filming her autistic son having a meltdown came up as a top result. I know I probably shouldn’t have clicked on it, but…holy shit. They’re blocking LGBT videos and allowing this? 

This is…hard to watch. I couldn’t make it through, and the comment section is toxic. I’ll put the video at the bottom.

I’d heard about parents filming their kids during a meltdown, but so far I’d never watched one. It’s even worse than I thought, and you know at the right hand side of the pages when they show videos related to what you just watched. There’s more of them. Most with over a million views. 

The mom here claimed that she was given the kid as a “punishment” from God. 

Autism awareness month starts tomorrow. If you still think we don’t need to spread awareness, I got one thing to say. Screw you. Take a look in that damn comment section and then come talk to me. I just read through pages of people talking about how that kid should have been put down or institutionalized. Calling him an animal. Using him to insult people of opposing political positions.

Here’s only a few of the comments:

CrackerXZ 2 months ago

Maybe it should be legal to put kids like this down if the doctor diagnosed severe mental retardation and the parents agreed? This is just a sad.

Mehru83 1 month ago

Very brave of this family to film this episode for public education. Bless you all, very few viewers can imagine your daily struggle. Hats off to the courageous mama … more strength to you sweetie xx

Metal Head 1 month ago

This kid is retarded. I don’t want him anywhere near me. Disgusting.

Dolan Pls 7 months ago

Remember guys, these people are high functioning, intelligent people. Truly the next step in human evolution. 

Malware 2 months ago

Just fucking put the kid out of his misery, hes living but its like he isnt beating himself and schreching its really disturbing

Bone My Clone 2 months ago (edited)

“Autistic Child Has An Outburst”. That’s not true. Since when were baby monkeys called children?

EXOizBÆ 4 months ago

Sad how the rest of her life will be spent taking care of him. Then once she dies he might be handed off to his sister and she’ll be forced to care for him. If his sister refuses then he’ll end up in a facility. What a life.

Apollon Abaddon 15 hours ago

LOL, just shoot the fuckin’ spazz. Sorry asshole, your brain not work right. Bye.

Tyler Montana 3 weeks ago (edited)

God made him that way?? Oh give me a fucking break. Seems more like Satan made him that way to annoy the fuck out of anyone that goes near him. 

Tyler Montana 1 week ago (edited)

I used to work with autistic kids. They are the most annoying fucking people on the planet. And they hit, kick, bite, pull your hair, spit on you. All for minimum wage too. Fuck that. No one deserves to be abused at work for any amount of money. They offer absolutely nothing, other than misery to everyone around them.

Cyril Figgis 2 months ago

“God made him that way to make me learn a lesson probably.” - In other words, your god made him to punish you.  How you could possibly believing in a loving god make any sense to you when you have to deal with THAT on a routine basis?  His defects are terrorizing his sister for crying out loud.

Cavefire 2 weeks ago

I would give him to adoption, or just kill him

It’s a shit show. Those are only a few, and not even the worst. I’m just about ready to track every one of these assholes down. There were a few people talking about how they were scared of autistics. If they aren't now they they might be soon, because I'm legit really to bring down hell.

I had meltdowns. Maybe not as bad as this, but I had them, and let me tell you right now they’re horrible, and the fact that his mother fucking FILMED this and put it up for the entire damn internet to mock? I wouldn’t be surprised if the kid is in a constant state of panic with parents like that. This is abuse. I'D also like to point out some of the ways they were trying to restrain him are ABA techniques, one's which I've personally experienced and can say with full authority on the matter hurt like hell.

It’s people like this Autism Speaks focuses on and tries to tell people to feel sorry for, people like this shit mom. 

If I see a single trace of that Light It Up Blue bullshit within the next month, if I hear a single word about how bad parents with autistic children have it, I WILL bring down hell! And I WILL bring it down as hard as I possibly can. This is the video, and if you can watch this and try and tell me it’s right, and that this kid isn’t scared out of his mind…shit.

And for the fellow autistics in the comment section talking about “I NEVER did that.”

“At least I only have it mild.”

Or other disabilities saying:

“At least I only have ADHD.”

You can shut it. 

This is sick and screwed up and anyone who sees this as anything other than 100% abuse can unfollow me right damn now. 

[ninja8tyu]

My brother came back home, and I remember why I always never can stay mad at him.

Yeah, he’s a fuckin’ narcissist, I will still bet everything I have that he is, but if that’s all he was, I wouldn’t be on the internet venting my feelings and instead be in jail.

Also apparently I now have a FBI agent watching my every post now. Yay. Big brother’s watching my hentai. Well, hopefully they only monitor what I post rather than what I see.

Also, yay. I get to make the FBI agent watching my porn jokes unironically. New material for jokes and stuff.

Anyway, my brother’s a cunt. He says shit that gets to me and I despise him for it. His constant beratement of me for never having changed despite the efforts only I have seen ticks me off, and so on.

And again, if anyone else were in my shoes, they’d go insane. Still will bet all I have on that.

`

But honestly, I’m not an idiot (do not bring that/those incident(s) up) enough to see it as everything he is. I hate him, but because we’re family, I know a lot about him.

Thus, I can never make an irreversible decision. I can say shit that can’t be reversed (hooray databases and archives, and lovely that a trollface in a suit flipping the bird enters my house in the form of a printed paper now with my name on it) but never make a truly stupid irreparable decision.

I’ve made an analogy like this before, but talking to him is like sifting through dirt, gravel, and sand for gold. The dirt, gravel, and sand being emotional torment, and the gold being genuinely useful pieces of information.

I’m ticked, of course, that I usually get grains of gold when I have to deal with him, with only dirt to fill up my filter, but sometimes I get large pieces of gold.

And as much as I can complain about being forced to sift through gold, I get some of those larger chunks of gold and remember why I bother.

This time around, he didn’t decide to insult me, berate me for never having changed. Or rather, maybe it’s because I’ve grown and actively decided to not permit any kind of that topic to be discussed when I don’t want to.

Or maybe the FBI visit woke him up. Who knows. Also hi if you’re still reading this far.

But yeah.

To put it in my own words, if he really were as bad as I always make him out to be, then I must ask the following questions:

“If he is that bad, then why doesn’t he do this?” in a general abstract sense.

But specifically, “If he truly wants to see me be miserable and a failure, why does he give me very good pieces of advice that I know I can use?”

A true piece of shit would do something else. As in, I would know the knowledge they provide to me is practically useless or detrimental.

Maybe I’m just autistic as all hell. Seriously, I need medicine that numbs my emotions. I heard anti-psychotics work. It was said as a joke, but I think I really need them. I’ll ask the psychiatrist about it.

And I’m reminded that he probably also knows about the bloody FBI visit. God, I don’t want to get help if the first thing I’m gonna hear is “WHAT UP MAN I HEARD YOU GOT VISITED BY THE FBI WHAT’D YOU DO” except in a more formal manner like “Hey, uh. I heard that you did something to get visited by the FBI. Could you... tell me about it?” 

God fuck it certainly was a wake-up call, but I wish it wouldn’t have lasting consequences. I swear if every doctor on the block that has access to my data, I don’t think I could live without wanting to hide in a shell.

`

But anyway.

Venting online is basically forfeiting all the power I have to others. If I need to release my anger, I need to channel it into something else.

Else, even if I do make a decent point...

“OH REALLY?

Ninja8Tyu says [thing I think is wise and smart], but isn’t this the same person that made a tumblr post about shooting up a school?

And don’t forget when he added protein powder into pasta, only to complain about it tasting bad.

Are we REALLY going to listen to Tyu, the person who faps to Japanese cartoons?

Vote No on listening to Ninja’s words TODAY.”

So, yeah. Never a fan of bringing shit up from the past. It’s literally attacking the other person rather than their arguments. People will still do it because they’re pieces of shit, but if I actually want to make a point, I should probably not make myself look like an idiot.

And Ninja8Tyu is kinda an original brand I made since childhood, so fuck if I’m abandoning him. I doubt anyone looked at the fucking keyboard, say the consecutive ‘T’, ‘Y’, and ‘U’ characters on the keyboard and thought “hey that looks like a name” and took it as their own.

So yeah it’s my brand. Not abandoning it despite how much I fucked it up.

I think I really need to get a therapist soon so I can vent in private. Surprisingly (not), therapists are a better audience than the internet because whatever I say out of anger isn’t likely to “FBI, OPEN UP!” my ass the two days after.

Speaking of therapists, apparently someone was receiving calls from the FBI asking when I’m going to get my weekly medical screening of my mental health, which, uh, I haven’t kept my word yet on going to see a therapist.

Because like, my original plan was to save gas and see a therapist at my college, but turns out that they don’t have that, only counselors, and going to a hospital would waste gas, and if I dared to waste my mother or father’s time to go see a therapist, well it’s gonna make me more depressed.

“Why still you haven’t gotten a driver’s license? This is getting annoying.”

I don’t wish to be a burden on anyone because I don’t want to consistently deal with the constant complaining caused by it.

So I’m choosing to shut up and just stay at home, venting online still except this time I’m a bit more cautious about how I go about it, as to mediate it as best as I can and also avoid the damage to my mental HP caused by the complaining of having to go to the therapists every single week.

Maybe if I found somewhere close by I could walk to that I can see a therapist, I might, but like, if I need to get in a car to get there, I likely won’t do it.

So yeah.

Things aren’t as bad as my fight or flight response pumped up with an overdose on anxiety claimed to be.

For now.

I’m not betting anything. I’ll just see what happens and hope that I’m wrong.

Nothing makes a pessimist feel happier than being proven wrong about his suspicions.

But yeah. Currently smooth sailing, storm warning was a false alarm, hopefully shit gets better.

[lifeofthegelfling-blog]

Moving

It’s been a while since my last blog post, but I need to take my brain out for a jog and write. Use it or lose it. A little about me. I’m 32 years old, single parent of three children. Right now two are with me, and one is back home,  back home being a small town on the border of Alabama and Georgia.

I will delve a little into my history. About 4 years ago I met “S”. S had moved to the city I’m originally from having moved there from Washington State. He said he needed to start over. We began dating and things got serious. Something to note is that my middle child is non verbal autistic. Taking care of him is very taxing and it’s not easy to say the least. S completely understood this and accepted this as our relationship progressed.

So, as the relationship moved forward we moved in together, got engaged. I’m thinking this is it. Then came the cracks in the relationship. S drank. A lot. Got two DUI’s in a two month period. He was sentenced to a hefty fine  (which I paid with my tax returns) and 10 weekends in jail. I stood by him through all of that.

I shouldn’t have done this, but I did snoop through his phone one weekend while he was  not home. Honestly, I was doing it to see who his drinking buddies were and to let them know the shit wasn’t gonna fly anymore.

That’s not what I found at all. S was a musician, and with that, come groupies. Two way conversations of “non musical activities” they had planned and some that had even occurred from what I could gather. When S came home that weekend the look on my face when I met him at the door with his phone in my hand said enough.

S completely broke down. Told me right then and there everything that had happened. I was livid. Then all of the sudden he blurts out that he hated who he was when he drank and that he could stop if we moved back to his home town. Across the country. Away from everything I had known. He called his mother and had a long conversation with her. When they were done, he turned to me and asked if it was something I would think about. I called my mother. It would be easy for my little boys to transition, but not so much for my oldest who had the same friends for years. I made the decision that he would finish out the school year and then move up to start High School and my mother agreed with this plan.

I know if anybody reads this, they may be saying “I can’t believe you did it” at this point. I can’t either; but between the time we made the decision to move and the actual move, things did get ALOT better. S stopped drinking cold turkey. He deleted every non family member contact from his phone. I truly believed the move would be step in the right direction, which is why I agreed to it.

Boy was I wrong. We were there a few months at his mother’s house helping her with her two younger children while we figured out our living situation. Right away I could see the cost of living was astronomically higher than what I was accustomed to. S was very slow about getting a job. He started smoking pot (it’s legal here, I have no issues with and do occasionally but all day everyday isn’t really necessary). To add insult to injury, in January he started drinking again with his uncle who lived in an RV on the property. His uncle also had a friend a few blocks over who was a known drug user. S and his uncle began spending a lot of time there despite my protests.

S lost weight. He had always had a good heart, but a lot of baggage (this is what I wanted to believe anyway). He began to have mood swings that seemed to come out of nowhere over very small things. I work from home, so financially that was better than nothing and we at least had that. However the drinking, possible drug use, and S’s aversion to working for more than a month of two wore down on me. By June, he and I couldn’t be in the same room without arguing, no matter who else was there. He told me to get a second job and I told him to get bent and that when he could keep ONE down, I’d consider it.

Then came the final straw. He put his finger in my face and told me to step up. LIke a dog that had pissed on the carpet. All I could see was red and I wanted to scream at him over every little thing that I looked over or supported him through. I didn’t say anything except that I was going out for a drive, and when I was calm enough to speak to him, I would. All I could think about what direction my life would go in if I stayed. What kind of example that would be for my children. I didn’t like what I knew would happen if I didn’t put a stop to it.

I told him to make a choice; keep living the way he was and lose me, or to grow up. He choose the first option. I moved out as soon I could and I haven’t looked back. He and I haven’t spoken since that day. As far as I know he is also living in an RV now, like his uncle. With no electricity or water, I might add. Needless to say I'm better off. Am I bitter? Yes. Do I wish I could have seen the real S before all this.? Yes. There’s no time travel, so that’s a moot point. My oldest son is back home, so there is no choice for me. I’m gonna stay here in Washington State to let my two little guys finish out the school year, then we’re going back to bring my family back together. This has been a real eye opener for me. When someone sells you a dream you better read the fine print.