Neurotypical - The New N Word

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I remember when I first joined this website, I saw frequent use of the word NEUROTYPICAL. Neurotypical in further depth, describes someone who had not been diagnosed with a developmental disability, hence Autism is what this forum is designed for,people like us, and preferably, people with disabilities.

So when I see the word Neurotypical, it is designed to indicate that a "Neurotypical" will never see things the same way a person with a disability would. I see that word the same way as a person would say, "And Oh My God! They're black, They're gay, They're transgender, etc." You get what I'm going into as far as having to specify their difference deliberately.

I noticed this word comes off as a way of stigmatizing people without disabilities, although it's funny they are the reason any person with disabilities will ever succeed or receive assistance in their lives. A majority of non-disabled have advocated for disabled folks. To spit in their face with that terminology is generalizing they will only handle things the way an abusive institution would or abusive models of parenting. However, that does not dismiss there is still too much abuse and misunderstanding of disability that must be dealt with by advocating for ourselves and stepping into the light of the scheme and gather support from Non-Disabled.

I confess to using it before realizing it is supposed to discourage efforts made by non-disabled to help us.

It would be a huge disrespect for me to ever use that towards my family, friends, teachers, and co workers. Also further treat them they are seconded and not important. Many Non-Disabled have helped me immensely to get me where I am today. I am working a day job, I am in a band, and I am able to write this post with my determination to make a difference for others and to succeed on my own.

Quite honestly, I am very vocal about what I say, and I honestly felt like writing this from my heart. I will leave this as an open forum of communication amongst ourselves.

How many N words do we need? None at all, last time I recalled. I do acknowledge no one is perfect, and both disabled and non-disabled still have ways to go before there is a higher level of acceptance.

The term isn't meant to be insulting. It's just a handy way to refer to those who don't have a mental disorder, much like "cisgender" is used to refer to those who aren't trans.

Many Aspies associate negative connotations with NT.
There isn't much you can do about it unless you offer up a new term to define neurotypical people and discourage it's hijacking.

As several have said above "NT" is just a term for anyone not dxd with a neurological disorder (ie not on the ASD spectrum, and maybe also not ADHD, nor like that).

Its not derogatory.

Folks on this site have gotten bullied by non autistics all of their lives so they are entitled to vent on site like this.

Any term can become derogatory with time. Steinbeck's Dust Bowl refugee characters in the "Grapes of Wrath" talk about how the term "Okie" originally just meant "you are from Oklahoma", but how it had become an epithet during the Dust Bowl crises.

"Aspie" is considered by some to be offensive. Though most folks on WP use neutrally, or even affectionately, still.

But even if NT were to be considered an insult, so what?

The folks it applies to (namely non autistics) are 98 percent of the population, and they have all of the power, and they are not even aware of the lingo used by the tiny powerless autistic community in the first place, and they don't have any reason to give a crap about our lingo either. So the term "NT" doesn't effect them the way that the term "k*e" would have effected Jews in Eastern Europe or the N-word would have been in the face of American Blacks in the Jim Crow South. Few NTs ever hear nor read the term "NT", and the few who do have no reason to associate the term with discrimination or with humiliation of any kind, and so they would not be triggered by it.

So NTs do give a crap about being called "NT". So why should we care if we call them that?

It is similar to calling a non-ethnic person "white".

It is just a handy word to quickly say "a person that is not part of any minority/ethnic group/neurological difference/whatever"

Now, it is used in a negative manner, but those are exeptions

To me it seems words are derogatory and not derogatory based on the convenience of the poster.

If we're going to make almost everything in this place fair game for discrimination and hate speech then we don't get to decide if others should be offended if a demographic of people they belong to are being spoken about in a discriminatory fashion. Horse for courses.

I don't like how "NT's" are spoken about generally in WronngPlanet as they are potentially one diagnosis away from being like many of the other people here in need of counsel, friendship and understanding. By all means people should share their experiences, and vent if it helps, but we shouldn't emulate the problems we feel exist in others.

I think the comparison is ridiculous.

People sometimes do use it in a "boo hiss evil" way, and while that's obviously broadly unfair, I think it has to be understood in its proper context. It is people moaning on the internet, not crowds shouting on the street.

For the most part, it's just a value-neutral descriptive term. It doesn't come with a stigma or suggest disrespect or inferiority. If people get offended by it then that's their problem.

I definitely think it's a better term than "non-disabled" - lots of disabled people are neurotypical, after all.

It's perfectly fair to say "neurotypicals will never understand xyz".

Yes, Neurotypical is often used in a derogatory manor and IMHO is a flawed descriptor. But I am sick and tired of legitimate descriptors bieng successfully turned into insults by bullies and a bland meaningless expressions replacing them. I would not be surprised if in 5 years we on are the website "Wrong Planet - For the differently neurologically abled" because "autism" is bieng used as an insult now.

The practice of using neurotypical in an insulting way is critized often on WP. That is preferable to language policing.

Both words can be used in stigmatizing ways. Sounds like what you are describing. At various times for various reasons, people will attempt to stigmatized each other, sometimes without realizing and it is considered negative.

I don't like it when people use the term NT with blatant negative connotations attached to it... like they think that neurotypical really means being horrible. I get it that some had bad experiences with others who may well have been NT... but does that make all neurotypicals awful people? Nope.

I think though it comes down to the intent behind the word. I struggle to view a lot of word themselves as bad things... it's how people mean the words that make it either okay or not so much to me. Some people use NT in a negative way, others use it as an adjective.. no more, no less.

I used the word Neurotypical/NT for a while when I first started posting on WrongPlanet...

I subsequently abandoned it, though, due to its frequent use as a derogatory term. Many statements by the so-called "Aspie Supremacists" were especially cringe-worthy...

The term also tends to invite a particular type of bias known as Out Group Homogeneity, where some (usually less than flattering) trait is assumed to be a general feature of the "Neurotypical" population...