@actuallyautistic
I'm visiting family, and wow am I deep in autistic denial territory.
Some of my younger relatives have approached me, asking about neurodivergence because I've been so open about my experience as a late realised autistic person. They're wondering about themselves and their parents.
The older people though, are unable to have that conversation. There are jokey, sidelong half acknowledgements that "there might be something going on" with them, but otherwise it's High Masking At All Times.
What I find difficult to deal with is the rather toxic judgemental attitudes.
So-and-so relative is "so picky about his food, he thinks it makes him important" or "how ridiculous, he doesn't like the too bright light in the bathroom" and all the while I can see them struggling to deal with the exact same difficulties they're judging in others.
It's so ingrained, I don't know if there's a way for them to find self acceptance.
To add, this is a pattern I've seen more than once:
You have a family member who, for whatever reason, is more "obviously" autistic than you are.
The relationship between you isn't great, maybe directly related to them being visibly autistic and triggering your self judgement, maybe for unrelated reasons.
This makes it much more difficult to accept that you might also be autistic. Because you don't want to have anything in common with them.
This is especially true if you have a lot of internalised abelism and struggle to be compassionate towards yourself, and also if you've been judgemental towards that person.
Now you not only have to acknowledge that you may, in fact, have something in common, but that you've been as unkind to them, as you're being to yourself.
@Zumbador@actuallyautistic It's hard to leave a shell you used your whole life. Even if it forces you into a horribly uncomfortable position. Known vs. unknown.
@Zumbador@stahldame@actuallyautistic I happen to come across a similar analogy to a creator I heard describe masking and unmasking. They described it as (hesvily reductionist paraphrasing begins) "Masking is like being one of those beds compressed into a box. When you pull it out it gets space to expand and "grow". Once it's out of the box, it's very difficult to put it back in the box. But just like the bed, you won't get any rest if it stays in the box".
@Zumbador@stahldame@actuallyautistic , also of course, this doesn't apply to every autistic person. Some are really good at masking, but once I learned I was, once I realized my energy is mostly wasted masking everything and I was already so bad at it, I just can't mask as much as I used to. It's such an aversion now for me. Sure, there are some things more easily done and I find to me are possibly like etiquette in a way, but it's so nice to just not do as full throttle as I used to.
Likely contributing source for older people ("older" in this context can easily be as young as 35-40, but it gets worse the older you are): massive amounts of social stigma with the term "autistic".
It took me two years since an official ASD diagnosis in 2019 before I could apply the term to myself, and even now, 5 years later, it's still not emotionally neutral, the way that saying "oh, I've got brown hair" or "yeah, I get migraines too" would be.
The main reason? Suspected (still unclear how definitive) "autistic" diagnosis in the early 1980s that really screwed up my family of origin, and led to a lot of misguided and actively harmful treatment from them (both senses of the word: medical and interpersonal) for years.
If they're older than 40, they probably associate the term "autistic" with people who have to be shunted off into separate classrooms because they're too "fragile" for or "incapable" of dealing with "The Real World".
If they're older than 55 or so, they probably associate the term with people who don't even get the separate classrooms, but just get institutionalized indefinitely.
If they're older than 70 or so? Good grief, they actually personally remember the existence of lobotomies. (It's unclear how many autistic people were subjected to them, but I'd be astonished if the number was zero.)
@dpnash@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
I’m in my mid-sixties and I had mostly simply never heard of it. People were just R-worded back then, and as the term came to more common use, it just missed me, never came up.
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Should have, if my family had dealt with me, I guess.
My autism presents opposite to that. I have hyperlexia, taught myself to read by the time I was 3 or 4, was reading at an adult level by the time I was in 3rd grade. My school records all say I didn't perform to the level they expected.
I have a lifetime of being a disappointment.
@ScottSoCal@dpnash@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
I’m good with letters too, less so with numbers. I never heard the R-word about myself.
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I’m actually looking at my report cards now, it was half about speech and numbers trouble early, then became what you say, a lot of, “if only he’d apply himself.”
@ScottSoCal@punishmenthurts@Zumbador@actuallyautistic I was hyperlexic and good with numbers as a little kid, which at least made school easier than it might have been otherwise. But that was more than matched by not caring for most of the other things other young kids liked, with a bonus level of dyspraxia making otherwise common activities difficult or impossible. School was a pretty dang lonely place for a long time.
I was born in the sixties, and until I was 48 I basically thought autism meant people who sit in a corner, staring blankly into space, rocking mechanically and with no capacity to communicate at all. Who on being spoken to wouldn’t even show a sign that they noticed your presence. Probably drooling, too!
So my journey of self-discovery was quite a trip, but today I think of autism as a badge of honour that says „not broken“ and I wear it with pride 💛
@nellie_m@Zumbador@dpnash@actuallyautistic
Pretty much me too! This was partly why it took me a long time to accept that I was autistic. A shit load of ableism and a really poor understanding of what it looked like.
I talked about my issues at an extended family picnic at one point, saying how medication magically helped everything. I was laughed at and scorned by older people who clearly have the exact same issues I do.
The older generation got beaten into compliance. I doubt they will ever find their way out. :flan_piteous:
About the part with the bright light:
I knew annoying people who liked to turn on a light in a room I was sitting in "because I am going to ruin my eyes reading in the dark".
It has always been my perspective that certain people are just... fanatics for a weird religion that is based on "common knowledge" (that was never questioned).
I can understand how this might break a lot of people's resistance over time.
@Zumbador@mwl@actuallyautistic
try talking about normal people
instead, ask ‘em what’s wrong with the world what sort
of thinking they blame for everything, find a common enemy, sorta deal?
@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
I might be the only one who thinks neurotype means what thoughts you have or something.
I feel like folks talk about how we think differently but never WHAT we think differently, like all the types have different methods but we’re all supposed to arrive at the same conclusions
I don't just take another path to arrive at the same place as everyone! I take another path that lands me in another place, and often quite alone in my perspective.
@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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❤️ TY.
I don’t think there’s one Autistic philosophy, but maybe there’s some NT ones we mostly don’t have or something
@punishmenthurts@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
This has been my main issue with all the autistic diagnostic tests online.
It really doesn’t explore our whys. And our whys, our philosophy, our integrity, our defiance, our sensitivity, all relates to our whys.
There should be more philosophical questions because I think that is what sets us apart. We think differently because we value different things. We prioritize different things. We have courage for different things.
I just did a bunch of tests. On some metrics I am above even autistic average. On some below. On some I am really on border of autistic scores & allistic. With masking test, I am waaaaay below both autistic and allistic low scores. I scored 37 on the CAT-Q…
But did a lot of dimming my light, I hid my pain.
I score about 56% Autistic, but I am pretty confident I am autistic bc I see & relate to autistics more & mostly philosophically.
@punishmenthurts@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic I also think the tests really don’t cover older undiagnosed adults, who really learned to figure things out and manage what was unmanageable, who became wiser, better at self care, self respect.
Things changed significantly for me with age & experience, and I started including myself in the whole of things I cared about.
The metrics didn’t apply as much if at all as an older adult. But I’m still autistic. So something is off.
@JoBlakely@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
my deal is, get the ideas in your head, especially masking and do the tests again - that settled it for me, that the less I worry about what are the “right,” answers, the higher my scores get. I don’t remember my numbers, and it doesn’t matter, they’re sort of just my masking numbers. But if they tend to rise by unmasking, then you’re masking, and you’re Autistic.
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Make any sense?
@JoBlakely@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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also, when I told them to my spokeskid, they one-upped me, they had higher numbers - and I still think they’re not Autistic, I mean they’re my current main hater.
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So I suspect the tests can be fooled in less educational ways also. They’re soft tests, I guess is the point, so the process was the point for me, not the result.
@punishmenthurts@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic I went without friends and family rather than pretend to be something I’m not.
I am not surprised by my low score on the test BUT I think there are ways I dimmed myself, stopped talking, felt less confident, hopeful, supported bc people got jealous even scary.
I had to fight the whole way trying to just be me, who I always respected…but hadn’t learned to walk away, confront, or create boundaries for myself…
Things that make some ‘mask’, made me walk away & not care or respect their opinions of me.
I always liked & respected myself, even if no one else did. I am self aware, & know who I am.
tbh I find allistics often fronting & that’s masking to me. I find a lot of people struggle to be themselves.
I think the tests don’t capture how I dealt with these same causal issues. It explores a specific set of behaviours, not causes or whys.
I never doubted myself. I’ve often been confused why what I think is obvious doesn’t work with most people. I still don’t really get that. But I never wanted to be that way. Dr. Tony Atwood said about neurotypical people: „They are irrational! They are emotional!” And I realised that before discovering I’m autistic I spent a lot of my energy trying…
…to change that in the people around me. As if giving them facts and good arguments would make them more rational. I see now that that’s impossible, and it’s sad to give up hope but also much less exhausting and frustrating to not have to try so hard anymore.
@Uair@nellie_m@JoBlakely@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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not sure if it's better or worse, both I guess, but I have for myself moved the get-go from three million or three hundred thousand years ago ahead to maybe fifteen thousand years ago, and also moved it onto "normal people," and off of us.
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I mean what is philosophy for if not to exempt oneself 😈
I think evolution is based on perception & response to our ‘feelers’. Things that feel good you seek out. Things that don’t you will avoid, learn to tolerate, or learn to hate.
We have at least two feedback loop perceivers/processors connected to those feelers which are a much more recent addition to our evolution. That is self-awareness/self-reflection feedback loop, & other POVs context loop which provides relativity.
@punishmenthurts@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
It is with these things that we grow and evolve as individuals and in group context. Listening and respecting others allows for right context and humility, listening to oneself allows for integrity and right action. Both are new and critical developments.
@JoBlakely@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
my point is if it's in the environment, it changes you.
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If your environment has say, lions, those you will want to avoid, but your life of avoiding them will change you, the gazelles get fast and the elephants get big and the buffalo try to stay together, they "avoid," but you can't avoid evolving.
@JoBlakely@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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Ah, OK, no worries.
But same with spanking and cops, punishment schemes: you can often avoid the penalty (the lion), but the act of dealing with it still changes people, it is a real part of a real environment and despite what NT science seems to think regarding humans, evolution hasn't suddenly stopped just because we learned to read.
😀 ❤️
@JoBlakely@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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I don't think I've yet made sense of the "landscape of fear," thing they discovered in Yellowstone as regards people, but there's something in there.
Teacher fantasy: make it somebody's homework assignment, LOL
@JoBlakely@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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I have got an old one about it, reading that now. The basic idea is about how the presence of predators protects the prey's prey, the prey species' food, which in turn is something else's whole habitat . . . yeah, I only posed the question then, so I remembered that part right. Still an un-sounded rabbit hole.
@JoBlakely@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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So, what's the metaphor, I'm saying the Police state is the predator, and we are the prey species, what does our fear protect, what is it we would theoretically over-control, over-consume if we didn't fear the police about it?
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/3
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I mean besides fun, amirite 😘
@JoBlakely@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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I suppose nothing fucking good, is the point, there is a landscape of fear alright, but not a functional one, no wonder there's no figuring out what that function might be.
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The answer is just anarchism, all this landscape of fear protects is a caste of human parasites?
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/4
Authoritarianism comes with organizational structure, right out of the box.
Cooperativism (or horizontalism or anarchism or whatever you want to call it) tends to define itself by the rejection of hierarchies -- and since nearly all organizational structures we're exposed to are hierarchical, we tend to reject organization as well.
We need to focus on working out non-hierarchical ways of organizing.
I do have some ideas... [points at hobby-horse on the mantlepiece]
@woozle@punishmenthurts@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
It’s hard for me to answer this, but having followed this way, I was given those things.
I was given joy & laughter & healing & true miracles in the midst of sorrow & pain. I was given the support, respect & love of God, & learned to respect myself. I was given knowledge & chose wisdom that helped me navigate safely numerous times. If I evolved, I don’t take it for granted. It feels like salvation.
I think I'd say: it's an excellent default practice; just be aware that there are people out there who will... game it to the point of destruction.
The hard part is telling the difference between those who abuse it accidentally, in ignorance, and those who know full well what they're doing. At some point, we have to stop turning the other cheek and reaching across the aisle -- but drawing that line is in itself a kind of surrender to darkness; the innocence saved needs to be worth the innocence lost.
@woozle@punishmenthurts@Uair@nellie_m@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
Turning the other cheek does not mean not calling the other person out for their errors, though.
We are supposed to do that as he did. If more ppl called out errors, bigotry, lies, hypocrisy, injustice, cruelty, etc. IRL among friends, family, workplaces, community, the rest wouldn’t even be necessary. Instead it becomes used, politicized, & we stop getting governance. We get control.
@nellie_m@JoBlakely@axnxcamr@Zumbador@actuallyautistic
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and I suppose there are many things we think differently about, but I've boiled it all down to, well, everything I'm always saying, the main thing that convinced me was some, let's say, "extreme spanking (not of me)," where they talked about teaching the kid right from wrong and I just knew in my bones as a young'un that that does not make people "better." Same shit I'm still raving about always and right now in two other conversations. LOL.
The tests seem really off to me. I did not find many of the questions profound, showing any deep understanding of what makes us us…or even a curiosity.