The Unedited Speech

Diversity Week. I "spoke" at it yesterday by way of having someone else read what I wrote. Here's what they read.
Today, you get the long version.

Trigger Warning: Descriptions of ableist bullying, invalidation, r-slur (censored.) 

Hi. My name is Alyssa, and I can't be here today to talk to you because I'm studying in China, and I don't know how to teleport. That's OK, though- we have Internet, so I can write something and send it and someone else can read it for me. That might be better- I stutter when I read out loud.

I'm talking (writing) today from diversity. I'm white, if a bit ambiguously so. My family members are all Eastern European Jews, and I look like a pretty average Russian Jew. Most people don't know what Russian Jewish looks like: I've been misread as Latina, Mongolian, half Han Chinese (they never said what they thought the other half was,) Indian, and Xinjiang. I get read as a woman, which can be interesting. Trying out for a bass solo in front of the whole choir was fun, even with the whole choir already knowing that I typically sang tenor second. I'm genderfluid, though I pretty much stay within androgyne. That's a decent sized area of gender identity. People never realize this, since it's assumed that we are either men or women, never somewhere in between, and masculinity is a sort of default. If I have even a little bit of femininity, like my long hair, I will be read as a woman. I'm asexual. People talk about having a sex drive. I get confused. Hunger is a drive. Once it gets through my cruddy body awareness, I can't ignore it. Pain is a drive. Thirst is a drive. Desire for sex? I understand intellectually that it is a drive for many people, but for me? It's just not. I'm biromantic- I can have romantic attraction to people of my gender or to people of other genders. That doesn't mean I want to have sex with them. And... I'm Autistic.

I don't know if anyone's head just perked up, if anyone wants to tell me that surely I mean I have autism, or that I'm a person with autism. I don't need to know how many of you are thinking that, because I'm on another continent, asleep! But no, I definitely do not mean that I have autism or that I'm a person with autism. I'm also not a person with Jewishness, nor do I have tenor-secondness. Those have less to do with my identity than the way my brain is wired, though, say those before I said I was a person with autism. Also, telling me what I should call myself? That would be rude. Believe me, if a Disabled person is using identity-first language (that's “Disabled person” or “Autistic person” or “I'm Disabled” or “I'm Autistic” or really anything like that,) they've already heard all the reasons in favor of person-first language. Many times. Each.

But I'm not here to tell you all the reasons I prefer to be called Autistic. I'm writing from China and also from diversity. I have stories.

When I was in third grade, some advanced students had a separate language arts class. I was in it. I didn't know that it was more advanced because no one told me and I don't figure out that sort of thing from context. This class was in a room with a slanted roof. I was one of the tallest kids in the class. I was also in one of the seats where standing up all the way meant I would hit my head on the ceiling. I hit my head on the ceiling every day. Those of my classmates who were tall enough to hit their heads on the ceiling stopped after about a week. I didn't. My record? Stand up, hit head on the ceiling. Kneel down to grab books, hit elbow on chair on the way down. Hit back, then head on bottom of chair grabbing books. Hit back on bookshelf sitting up. Stand up- hit head on ceiling. Realize I forgot one pen on the ground. Kneel down to grab it- hit elbow on bookshelf. Sit up properly, hit head on the bottom of the table, then hit back on the bookshelf again. Teacher hits me on the head with a book. Stand up, hit head on ceiling. My main classroom teacher was used to my coming back from the special class with various sore spots. She never did anything.

Also in third grade, they wanted us to memorize our times tables. Despite being top of the class in nearly everything math, despite having been the only person to get the math challenge completely right one week, I was one of the last people to memorize my times tables to the teachers satisfaction. She made fun of the way I jumped and flapped when I took my test, just like my classmates did. They called me a r****d for it. Yes, r****d is a slur.

When I was in fourth grade, they sent me in for testing for two days. No one told me why until years later. The fact that I was sent back with no diagnosis, but with the doctor having wanted to discuss some “findings” that were not being sent to the school was evidence that the guess of “autistic” I'd already made couldn't possibly be right. I was sent back with what amounted to “gifted kids are weird.” That was true enough, but why are gifted kids weird? Maybe because a lot of us are also autistic?

In sixth grade, “r****d” came up again. I don't remember why. Being the only one who was still jumping at the bell more than a week after school started may have been relevant. It might have been the way I jumped and flapped when we played “Around the World.” Maybe it was my complete inability to get organized. My locker was always a mess, and I couldn't open it. I stuck a pencil in the lock so I could open my own locker, which got me in trouble because we weren't supposed to do that. Since I was smart, my inability to work the lock properly was my fault. Clearly I just didn't care. I couldn't keep my locker organized. They said that was because I didn't care too. The idea that I couldn't keep something organized without help wouldn't occur to them, because I was smart and that meant I didn't need help.

That year was also the start of my homework problems. Keeping track of what homework needed doing, remembering to do it, knowing where it was once I did it, the whole deal. Or, as others would put it, I was lazy. I wasn't actually lazy. I just have nothing resembling typical executive functioning skills, and no one would teach me to keep organized in a way that worked for me because I was smart and should be able to figure it out.

Do you get the idea? That's what indistinguishability from one's peers means, and that's what being smart enough that no even one figures out you're disabled (so you're clearly indistinguishable!) means. It means no one ever gives you the help you need because you're smart and you can figure it out. It's also the goal of most therapy for autism. It's a bad goal.

In high school, I was all kinds of visibly weird. I was the only person read as a girl at my lunch table. I was absent more times than I wore pants. (Yes, I know, androgyne and skirts sounds like a strange combination. Perhaps it will make more sense when combined with bound breasts? It might not be the exact mix people think of, but I did mix masculine-coded things with feminine-coded things. That's all androgyny means.) I made almost all my own dresses and skirts, because the ones in the stores were too short or too tight or too boring. My shirts were either men's or homemade. I was the slowest person on the cross-country team for four years. I joined tenor bass choir. I was the only theoretical girl there, too. I actually made a joke about the whole gender thing there once, not that anyone picked up on it. It was about uniforms: “For the purpose of this group, what gender will I be at 7:30pm tomorrow?” I wanted to know if I should wear the men's uniform or the women's uniform for the next night's concert. They said it was up to me. I wore the men's uniform. I was also the only theoretical girl on the Ultimate Frisbee team. I say theoretical girl because I wasn't actually out as nonbinary, and I'd still have had to choose one for legal stuff like school paperwork. I still go with female for that, since it's what I was assigned at birth and it's not as if I'm a man either.

And yet... when I talk about diversity? Even though I break way more gender stereotypes than I do autism stereotypes, no one ever tells me how I'm overcoming my gender, or how I must be recovered from femaleness. Sometimes they say I'm overcoming sexism, which is different. No one ever told me I was an inspiration for it. No one says I overcame Jewishness or recovered from Jewishness when I eat bacon. I've not even heard it as a joke, though it's one I might make as a Jewish Autistic person who eats pork and likes to poke fun at the stuff I hear about disability. If I do a thing while openly Autistic, while openly Disabled? Suddenly it's all about having recovered or all about having overcome or being inspiring. It's not about having overcome a whole lot of ableism- discrimination based on disability. It's about having overcome disability. Yeah. No. Not cool. It's quite thoroughly not cool. Like, it's not cool to the point that I have a pre-written speech that I will spring on any organization that wants to bring me in as a Token Autistic (should I say Token Person With Autism?) and talk about how I overcame my autism to do cool things that I do. No, really. I have one. It's on my blog, and I've told people that they can use the frame if they want to, though they should probably change the example stories.

No, it's not the speech you're listening to now. My Token speech isn't for people who might only get one Autistic person on a small panel that's about diversity in general. That's actually pretty good. It's for people who think that one or two autistic people is enough for a whole conference about autism, or that one or two disabled people is enough for a whole conference about disability.

The way it goes is that I thank them for inviting me to speak as their Token Autistic. I use the word Token Autistic, too. I tell them I'm going to talk about how much I'm a success, and that this is to give them hope that their children may be successes too. If they're lucky, their children may even be the Token Autistic at a conference some day, where they will talk about how they couldn't do anything independently as children and now they're successful and it's great. They'll neglect to mention that they still dig their fingernails into their hands hard enough to leave marks, and they won't let you see them rocking. That would make the Parents and Experts uncomfortable, since it would mean that the Token Autistic has achieved success while still acting Autistic. This would be unacceptable, because Autism is Bad. (It's not. It's not. The messages are so there and so loud and so horrible that sometimes even I have trouble remembering that the way I am is OK, but it is. It's OK to be Autistic.)

I go on to tell stories. I did this here, too, but the stories they get are of succeeding because of autistic traits. I point out every single autistic trait I use and keep repeating that I am successful by embracing my autism, not overcoming it. It's still stories because stories are important.

I know stories are important because everyone says they are a reflection. I wonder what it means that the only stories with people like me in them are told by people like me. Does the rest of the world think I don't exist? Or do they just wish I didn't exist?

When I comment on this, they say I am not like those people I don't see in stories. They don't see me as Autistic, which makes no sense because if they don't see me as Autistic, how do they know I'm Autistic to need to tell me they don't see me that way?

I finish telling stories, and then I explain exactly why I am like their children in the ways they don't want to see. I even use their Expert Pathologizing Words. I point out all the reasons that being a self-narrating zoo exhibit is horrible under the guise of being one myself. It's a trick, because ableism is the thing I need to overcome, not autism. Ableism is the thing that I try to educate people about, in the hopes that they'll enforce it less.

It's also one of the scariest things to fight, because when you admit to being disabled, a lot of people decide that either you are Making It Up or you are Not Really A Real Person. If you're Making It Up, you're still a person, but you're not allowed to need help. If you're Not Really A Real Person, you get help, but also abuse in the name of therapy, and people think that it would have been better to abort you than to let you grow up to be the Burden that you are, and you can't understand how hard it is to deal with People Like You. If you understood, you would sympathize when the parent of Someone Like You snaps and kills their kid.

That's why it was so scary to lend my Chinese roommate my copy of Loud Hands: Autistic People Speaking. She's studying English, and she's been looking for a book with simple words. Loud Hands has simple words and is meant for adults, not a combination you see much, and it was terrifying because handing it over meant admitting that I am one of Those People.

It's scary because the people who understand are so rare. It took until two weeks ago for someone to finally decide that they should teach me how to study independently and how to find a way to get my homework done properly, rather than saying I'm smart and so I should be able to figure it out. It took until I was twenty-one years old for a teacher to understand what I needed- how many people do you think fail out before someone gets it? That's what disability means. It means all kinds of challenges, and the actually bad ones generally boil down to some variation of “people don't understand” or “people are horrible” or maybe both at once.

I didn't get where I am by overcoming my neurology any more than I did by overcoming my asexuality or my androgyny or my Jewishness. I think you'd laugh if I started talking about overcoming my whiteness, that or throw something at me. But I'm not allowed to be Disabled and a Real Person, so I must have overcome it. Right?

My Diversity Week Speech

I'm pretty sure that this is what's getting read for me for Diversity Week. My professor from Gender and Women's Studies wanted me on the "From Diversity, We Speak" panel, but being in China is a thing.

I edited it down to about half the original length- I'll stick the original up tomorrow. 

Trigger Warning: Descriptions of ableist bullying, r-slur (censored), tokenization, invalidation

Hi. My name is Alyssa, and I'm studying in China. I don't know how to teleport, so I'm writing from diversity instead of talking. I'm white: I an average-looking Russian Jew, but most people don't know what that looks like: I've been misread as Latina, Mongolian, half Han Chinese, Indian, and Xinjiang. I'm read as a woman. I'm genderfluid and androgyne. I'm asexual. I'm biromantic- I have romantic attraction to people of my gender and people of other genders. I just don't want sex. And... I'm Autistic.

Does anyone want to tell me that surely I mean I have autism, or that I'm a person with autism? Because no, I definitely do not mean that. I'm also not a person with Jewishness. Telling me what I should call myself is rude. Believe me, if a Disabled person is saying Disabled and Autistic, not “with disabilities” or “with autism,” they've heard all the reasons in favor of person-first language. Many times. Each. But I'm not here to tell you why I want to be called Autistic. I'm writing from diversity. I have stories.

When I was in third grade, there was a separate language arts class. I was in it. I didn't know that it was more advanced because no one told me. There was a slanted roof. I hit my head on the ceiling every day. My classmates stopped after about a week. I didn't. No one ever thought to move me to a different seat, where I wouldn't hit my head. They just made fun of me. My teacher even hit me with a book.

Also in third grade, we memorized our times tables. I was the last person to memorize my times tables to the teachers satisfaction. She made fun of the way I jumped and flapped when I took my test (it was an oral exam,) just like my classmates did. They called me a r****d. Yes, r****d is a slur.

When I was in fourth grade, they sent me in for testing for two days. No one told me why until years later. I was sent back with no diagnosis, but with the doctor having wanted to discuss some “findings” that were not being sent to the school. I was sent back with what amounted to “gifted kids are weird.”

In sixth grade, “r****d” came back. I don't remember why. Being the only one who was still jumping at the bell more than a week after school started may have been relevant. It might have been the way I jumped and flapped when we played “Around the World.” Maybe it was my complete inability to get organized. My locker was always a mess, and I couldn't open it. I stuck a pencil in the lock so I could open my own locker, which got me in trouble. Since I was smart, my inability to work the lock properly was my fault. Clearly I just didn't care. I couldn't keep my locker organized. They said that was because I didn't care too. The idea that I couldn't keep something organized without help wouldn't occur to them, because I was smart and that meant I didn't need help. I should be able to figure it out.

That's what indistinguishability from peers means for us, and that's what being smart enough that no one figures out you're disabled (hence indistinguishable!) means. No one ever gives you the help you need because you're smart and you can figure it out. It's also the goal of most autism therapy. It's a bad goal.

In high school, I was all kinds of visibly weird. I was the only person read as a girl at my lunch table. I was absent more times than I wore pants. (Yes, I know, androgyne and skirts sounds like a strange combination. I also bound my breasts. It might not be typical, but I did mix masculine-coded things with feminine-coded things.) I joined tenor bass choir. I was the only theoretical girl there, too. I actually made a joke about my gender, not that anyone picked up on it. “For the purpose of this group, what gender will I be at 7:30pm tomorrow?” I wanted to know if I should wear the men's uniform or the women's uniform for the concert. They said it was up to me. I wore the men's uniform. I was also the only theoretical girl on the Ultimate Frisbee team. I say theoretical girl because I wasn't out as nonbinary, and I'd still have had to choose one for legal stuff.

And yet... when I talk about my life? Even though No one ever tells me how I'm overcoming my gender, or how I must be recovered from femaleness. Sometimes they say I'm overcoming sexism, which is different. No one says I overcame Jewishness or recovered from Jewishness when I eat bacon. I've not even heard it as a joke, though it's one I might make as a Jewish Autistic person who eats pork and likes to poke fun at the stuff I hear about disability. If I do a thing while openly Autistic? Suddenly it's all about having recovered or all about having overcome or being inspiring. It's not about having overcome a whole lot of ableism- discrimination based on disability. It's about having overcome disability. Not cool. It's quite thoroughly not cool. Like, it's not cool to the point that I have a pre-written speech that I will spring on any organization that wants to bring me in as a Token Autistic (should I say Token Person With Autism?) and talk about how I overcame my autism to do cool things that I do.

I thank them for inviting me to speak as their Token Autistic. I tell them I'm going to talk about how much I'm a success, and that this is to give them hope that their children may be successes too. If they're lucky, their children may even be the Token Autistic at a conference some day, where they will talk about how they couldn't do anything independently as children and now they're successful and it's great. They won't say they still dig their fingernails into their hands hard enough to leave marks, and they won't let you see them rocking. That would make the Parents and Experts uncomfortable, since it would mean the Token Autistic has achieved success while still acting Autistic. That would be scary because autism is scary. It's really not, but they think it is.

I tell stories of succeeding because of autistic traits, because stories are important. I know stories are important because they are a reflection. What does it mean when the stories with people like me are told by people like me. Does the rest of the world think I don't exist? Or do they just wish I didn't exist?

When I ask, they say I am not like those people I don't see. They don't see me as Autistic. Nonsense. If they don't see me as Autistic, how do they know I'm Autistic to say they don't see me as Autistic?

Ableism is scary to fight, because when you say you're disabled, people often decide that either you 're Making It Up or you're Not A Real Person. If you're Making It Up, you're still a person, but you don't get help. If you're Not A Real Person, you get help, but also abuse in the name of therapy. You can't possibly understand how hard it is to deal with people like you, or you'd know. They have to abuse you.

That's why it was scary to lend my roommate my copy of Loud Hands: Autistic People Speaking. She studies English, and she wanted a book with simple words. Loud Hands has simple words and is meant for adults, and it was terrifying because handing it over meant admitting that I am one of Those People.

I didn't get where I am by overcoming my neurology any more than I did by overcoming my asexuality or my androgyny or my Jewishness. I think you'd laugh if I started talking about overcoming my whiteness, that or throw something at me. But I'm not allowed to be Disabled and a Real Person, so I must have overcome it. Right?

Sources. So Many Sources

I finished writing my paper: "The Erasure of Queer Autistic People."
These are a list of all the sources I either cited in the final paper or made notecards for while doing research. [Some things I did both, and some things I only did one or the other. Yes, I cited a couple things I didn't make notecards for.]
Have fun. [No, the swears are not censored in the actual blog titles. Or in the actual paper!]
The source list should be fine, but assume trigger warning for any sources you track down.

Ali. "Addendum to Latest SBC Rant." Web log post. The Polite Yeti. 2 May 2011. Web. 3 Apr. 2013.

Ali. "So Glad You're Writing These." Web log comment. B*tch Media. 6 Jan. 2012. Web. 20 Aug. 2013. 

Ali/Eliot. "The Very next Day Was My Birthday." Web log post. The Alternate Lexicon. 1 Apr. 2011. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

Amialone. Web log post. This Is Not a F*cking Thinspo Site. July 2013. Web. 24 Aug. 2013. <http://amialone.tumblr.com/post/56116672621/throwing-in-one-or-two-female-pronouns-when>.

"Any Other AS Transwomen Scared That You’ll Be Socially Forever Male?" Web log post. Queering Autism. Apr. 2012. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

Anzaldúa, Gloria. "La Prieta." This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. By Cherríe Moraga and Gloria Anzaldúa. New York: Kitchen Table, Women of Color, 1983. Print.

"Autism and Transsexualism." Transsexual Roadmap. 6 Mar. 2012. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

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Baggs, Amanda. "Please Violate Only One Stereotype at a Time." Web log post. Ballastexistenz. 16 Dec. 2007. Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

Baggs, Amanda. "This Is Not the Post I Started out Writing." Web log post. Ballastexistenz. 19 Nov. 2009. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Bascom, Julia. "Whose Stories Get Told: Regarding Feeling Unsafe In The Glee Fandom." Web log post. Just Stimming. 14 Oct. 2011. Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

Becker, Corina. "The Beginnings of Autistic Speaking Day." 2011. Loud Hands: Autistic People Speaking. Ed. Julia Bascom. 1st Ed. Washington, DC: The Autistic Press, 2012. 70-74. Print.

Bedard, Cheryl, Hui Lan Zhang, and Kenneth J. Zucker. "Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation in People with Developmental Disabilities." Sexuality and Disability 28.3 (2010): 165-75. Springer Link. Springer, 20 Mar. 2010. Web. 29 Mar. 2013.

Bev. "The Ever-expanding List of Neurotypical Privilege." Weblog post. Square 8. 29 July 2009. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Brown, Lydia M. "How They Hate Us." Web log post. Autistic Hoya. 19 Aug. 2013. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

Bryce, Landon. "John Elder Robison on Autism and Sexual Orientation." Web log post. ThAutcast. 20 May 2012. Web. 3 Apr. 2013.

"Call for Submissions: TFW Forum on Disabilities, Ableism, and Disability Studies." The Feminist Wire. 26 Aug. 2013. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

Cat. "Meet Your Moderator: Cat." Web log post. Nonbinary Autistics. 10 Jan. 2011. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

"Database of Sexuality and Disability Resources." Ed. Grace Kelly, Lorraine Hone, Zoe Hughes, and Adrianne Pullen. Connect People Network, 2012. Web. 1 Apr. 2013.

Ditz, Liz. "Vigil for George Hodgins and Other Disabled People Murdered by Their Families." Web log post. I Speak of Dreams. TypePad, 16 Mar. 2012. Web. 3 Apr. 2013.

Doetsch-Kidder, Sharon. Social Change and Intersectional Activism: The Spirit of Social Movement. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Print.

DYMPHNA. "A Perspective on Queerness, Transgenderness, and Ableism from a Queer, Nonbinary Autistic with Severe Clinical Depression [1]." Web log post. NeuroQueer. 24 Aug. 2013. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

E. "Dear Younger Self." Loud Hands: Autistic People Speaking. Ed. Julia Bascom. 1st Ed. Washington, DC: The Autistic Press, 2012. 87-90. Print.

E (The Third Glance). "On (A)sexuality." Web log post. The Third Glance. 3 Jan. 2012. Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

Edelson, Meredyth G. "Sexual Abuse of Children with Autism: Factors That Increase Risk and Interfere with Recognition of Abuse." Disability Studies Quarterly 30.1 (2010). 2010. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

Elmindreda. "The Difference Slot." リザード. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Erwin, Marja. "So I’ve Been Wondering…." Web log post. Ananiujiþa. 26 June 2013. Web. 30 Aug. 2013. <http://ananiujitha.tumblr.com/post/53960445503/yesthattoo-ananiujitha-so-ive-been>.

Fine, Cordelia. Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference. New York: W. W. Norton, 2010. Print.

Gabriels, Robin L., and Dina E. Hill. Growing up with Autism: Working with School-age Children and Adolescents. New York: Guilford, 2007. Print.

"Gender and Sexuality." AWN Radio. BlogTalkRadio. 6 Dec. 2010. Autism Women's Network. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

Girljanitor. "A Conversation the Autistic Community Needs to Have, Desperately." Web log post. Patient Presents as Academic and Upset. 25 Aug. 2013. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

Grace, Elizabeth J. "Autistic Community and Culture: Silent Hands No More." Loud Hands: Autistic People, Speaking. Ed. Julia Bascom. Washington, DC: Autistic, 2012. 95-99. Print.

Guin, Kristin. "My Perspective: Autism, Sexual Orientation (or Gender Identity) and the Intersection of the Two." Web log post. Queerability. Tumblr, 3 Apr. 2013. Web. 3 Apr. 2013.

Halberstam, Judith. In a Queer Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives. New York: New York UP, 2005. Print.

Henny. "Asexual on the Spectrum." Web log post. Procrastination Embodied. 22 Jan. 2011. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.
Hillary, Alyssa. "Queer Autistic Voice." Web log post. Yes, That Too. 26 Aug. 2013. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

Ingudomnukul, E., S. Baroncohen, S. Wheelwright, and R. Knickmeyer. "Elevated Rates of Testosterone-related Disorders in Women with Autism Spectrum Conditions." Hormones and Behavior 51.5 (2007): 597-604. Print.

Jack, Jordynn. "Gender Copia: Feminist Rhetorical Perspectives on an Autistic Concept of Sex/Gender." Women's Studies in Communication 35.1 (2012): 1-37. Taylor & Francis Online. Taylor & Francis Group, 16 May 2012. Web. 1 Apr. 2013.

Java Junkie. "Re: Double Rainbow: Parent Guides, Part 1." Web log comment. B*tch Media. 17 Feb. 2012. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

JJ. "Re: "On Ableism within Queer Spaces, Or, Queering the "Normal"" PrettyQueer." Web Log Comment. PrettyQueer. 11 Dec. 2012. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

Kaz. "Disability and Asexuality." Web log post. Http://disabledfeminists.com/. FWD/Forward, 6 Nov. 2009. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Knoepfler, Peter T. "Sexuality and Psychiatric Disability." Sexuality and Disability 5.1 (1982): 14-27. Springer Link. Web. 1 Apr. 2013.

Koller, Rebecca. "Sexuality and Adolescents with Autism." Sexuality and Disability 18.2 (200): 125-35. Springer Link. Springer. Web. 1 Apr. 2013.

Kris. "Re: "On Ableism within Queer Spaces, Or, Queering the "Normal"" PrettyQueer." Web Log Comment. PrettyQueer. 28 Dec. 2012. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

Lawson, Wendy. Sex, Sexuality and the Autism Spectrum. London: Jessica Kingsley, 2005. Print.

Löfgren-Mårtenson, Lotta. "The Invisibility of Young Homosexual Women and Men with Intellectual Disabilities." Sexuality and Disability 27.1 (2009): 21-26. Springer Link. Springer, 9 Oct. 2008. Web. 1 Apr. 2013.

Lindsay. "Doubly Deviant: On Being Queer and Autistic." Web log post. Autist's Corner. 10 Nov. 2010. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

McRuer, Robert. Crip Theory: Cultural Signs of Queerness and Disability. New York: New York UP, 2006. Print.

Mingus, Mia. "Moving Toward the Ugly: A Politic Beyond Desirability." Speech. Femmes Of Color Symposium. Oakland, CA. 21 Aug. 2011. Leaving Evidence. 22 Aug. 2011. Web. 7 May 2013.

"Monochrome Logic, Greyscale Sexuality, and Finding My Identity." Web log post. The Shiny Lair of Quirks the Magpie. 30 Jan. 2011. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

Montgomery, Cal. "Critic of the Dawn." 2001. Loud Hands: Autistic People Speaking. Ed. Julia Bascom. 1st Ed. Washington, DC: The Autistic Press, 2012. 49-59. Print.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: A Peek at Autism Speaks." B*tch Media. 17 Jan. 2012. Web. 25 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Asperger's and Girls." B*tch Media. 7 Feb. 2012. Web. 25 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Autism and Masculinity." B*tch Media. 16 Feb. 2012. Web. 25 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Erasure and Asexuality." B*tch Media. 6 Jan. 2012. Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Navigating Autism, Gender, and Sexuality." B*tch Media. 3 Jan. 2012. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: On Lisbeth Salander." B*tch Media. 5 Jan. 2012. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Parent Guides, Part 1." B*tch Media. 17 Feb. 2012. Web. 25 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Parent Guides, Part 2." B*tch Media. 21 Feb. 2012. Web. 26 Aug. 2013.

Narby, Caroline. "Double Rainbow: Tony Attwood Tells Us to "make Lemonade."" B*tch Media. 3 Feb. 2012. Web. 25 Aug. 2013.

Natalie. Web log post. F*ck Yeah, GSM Autistics! 2012. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Ndopu, Edward, and Darnell L. Moore. "On Ableism within Queer Spaces, Or, Queering the "Normal"" PrettyQueer. 7 Dec. 2012. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

Nebeker, Lindsey. "9 Things You Must Include in Sexuality Education for Individuals with ASD." Naked Brain Ink. 24 Apr. 2013. Web. 07 May 2013.

Omagdi. "Being A Transman With Autism." Experience Project. 19 Feb. 2011. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Orwell, George. 1984: A Novel. New York, NY: Signet Classic, 1977. Print.

Queering Autism. Web. 1 Apr. 2013.

Richter, Zach. "Campbell and the Markedness of Autism: Interrogating the Reproduction of the Neurotypical Subject." Proc. of INSPIRe Virtual Symposium. 22 Sept. 2012. Web. 31 Mar. 2013.

Richter, Zachary. "Intersectionality and Cynicism: Why We Will Never Arrive "home" and Why It Is Important to Have This Realization." Web log post. That Autistic That Newtown Forgot. 8 Aug. 2013. Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

Richter, Zachary. "On the Erasure of Queer Autistics: What It Feels like to Be Erased and Haunted." Web log post. That Autistic That Newtown Forgot. 1 Mar. 2013. Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

Sinclair, Jim. "Don't Mourn For Us." 1993. Loud Hands: Autistic People Speaking. Ed. Julia Bascom. 1st Ed. Washington, DC: The Autistic Press, 2012. 13-16. Print.

Sinclair, Jim. "Personal Definitions of Sexuality." Jim Sinclair's Web Site. Syracuse. Web. 1 Sept. 2013.

Soraya, Lynne. "Dating and Romantic Relationships." Living Independently on the Autism Spectrum. Avon, MA, USA: Adams Media, 2013. 245-60. Print.

Soraya, Lynne. Living Independently on the Autism Spectrum. Avon, MA, USA: Adams Media, 2013. Print.

Stevenson, Michael R., and Jeanine C. Cogan. Everyday Activism: A Handbook for Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual People and Their Allies. New York: Routledge, 2003. Print.

Tager-Flusberg, Helen, and Simon Baron-Cohen. "The Extreme-male-brain Theory of Autism." Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 1999. Print.

Tal9000. "Any Other AS Transwomen Scared That You’ll Be Socially Forever Male?" Web log post. TAL9000. 4 Apr. 2012. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

Thompson, S. Anthony, Mary Bryson, and Suzanne De Castell. "Prospects for Identity Formation for Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual Persons with Developmental Disabilities." International Journal of Disability, Development and Education 48.1 (2001): 53-65. Ilga-europe.org. Web. 30 Mar. 2013.

"Twenty Hallmarks of Fake Trans Personae." Transsexual Roadmap. 6 Mar. 2012. Web. 21 Aug. 2013.

University of Cambridge. Office of Communications. Female-to-male Transsexual People Have More Autistic Traits. EurekAlert! AAAS, 5 Mar. 2011. Web. 22 Aug. 2013.

Vivian, Amanda F. Web log post. I'M SOMEWHERE ELSE. 13 Apr. 2011. Web. 29 Aug. 2013. <http://adeepercountry.blogspot.com/2011/04/i-was-thinking-about-identifying-as-gay.html>.

Vivian, Amanda Forest. "The Ultimate (ridiculous) Showdown." Weblog post. I'M SOMEWHERE ELSE. 23 Mar. 2011. Web. 20 Aug. 2013.

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"Welcome!" Autism Women's Network. Web. 30 Aug. 2013.

West, Sara. Web log post. French Assassins! Sarasempaii.tumblr.com, 7 May 2013. Web. 10 May 2013.

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*Cries*

Trigger Warning: Erasure, ableism, meltdowns

I am dealing with too many messes right now. Just too many. The Feminist Wire is still being horrible. They said they were engaging, but that kind of involves talking to the people having the problem and they're not doing that. At all. Even the thing where they said they were engaging (conversation off this tweet)? Wasn't doing that. Mama Be Good may be an awesome parent of an Autistic kid, but she's still a parent, not herself an Disabled person having access issues with their call. Part of her awesome is the fact that she recognizes that, and actually talked some about why them talking only to her on Twitter is bad. And I've sent them an email that's been unanswered since August 29, which is before the tweet where they claimed to be engaging. And just a reminder that they did, in fact, think that this was a possible solution to cognitive inaccessibility.

Dear Alyssa,
We appreciate your feedback and comments.  We've discussed the concerns, and rather than rewriting the CFP again, or creating multiple versions, we invite you (and others) to share your own interpretation of the CFP with your communities.  This seems to us the most reasonable and helpful way to proceed.
Best wishes,
Editorial Collective

I tried that, by the way- it didn't go well. We did find someone willing and able to translate, but since The Feminist Wire isn't talking to me anymore, or really to any of the actual Disabled people who have issues, much at all ever, we don't know how accurate it is. It feels like maybe they're doing the "ignore them and maybe they'll go away" method of social media crisis management. So I may have escalated, and Thinking Person's Guide to Autism tweeted at them too. (I asked them to.) (I have some issues with TPGA, but I can be pragmatic and this is a sufficiently clear-cut issue that I thought they might tweet. I was right.)

That's The Feminist Wire.
Now China.

I'm in China! Yay! Also, my medical exam didn't have a stamp across my picture from the doctor because that's not something we do in the USA. It's just not. The doctor doesn't even have a stamp for that. So I and everyone else in my program had to re-do the medical exam, including a fasting blood test. It was loud and busy and crowded, so I was pretty overloaded by the time we were done. And instead of going straight to food? Because it's now noon and no one's had breakfast and I didn't have dinner either? We go to the entrance-exit administration to get residence permits. Guess what they want? PHOTOS! Guess what else they want? To take them themselves! With flash! Such a strong flash that I'm jumping a foot from it while I'm not even in the same room! Yeah, that's not a thing I can do, and certainly not while overloaded and really hungry. Cue first public meltdown of the day. In the entrance-exit administration of Tianjin. Yup. That's great. /sarcasm. Then we got food as a group, and, um, spending what I would normally spend on a meal and a half to eat at a place that's overall less noisy but has more of the sensory issue sounds and not actually get full? Yes, that's wonderful. And the suggestion? Eat more for dinner. Oh, wait, we're supposed to do something right after this with people showing us how to get to the other campus, which is something I'm supposed to remember. NO I CAN'T STILL BE HUNGRY FOR THAT, YOU WANT ME TO REMEMBER THINGS. Also we only got 15 minutes break between these things, which I spent curled up in a ball having a quiet meltdown in my room. Which meant that I wasn't able to get food. So I go downstairs to meet people. And it's pouring, so I don't have my laptop, which means I don't have AAC. And I'm only semi-verbal, even in Chinese. They decide they're going to wait for the rain to slow down a bit before doing the thing, so I tell them I'm getting food. They come up with lots of other things they think I should do, and I'm all out of politeness energy, so what comes out is “如果我们不是现在出去的，我是现在找吃的。” (If we're not leaving right now, I'm finding food now.) In response to a suggestion that when we leave (which we're not doing because we're waiting for the rain to let up some) we can get me food. Which isn't actually a good thing to say to a teacher. Students are supposed to be deferential and all. BUT teachers are also supposed to look out for the well-being of their students! And they weren't able to do that.
Then once I was back, they wanted me to introduce myself. I've actually got a script, but I was kind of mute at the time? So I wound up gesturing and no one understood what I was trying to gesture and then I wound up curled up in a ball under the table having a second semi-public meltdown. Yup. So I'm kind of scared now, since I melted down at least semi-publicly twice in a day and my program is super-selective and all.

That's being in China.
Now stuff back on campus in the USA.

Um. eCampus says I'm just a grad student now, and I was just an undergrad over the spring and summer. These are false. I've been both since Spring 2013 and will remain both through Spring 2015, when I graduate from engineering and Chinese. Enrollment services, who do most of the eCampus stuff, think I should talk to my advisers. But wait! If I'm not enrolled, I don't actually have advisers, do I? Thankfully my advisers who I should have are still acting as such, because they are cool like that. It's also messing up my financial aid, because you can't get aid for programs that you're not enrolled in and as far as aid goes, eCampus=reality. The problem is that eCampus is not matching up with reality, and I've never been able to make enrollment services fix anything without showing up in their office before. So once again school is messing stuff up. See also: reasons I don't trust schools to do things right ever ever ever. At least my Chinese adviser has said that if there is anything she can do to help, I should let her know. I told her that going to Enrollment services and yelling at them might be it since I've never gotten them to fix anything without going there in person before. : /

So that's my life. I've also got various papers to write, and the Chinese flagship people are now thinking I shouldn't take the math class I want because of the hours it meets (it's evening) and ugh. Stop. The amount of messiness I deal with to get and keep classes and stuff I want/care about? Fairly high. For stuff I don't much care about? Near zero. So you all should probably just let me have the classes I actually want? Like, the language classes are being described in ways that sounds like they fall under "obnoxious stuff I'll deal with so I can have my direct enrollment classes." 

So Much For Interpretation

Trigger warning: Ableism. Uh. If being told that if you want access you need to do it yourself is triggering, that. 

So, the editors at The Feminist Wire invited me to share my interpretation of their call. I don't think this is quite what they meant, but what they meant is a thing that's not possible: If I could understand their call well enough to really interpret it, we wouldn't be having this problem. Or, in terms of access needs, if it were written so that I could understand it, we wouldn't be having this problem.

But.

They inspired my abstract for a text chapter, so I at least get something out of this mess. [Social media crisis still on because they still haven't actually done anything that makes their call understandable/accessible. Also they said in this Twitter conversation that they weren't being exclusive of disability because one of the writers is deaf.]

At the feminist wire, they want to make feminist stuff. And also they want to ?????? relating to feminism in how they edit. They say this means talking to the writers and helping people revise. Which is cool, but I'm not sure how it relates to feminism? Also they say they take reader ideas and criticisms seriously [I do know that critique is a fancy word for criticism.] Since I already had a ?????? moment in this paragraph, I'm not sure I believe it, but maybe it gets better.

The call went online yesterday. [Well, not yesterday anymore, but yesterday when they wrote this thing.] A bunch of people said stuff about how they're doing the exact stuff they wanted to stop from happening. #irony. That sentence is written in academicese, and it took me a while to parse, so I'm going to go with not accessible. Sad.

Some people said that focusing on the body instead of the mental or the cognitive was excluding certain disabled people. [I didn't understand enough of the original call to tell you if they did that, which excludes cognitive disability anyways. So...] We didn't mean to do the thing? I think the thing is specifying kinds of disability to talk about? They say that people telling them this reveals a problem. Therefore they word salad broadly. What they word salad about is unclear, but it has the word broadly so I assume it's broadly.

We also got emails on how the call was inaccessible. WORD SALAD about people with disabilities, therefore the language is excluding. Pity the language is still excluding enough that a disabled academic can't parse it! Ok, I know what “reduced access to higher education works to perpetuate a cycle of ableism” means because it's a thing I say in different words. It means “Disabled people have a hard time getting to college and then....” ok scratch that no I don't know. Then this does something that makes discrimination against people with disabilities worse. I think what it does is interact with classism, except they don't say classism here, just ableism. So I don't know. There's a disjuncture... is that like divide? Ok, got a dictionary, it's like divide. Or close enough. There's a divide between academics and activists. [Well, not always, I'm both. And quite a few of my friends who are complaining are kind of both too. I present at conferences! Disability Studies conferences! And they're accessible to me!] So... are they maybe trying to say that they just continued a thing that's already there? /annoyed because this is worse than anything I've seen in disability studies, so no you're not. They “get” that lots of... actual marginalized groups? I think that's what communities on the front lines of oppression means. They “get” that actual marginalized people often find academia to be the oppressor/help the oppressor. Yup. Like with this call, actually. That's exactly what happened, and given how much of this is me going ????? or WORD SALAD or needing a dictionary or not getting what you're saying? Yeah still being the oppressor. I think the word gatekeeper applies? The feminist wire wants to stick stuff in the middle of academia and activism, but academic-ish means... word salad? Word salad that I've been told is just bad writing. They want to make the forum accessible, but what I assume to be other thing they want is written in a way that's totally not accessible so this clearly didn't happen.

There's a revision below this! We revised it! We added things! Also, thanks for calling us out and asking us to do better. But also thanks for a thing that you didn't actually do but we'd like to think you did while we say we did a thing we probably still did wrong. Because this apology really feels like it's about them, not the people who are getting excluded. Mainly because it's written so that the excluded folk still don't know what's being said. Also, we need to do hard work and look at how we make stuff work, and respond fast with thanks and doing stuff. [Except that this thing is totally not actually fixing it and shouldn't count.]

Disability is coming up a lot, name a conference, say it talks about disability, gender, sexuality, and focuses on animals [why] chronic pain/injury [makes sense] and trans* ???????? thing. Also folks in insert words here are criticizing disability stuff?

We like interdisciplinary stuff. Also we're confused/wanting to know what's up with suddenly DISABILITY. We want to know what it means for disabled people when disability is used as ?????? with human-animal relationships. Do they mean when it's a metaphor? I hope not, that's a bad metaphor. Don't make comparisons you don't understand and all that. The ??use?? of disability and ???????? bodies that aren't typical?????????? in stuff that's not disability is ick? Needs people explaining why it's ick? Needs to be looked at through ickyness?

So we thought ????????? about rediscovery of disability stuff??????[as opposed to why it got ignored in the first place]????? and it getting used badly in other stuff. And we ask bad “why” questions. And we ask stuff about mixing things I don't know. Something about disability studies, that's a thing I do. And word salad about exploring? Something about learning from activists.

We want to challenge ick, so we want to have people write stuff? And we ask a bunch of questions?

• What does disability mean? I think. Also maybe intersections. And me wanting to know why disabled is in quotes.
• Intersections list other oppressions want to know a thing?
• Talk about ??????? with race, class, gender. And norms. And other words.
• Feminst disability thing? Words. I dunno.
• Disability and monolith are both in this sentence. I really hope it's about how disability isn't a monolith, but word salad.
• … isn't that the same as feminist disability? I don't think you've got the right to the word "crip" though. I'm not sure I do, though if not than the choice of it to represent disability is part of excluding my kinds of disability.
• What are activisty people doing?
• Who isn't here? Maybe “what stuff would they be saying?” But we can't know that because they aren't being heard. So maybe we should get them in instead of talking about what we think they would want?
• INTERSECTIONS.
• What is disability?

We want academics, writers, and activists to talk about the things. Pile of formats OK. Not sure what all the formats really mean, but OK. Submissions due by October 10, 2013, and can be submitted through a thing with a link. Email feministwire@gmail.com if questions. Look at the guidelines first, and give a title. Label the submission Disability Forum. Not sure if I'm supposed to make my own title or title it disability forum.

Except activists might not know what you're asking. And I don't know if anyone outside your little block of academia will either. So you might have trouble getting disabled people talking about the things. Is that maybe what the cycle of ableism is about?

See why this doesn't actually fix the access problem? Yeah, having me share my interpretation or attempt at it really just reveals how fail your “solution” is. Because it being written so that I can't actually interpret it is the exact problem.

Now for anyone who wants to help make this issue hard to ignore, good stuff to share (beyond this post, I mean):

Tweets in this conversation, this conversation, this conversation 

That Autistic ThatNewtown Forgot wrote a post.

Neurodivergent K: Feminist Wire, you may not colonize my community.

Neurodivergent K: More on "trending" and monoliths

Neuroqueer: The Feminist Wire, I'd Like A Word

My original post.

Facebook status.

Tumblr post.

I think sending submissions about how their call excludes disabled people fits under the who is missing thing, so you can also do that.

And I made a standard-ish intro to go with the link to my original post, if you want to put it wherever else:

"The Feminist Wire shared a call for submissions about disability, saying it wanted to include activists. It's not a call that a disabled activist could reasonably be expected to understand, and the revision is, if anything, worse. Please, contact them/share however possible. [ More details+methods in the post.] http://yesthattoo.blogspot.com/2013/08/see-you-and-social-media-crisis.html"

Violence Along Marginalization

Trigger Warning: Violence along privilege axis is THE MAIN DISCUSSION. Gender is the big one, disability also given specific mentions. Ableism.

This was finished about 10 minutes before deadline, and I was tired. Otherwise, the fact that neurodivergent folk are actually way more likely to be the victims would have gone in with citation, plus the "overall less likely to be the perpetrators" on what I think is the same citation. I'd have tossed in some examples of the dehumanization pattern in the last paragraph too. 

There are many factors promoting or excusing gendered violence, just as there are for violenced based on any marginalized identity. The same institutions which privilege one group allow them to get away with violence against the other groups, though the exact ways in which they do so may vary. As Kimmel mentions, it is those with “high-status” who typically get away with things, particularly gang-rape. In his article, discussing high school, it is the best of the athletes, who will never tell on a fellow bro. “Boys will be boys” is insulting to men, but it is used as an excuse (Kimmel,) and the threats going to the victims, not the perpetrators, only makes it harder to report these sorts of crimes and bring them to justice. Ableism helps hide many rapists with a popular theory that rapists are insane (Griffin) rather than seeking power over their victims. The theory also increases fear of those who truly do have mental differences, typically facing contradictory stereotypes of asexuality and of uncontrolled heterosexuality (Thompson et al.) The idea of domestic abuse being a “family matter” also protects many aggressors who engage in gendered violence, as judges and police have historically been unwilling to interfere (Lee and Shaw 505.) In this case, it is the idea of the family, particularly the family ruled by the man who can do as he wishes with the women and children, protecting abusers.

In order to prevent gendered violence, I think power dynamics need to change, and people need to recognize which power dynamics allow which acts of violence to happen. It is not the existence of gendered violence that is different between the USA and countries where we read about acid throwing or dowry violence, but the specific ways that gendered violence occurs (Lee and Shaw 507.) Right now, those who commit gendered violence (violence based on any privilege dynamic, really,) do so knowing that they are unlikely to face punishment. Kimmel argues that what needs to happen in the Stuebenville case is for those who committed acts deserving sanctions actually get those sanctions. I argue that this needs to happen consistently. When a boy pulls a girl's hair in kindergarten, he needs to hear that it's not OK. She shouldn't hear how this means he likes her.

I do not think it is as simple as “a society that allows violence towards women by objectifying them can more simply be violent towards other individuals.” I think that “all the oppressions reinforce each other” is closer to the real story, with many forms of oppression coming from one root source (Lorde 70) and oppression of other marginalized groups not actually helping anyone marginalized. It's all one pattern: make a group Other, then not-quite-human (monstrous, unfeeling, or just plain a passive object will all work here,) and finally OK to be violent towards because of whichever statement of not-quite-human was used.

Griffin, Susan. "Rape: The All-American Crime." 499-507.
Kimmel, Michael. "The 18,437 Perpetrators of Steubenville." Ms Magazine Blog. Http://msmagazine.com, 24 Jan. 2013. Web. 18 July 2013.
Lorde, Audre. "There Is No Hierarchy of Oppression." 2009. Women's Voices, Feminist Visions:
Classic and Contemporary Readings. By Susan M. Shaw and Janet Lee. 5th ed. Boston:
McGraw-Hill Higher Education, 2011. 70. Print.
Shaw, Susan M., and Janet Lee. "Resisting Violence Against Women" Women's Voices, Feminist
Visions: Classic and Contemporary Readings. 5th ed. Boston: McGraw-Hill Higher
Education, 2011. 503-524. Print.Thompson, S. Anthony, Mary Bryson, and Suzanne De Castell. "Prospects for Identity Formation for Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual Persons with Developmental Disabilities." International Journal of Disability, Development and Education 48.1 (2001): 53-65. Ilga-europe.org. Web. 30 Mar. 2013. [This is really a case of “here is a thing I know happens, and here's the first citation for it I can find.” I found the paper when doing research for my presentation on the erasure of Queer Autistic people at Debilitating Queerness, one of few that even touches on my main points from that.]

 

There are many factors promoting or excusing gendered violence, just as there are for violenced based on any marginalized identity. The same institutions which privilege one group allow them to get away with violence against the other groups, though the exact ways in which they do so may vary. As Kimmel mentions, it is those with “high-status” who typically get away with things, particularly gang-rape. In his article, discussing high school, it is the best of the athletes, who will never tell on a fellow bro. “Boys will be boys” is insulting to men, but it is used as an excuse (Kimmel,) and the threats going to the victims, not the perpetrators, only makes it harder to report these sorts of crimes and bring them to justice. Ableism helps hide many rapists with a popular theory that rapists are insane (Griffin) rather than seeking power over their victims. The theory also increases fear of those who truly do have mental differences, typically facing contradictory stereotypes of asexuality and of uncontrolled heterosexuality (Thompson et al.) The idea of domestic abuse being a “family matter” also protects many aggressors who engage in gendered violence, as judges and police have historically been unwilling to interfere (Lee and Shaw 505.) In this case, it is the idea of the family, particularly the family ruled by the man who can do as he wishes with the women and children, protecting abusers.

In order to prevent gendered violence, I think power dynamics need to change, and people need to recognize which power dynamics allow which acts of violence to happen. It is not the existence of gendered violence that is different between the USA and countries where we read about acid throwing or dowry violence, but the specific ways that gendered violence occurs (Lee and Shaw 507.) Right now, those who commit gendered violence (violence based on any privilege dynamic, really,) do so knowing that they are unlikely to face punishment. Kimmel argues that what needs to happen in the Stuebenville case is for those who committed acts deserving sanctions actually get those sanctions. I argue that this needs to happen consistently. When a boy pulls a girl's hair in kindergarten, he needs to hear that it's not OK. She shouldn't hear how this means he likes her.

I do not think it is as simple as “a society that allows violence towards women by objectifying them can more simply be violent towards other individuals.” I think that “all the oppressions reinforce each other” is closer to the real story, with many forms of oppression coming from one root source (Lorde 70) and oppression of other marginalized groups not actually helping anyone marginalized. It's all one pattern: make a group Other, then not-quite-human (monstrous, unfeeling, or just plain a passive object will all work here,) and finally OK to be violent towards because of whichever statement of not-quite-human was used.

Griffin, Susan. "Rape: The All-American Crime." 499-507.
Kimmel, Michael. "The 18,437 Perpetrators of Steubenville." Ms Magazine Blog. Http://msmagazine.com, 24 Jan. 2013. Web. 18 July 2013.
Lorde, Audre. "There Is No Hierarchy of Oppression." 2009. Women's Voices, Feminist Visions:
Classic and Contemporary Readings. By Susan M. Shaw and Janet Lee. 5th ed. Boston:
McGraw-Hill Higher Education, 2011. 70. Print.
Shaw, Susan M., and Janet Lee. "Resisting Violence Against Women" Women's Voices, Feminist
Visions: Classic and Contemporary Readings. 5th ed. Boston: McGraw-Hill Higher
Education, 2011. 503-524. Print.Thompson, S. Anthony, Mary Bryson, and Suzanne De Castell. "Prospects for Identity Formation for Lesbian, Gay, or Bisexual Persons with Developmental Disabilities." International Journal of Disability, Development and Education 48.1 (2001): 53-65. Ilga-europe.org. Web. 30 Mar. 2013. [This is really a case of “here is a thing I know happens, and here's the first citation for it I can find.” I found the paper when doing research for my presentation on the erasure of Queer Autistic people at Debilitating Queerness, one of few that even touches on my main points from that.]

Basically an ode to Kassiane

Trigger Warning: Sexism, Ableism, Gaslighting (institutional), probably more... 

For Gender and Women's Studies at the end, I had to write a "she-ro" essay (ugh I hate that name it's so corny.) And then I wrote it about Kassiane, aka Neurodivergent K. Who is super-radical. And kind of awesome. And possibly going to be embarrassed because I am gushing, but she said I could put this up so now you all get to see me gush about Kassiane.

Kassiane swears. I don't swear on this blog. (I do on Twitter and Tumblr, but not here.) I censored one letter from swears when I quoted her here, but you can still tell what she said.

Flash back to March 2012. I'm slowly entering online Autistic communities, and George Hodgins has just been murdered. People are calling it mercy and making excuses of his mother having killed him because of problems they didn't even have. I'm angry. I've been taught that anger is bad. It's not something you should broadcast. I don't yet know the extent to which people tame their portrayal of heroes- Martin Luther King Jr. and Ghandi are still people who were nice because they were nonviolent. Kassiane helped change that. I read her reactions: “My people are being slaughtered. Anger and hate is how people are supposed to respond to that” (You keep killing us, and I am PISSED.) Then I thought back to A Wizard Alone.

“It's not a good thing, not a bad thing, just what's so,” Millman said. “But you might want to think about what result this kind of emotion has produced in the past. Or might produce again in the future.” (Duane.)

I thought back on my own life. When I got angry, I made things happen. It worked. Kassiane's writing got me thinking in ways that led to creating my blog in April 2012- depending on what a person thinks of my activism, she gets a significant portion of either the blame or the credit for my turning activist.

Initially, I “knew” her as a blogger- I read the entirety of Radical Neurodivergence Speaking, and I eventually followed Kassiane on Tumblr. That's how we started talking, initially, and we met in person for a day and a bit in November 2012- our friendship has been almost completely online, via Tumblr, Facebook, Gchat, and reading (sometimes linking back and forth to) each other's Blogspot blogs.

I don't know as much about Kassiane's initial socialization as a small, cute, AFAB person, but I know the intersections she talks (and sometimes blogs) about now: In person, she will often ask: “If I was a foot taller & looked like a dude would this be happening? Ok let's pretend that's the case and move on" (Personal Communication,) though doing so has yet to make a person actually “pretend that's the case and move on.” When she talks, it's always intersectional. She's taken to saying “My activism will be intersectional or it will be bullsh*t.” She also types it. In the emergency room for adrenal failure? Kassiane will still talk about intersectionality- autism on her chart means incompetence gets assumed, and woman means “if I am not actively being mauled by a bear it's not necessarily really a real thing.” (And Then I Land Inthe ER Again...) At Geek Girl Con? Kassiane can tell you what was good: no creeps, so cosplaying is safe. She can point out what was at least better than most: still predominantly white, but there was more racial diversity than most conventions. She can point out the problems: no disabled presenters were mentioned, there were some access issues related to being directionally impaired, some presenters said problematic (sexist or heterosexist) things, and a person who used a wheelchair put strobey things on her wheels (access issue for photosensitive epilepsy.) (Geek Girl Con Reflections: TheGood, the bad, the WTF.) Skeptic communities? “The sexism is awful, and the way you try to blame it on people with my f*cking neurology is not acceptable.” (Skepticism's Ableism Problem.) Kassiane knows intersections because Kassiane lives them: she is Autistic; she is photosensitive epileptic; she has adrenal insufficiency; she is a small AFAB person who gets read as a woman; she is mixed-race. In winter, when I met her, she passed for white: had you put the two of us next to each other and said “One of these women is white and the other is mixed-race,” I think most white people would have pegged me as the mixed-race woman. In summer, she gets dark, and people can tell that she is, in fact, half Asian. That's when the racism comes in. Passing for white for part of the year and being a visible woman of color the other part gives Kassiane a very good perspective on how racism intersects with disability and gender.

I admire Kassiane because she knows how all the systemic patterns affecting her work, and she will call people out on their -isms. I admire Kassiane for the way she thinks: I remember her saying that she carries a wrench because if you pull out a knife someone will get stabbed, but a wrench will confuse people while being effective (I often carry bolt cutters.) I admire Kassiane because she is a walking, talking social media crisis: she chose that term for it because the Autism Speaks person who talked to her when they used her work without permission and got the attribution wrong had “social media crisis” in his title. She now has two shirts she has made to say “Social Media Crisis,” as it is now her title. I admire her because being a social media crisis gets things done. I know it gets things done because I do it too- she says she may need to make me a “Social Media Crisis” shirt, too. My exact method of crisis may not be exactly the same, since I seem to have become the Official Flash Blog Organizer for the Autistic community and she mostly seems to get her posts shared, but the fact remains: I learned a lot of my activism methods from Kassiane.

Works Cited

Duane, Diane. A Wizard Alone. San Diego: Harcourt, 2002. Print.

Sibley, Kassiane. "And Then I Land In the ER Again..." Web log post. Radical Neurodivergence Speaking. 15 Aug. 2011. Web. 26 July 2013.

Sibley, Kassiane. "Geek Girl Con Reflections: The Good, the Bad, theWTF." Web log post. Radical Neurodivergence Speaking. 11 Oct. 2011. Web. 26 July 2013.

Sibley, Kassiane. Personal Communication. 26 July 2013.

Sibley, Kassiane. "Skepticism's Ableism Problem" Web log post. Radical Neurodivergence Speaking. 7 Feb. 2012. Web. 26 July 2013.

Sibley, Kassiane. "You keep killing us, and I am PISSED." Web log post. Radical Neurodivergence Speaking. 13 Mar. 2012. Web. 26 July 2013.