Sometimes, when I let people know that something they did was probably not a good idea, they react badly. That's probably more than half the time, actually. But sometimes? Sometimes people are actually willing to listen. Right now, that's what I'm looking at. It's not to give them cookies- there will be no names here, good or bad. It's to give proof that reacting properly really is possible and really has been done.
So yes, there really are people who can do the right thing when the problem is explained. That's what gives me hope, and that's a big part of why I try.- One person posted a picture of their young cousin, talking about how great he was, but included the full name and mentioned the fact that her cousin is autistic. I let her know that the right thing to do would be to get rid of the full name, since you can't possibly know what a six year old will or won't someday be able to do, and that Google being able to out him could some day be a problem. I used the example of "If I judged what you could ever do off what you could do when you were six, you'd laugh, right? So why does it make sense when the six year old is autistic?" and she listened. She actually deleted the whole post and let me know that she fixed it and understood why it could be a problem.
- Another had been planning to do a walk for Autism Speaks. I showed them a budget report, explained that no matter what they thought was the way to help autistic people, if they wanted to help autistic people who were already here, Autism Speaks was not the way to go. They were genuinely shocked to see the anger at the group, and if I recall they signed up to do a 5k for Doug Flutie instead.
- A friend of mine had been raising funds "for autism" and hadn't made a final decision on what charity to give to. He had been leaning towards Autism Speaks, since they are the best known. Here we had another case where I explained what was wrong, and he listened. He didn't call me "too high functioning to understand," and I think he went with Doug Flutie as well.
- The person who grabbed my hands when I was flapping and had the conversation about how I didn't have to flap? I did wind up explaining what my reasoning was as why grabbing the hands is a really horrible thing to do. She apologized. She hasn't said a word about my flapping since.
Love this post. I think it's an important that we practice an assertive attitude with these kinds of conversations. I tend to be too passive-- one time I was telling a lady who was married to a drill instructor of my husband's OCS class about Tourette's Syndrome. I was anxious, and was having Tourette's symptoms. I attempted to explain how Tourette's was a neurological condition that was uncontrollable, and she interjected with, "Oh, you just need to learn to stop doing that. I had a stutter, and I learned to get over it." How do you fight willful ignorance? The answer is, you don't. You find the listeners, and you talk calmly but seriously about what implications their actions may have, about appropriate attitudes when dealing with you and your unique situation, and explain to the best of your ability what it's like to be in your shoes without turning it into a pity party.
ReplyDelete*Round of applause for Yes, That Too*