Having an interest in autism is unfortunately not the same as having an interest in Autistic people. Learning about “autism” means that you have already made the assumption that Autistic people are defective versions of a perceived “normal”. Saying someone “has autism” means that you believe that person has a condition, or a disorder. Why have you made this decision about us?
Somehow you have already decided that pathologizing of our way of being is valid.
But did you make that choice knowingly or did you even give it much thought?
How many other perspectives were you given before you made that decision in your mind? Or was it all based on one perspective? The perspective of those who view us from the outside with absolutely no idea what it is like from the inside. A perspective which only views Autistics in negative light? That same perspective which creates a deficit model because this perspective has never included the internal perspectives of those it seeks to oppress?
The focus of most “autism training” or “autism awareness courses” is to give other people strategies to “manage” or coerce Autistic children and adults to comply.
Read the descriptions on most courses and you’ll see what I mean. Here are a few I came across after googling autism awareness courses:
Autism Awareness Course for Parents – Autism Training
“Training Helps Parents Reduce Challenging Autism Behaviour. Learn to Understand & Manage Autism and Autistic Children”
From an Autism Awareness Course for parents
What do they even mean by “autism behaviour”? There is no such thing as autism behaviour, there is only human behaviour unless of course you consider Autistics to be subhuman or not human at all.
And here’s another :
This Autism Awareness training course will help you understand more about Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs) and how these affect the children that you work with.
Why are they saying that we are disordered? What have they based this massive assumption on?
This is the last one because it causes me great pain to see Autistic people described in such derogatory ways so I’ll end my google search here but safe to say that all the descriptions that would follow are incredibly negative, oppressive and unfounded. They are all based on the outside perspective of people who have no idea what it’s like to be Autistic.
Learn about autism, a complex and challenging long-term condition for many individuals and their families worldwide
Where is the Autistic perspective and where are the needs of the Autistic person in all of it?
Is this what Autistic people want? To be managed, coerced and trained to comply? To be seen “challenging” and “disordered”?
It is not!
We are not passive passengers in our own lives. We do not need to be trained how to play, how to feel, how to think, how to respond and how to be.
We are wonderfully and beautifully Autistic. That means we are at one with the world in way most people have forgotten and will never achieve in their distracted lives. If you would like to learn more about Autistic people from the Autistic perspective then AUsome Training is definitely for you.
