I inhabit a small sliver of autistic experience. I am one person of a population that is growing in diagnosis and self-realisation year on year. My experience is white, speaking, and economically stable. I am securely housed and employed, and I have a family and support network. Seeing, understanding and living my Autisticness through those lenses means I have to be intentional with what experiences I think about, write about and support. This is an ongoing journey as I continue to learn about myself and others and how I want to be in the world.

What I Thought I Knew

I fell into a load of silly traps at the beginning of my online ‘advocacy’ work. I ridiculously and arrogantly thought that my experiences were the experience of autism. I acted as though autistic people could have their whole personhood explained in a clever paragraph or two. 

I came to my diagnosis late and thought I knew everything about everything. I had no nuance. I had no humility, and I was quick to anger, often becoming upset when others disagreed with me. It didn’t matter what I was sharing; I wouldn’t listen to others. On other occasions, I was eager to listen to others who shared similar experiences. I thought there was no need for me to consider broader experiences.

I hung around with people who looked like me. I made an unintentional echo chamber in which I didn’t challenge others, and they didn’t challenge me. I enacted the same microaggressions on people which I find abhorrent to experience myself. I was harming myself and my community. In short: I was a dickhead. 

During my early adulthood, I was in a dark place. I was deeply unhappy and was going from one awful relationship to the next, working a job I hated, barely seeing the light of day. I wasn’t ready to unlearn ableism, unlearn racism, and all the other isms and phobias I’m still untangling and healing from. 

This is not a shameful reflection, but rather an acknowledgement that it was time for me to grow my work and my humanity.

What I know now

Now, I finally understand that my work cannot be meaningful if it remains white-centric, it cannot be inclusive if it doesn’t talk to disabled experiences, and it has to centre (where possible) working-class people and those who are precariously housed and employed. I need to appreciate as many experiences and identities as possible within the autistic community.  

What I was (and still am) shedding is the belief that anything is a single issue. That everything is unconnected. What I now know is that I cannot grasp ableism without understanding the violence of capitalism. I cannot fathom neuro-normativity without understanding racist rhetoric. I cannot comprehend imperialism without understanding the production and reproduction of the patriarchy. All oppression is connected.

When I leave people behind, such a non-speaking people, I add to this violence. It is not intentional; it is not something I actively choose to do. It is born of passivity, but this does not make this less violent. This also does not grant me the supposed magic power to say “I didn’t mean to” “I didn’t think it was my place to talk about this”, or my favourite “I can’t be racist, I’m Autistic.” (Massive indication of sarcasm here). I do not get a free pass because I mean well, and I don’t get a free pass because I’m queer, neurodivergent and disabled. If anything, those marginalisations should make me understand more fully just what is at stake when I focus on single-issue and single-lens advocacy.

Autistic people are not a monolith; we are not one person or a singular experience. We don’t all have the same life experiences and the same access needs, and we certainly don’t agree on everything! And that is okay. I believe they call this diversity.