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I find it interesting that TJ, Sandra, and I have caught the pushback, aggression, and outright racism and violence we have because we shared that the realities of our existence dictate that our lives are governed in a way white bodies are not, regardless of neurotype, and we must do what we can to mitigate that harm.
I find it disheartening to realize that “listen to Autistic voices” only means listen to those who echo dominant culture and thus the majority of presentations that are foreign to those like myself within this diagnosis.
Many do not care to listen because they have marked nuance as an obstacle to their advocacy. I read their posts, their vague shares that serve as aimless darts toward the heart of my posts. Only they don’t truly know the heart of it, do they?
For if they did, they would care.
If they were truly advocates, they would care.
If they did they would know that ABA is a set of principles that they themselves use with in their advocacy to shame and bully people into their grasp, squeeze them dry, and sprinkle them with alternatives that are either riddled with behaviorism itself, inaccessible to individuals and their families based on perceptual and/or structural barriers, or lack consideration for impairment.
This they would know if they truly listened.
If they truly bothered to learn.
If they cared about children as much as they claim to.
Instead they have gauged the shift within this community, the push for nuance, the calls to listen to more nonspeakers and BIPOC advocates, and they decide that it is best for them to be more aggressive, to use the language of oppressors, to rail past “abusive” and assign “torturer” to our person.
Vernacular used to demean us, other us, render us unfit to care for ourselves and our children, assigning disability to our bodies, and for the purose of governing us. They want full and total control of our stories, of our minds, of our bodies. If we don’t move and think as they do, we are dangerous.
But not this world?
ABA isn’t the gun, it’s the scope placed to up the chances we’ll hit the target.
I shared about my son being pet like a puppy and spoken to like a baby by a woman at a museum. She further disrespected my son by not stopping when he told her to stop with his device. I wanted to talk about the denial of who he is as a person, the discarding of his boundaries, how she only stopped when I told her to…
The whole situation is heartbreaking. It’s maddening.
Many of the responses, honestly, are as well.
Because I don’t know that you fully understand that to respond in the way many of you suggest, is a privilege that I do not possess.
Have I chosen to combat violence with violence?
Yes.
Has it always worked in my favor?
No. It often made the situation worse, resulting in harm coming our way.
Violence cannot be my default response in a society that has deemed this skin to be violent.
“I would have hit her.”
“Aidan should have swung on her.”
“You are so patient.”
“I don’t know how you stay regulated.”
No, I cannot hit her. I will not. I chose not to. And while I gave her a piece of my mind, I did not cuss her out as I felt she deserved. My histories and contexts are responsible for my choice.
My son cannot hit her either.
I have had enough interactions with LE to fill a book. My children are filling their own pages. The choice was to mitigate the harm caused and remove us from the situation asap.
A museum full of children, teachers, staff, and what if I chose to cuss out, swing on, hit the white woman with the “kind” eyes, bright smile, and “syrup sweet” voice who was just “saying hi” and “being nice.”
Yeah, I played the spin in my head. Seldom am I seen as the victim. This skin doesn’t invite soft thoughts.
I am not patient because I want to be. I regulate my behavior and my response because that is required of me to do. For myself to keep us safe. For them because they expect me to behave a certain way.
And there are those here who will claim we are torturing our children, using harsh ass, violent ass language of oppressors to describe us, but cannot understand that standing there while someone pets your child, talks to him as if he were a baby, dismissing his voice, and not being able to slap the fuck out of her, is fucking torture. That’s the torture. Even for a few minutes. I had to get her to stop in a way that didn’t threaten *her* safety, not mine. Not my son’s.
Now put up with that on a regular basis.
I am regulated and seemingly patient because that is what I was taught to be. In a world that expects us to be violent, too many of y’all defaulted to violence as a response. I can’t use half of the suggestions for phrasing on a new button for him cause they’re combative. And honestly, “stop” should have been enough. But now I have to come up with something that is both forceful but not going to produce feelings that will make someone want to escalate the situation.
Y’all defaulted to violence because you assumed I had the privilege to do the same. I do not.
I learned to control myself, to appear patient, because it is what I was taught, by my family, by this world, and by A fucking B fucking A.
That's it. I don’t have no more to write.
Cannot comprehend the complete lack of understanding that is shown here. There is no excuse for ignorance, I'm officially old, and white but realise the colour of your skin dictates that you are viewed as aggressive and have to curtain your anger however justified because it is simply dangerous for you and your son!