Autism: a diffability?

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Which is just the point of the disability movement if you ask me.



What's the point of calling someone "black" ("total absence of colour")?
What's the point of calling someone "gay" ("happy, cheerful")?

The word "disabled" exists. There's no point in trying to abolish it and put a new word in its place. It's more useful to change the way people think about people with disabilities.

By the way, the idea that autistics have a different ability in that part of their brains that NTs don't have sounds very hypothetical to me. Unless it's something like flying, my guess would be that it'll turn out to be something that NTs have too, only they will be less good at it. Like I could use a wheelchair if I had to, but I wouldn't be good at it. (Not that having strong arms is something inherent; but autistics compensate for things as well, so I think it's not completely useless as an example.)

I accept that there are disablities. For instance you walk, but the next day you get hit by a car and remain sitting in a wheelchair. Or you have a nreve desease and end up in a wheelchair. I just see the posibility that ability of non-verbal learning does not compare to this model of disability. I see a chance that it is evidence of the diversity of people, like there is diversity of plants and animals. They all are adapted to function well in certain environments and will die in other types of environemnts. For some reasons contemporary culture has this thrive to level everyone, make people equal ect. - everyone takes a SAT if they want to college and than we know who is smart and who is not.. everyone has to be 'normal' since 'normal' in regard to DSM is defined statistically. If you are far away from the average, you are 'disabled' by definition.

Maybe it has to do with religous influence: God created 'man', there is no evolution, there is creationism.. Maybe in a non-secular society, this is a problem? The church cannot even deal with homosexuals altough there is very hard effidence of human diversity, inherited over thousands of years, and that is cannot be called 'crime' or 'sin' other than on moral grounds. It certainly is not any more regarded as a sort of illness or disorder, as it was by some people - even medical professionals. That makes a case for socially created norms that don't have much to do with science.

But maybe peopel are very different, and that's different to disabled, altough disabilites may exist as well. I suggest you have to find the type of environment that suits you well in respect to autism. I think it cannot be cured. I like the monotropism theory of autism.

--> http://www.autismandcomputing.org.uk

You do agree that autistics lack typical abilities in the facial expression and body language area, don't you? Also, some of us have difficulty with speech, and many have sensory problems that take a lot of energy out of us. I think these things could be called impairments. Because of them, it can be hard for us to function socially in groups of people, and sometimes in one-on-one contacts too. That would be called a disability: we can't perform these typical functions in a typical way, the way of the majority. Technically, this is really all there is to having a disability. And then there is the political issue, that we are being handicapped by society; just like the wheelchair user is by buildings that are constructed in a way that excludes him. "Handicap" is discrimination based on disability, the way racism is discrimination based on colour.

I agree with your thoughts on diversity, but I also believe that disability is a part of diversity.

Just finished reading all of it...

Trying to summarize the point of the article and apply it to this thread, I think making a difference between "diffability"and "disability" is somewhat like making a difference between those whose disabilities are okay and those whose disabilities are "bad"; between the ones who should be accommodated because their disability is "only" political and those whose lives will never get better because there is something inherently wrong with them, whom society cannot possibly accommodate. This sort of thinking doesn't just exist in the non-disabled community but it also creates a division among disabled people; in this case autistic people - some Aspies saying it's just temperament, others saying it's inherently limiting and nothing to do with politics, you just have to adapt... a house divided against itself. (Someone please tell me if I missed something.)

I'm unable to draw a conclusion from all of this, or maybe I can but not put it into words right now... but anyway...

All right people, I'm done fence-sitting, I'm going to vote for "disability".

Last edited by echospectra on 09 Dec 2004, 9:05 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't know if that article can be summarized briefly, which might be the problem. (It's dealing with a complex issue in a complex way.) But what you said resembles some of my main reasons.

Also that the endless coming-up-with of new euphemisms isn't really something I'm all that interested in, and that I view the actual question of "Is autism a disability or just a difference?" to be substantially outside my own worldview. It seems to rely on constructs and assumptions that come out of language, and then pits the two language-constructs against each other. So I rarely know how to answer when the debate comes up, in that sense.

But what you said says some of what I think, that article I pointed at says a lot of what I think, and I generally don't find it a hugely fruitful issue to begin with. I think that while many people view me as an idealist at times, I'm really a weird sort of pragmatist at heart (I just don't view "pragmatic" as having to mean "go along with things" and that's what confuses people who use the word the other way).

diffability not a word.

I agree autistic people may have difficulties for instance in social situations or with senory issues and I thank that is because they don't spread their attention upon a lot of tasks at the same time. They focus ther attention, have an attention tunnel and may find it difficult to switch attention rapidly as for instance social group situations require (monotropism theory). If lack of social skills is a disabilty for aspies, than lack of having a strong focus is a disability for NTs.

Its true that this discussion is somewhat a 'construct'. we use language to make social models of what 'disability' is. And its important to see that this may not be so different from the way the DSM is made. Its a social construct, and it has not much to do with science. Its political. And not callling autism 'a psychatric disorder' has nothing to do with since, but with discrimination, when no one knows if a psyche exist in the first place, how it works properly and how it can meassured to be dis-ordered.

DSM is something that determines what Health services HMOs pay, but it can also be used to steel rights from people with the accuse that 'they are not mentaly capable of..'.'Autism' is not like in a wheelchair when one can walk - or can not walk. There is significant border between non-autistic and autistic. Everyone may have autism to some degree. Yes I acknowledge it can be very hard being on the more extrem spectrum of that. I also think disability can be part of diversity of people. Yet I just don't agree that we can think about autism as a illness than should be cured.

We should focus on finding or building the right environments for aspies where they are not disabled. Yes, maybe I don't recognize people by their faces. But in small comunities where its easier to know it may be less important.

Yes, shopping malls can be horror. So who comes up with a aspie - friendly shopping mall or home delivery service? How would a college for aspies look like where no one uses body language anyway? Think about the opportunities we have to make our lifes better. What about high pitched voices? I cannot stand high pitched voices when my TV sometimes makes them. Am I disabled? I think my TV is bad, and I would like to have a TV with no high pitched voices. Why should I meassure the value of my life against a stupid TV and let others tell my I have 'sensory issues'!? I think looking and building the right environment for apsies can do much to focus on our abilities rather than trying to find 'disabilites'. and I think that's better than letting NTs invent a list of socially anapproved behaviour which they call 'autism'.

It's basically a new word:

diff-ability (diff-uh.BIL.uh.tee) n. A disability, especially one that causes
or encourages the person to develop different or special abilities.

Wendy Lawson invented the term 'diffability' for 'different abilities'. The word 'disability' is NOT part of it. Its not about disabilites, its about abilities.

In fact, 'dis-ability' is about 'ability' as well. So the umbrella term for reference is not disability or diffability, but 'ability' in any case.

You can put a 'dis'- or a 'diff'- in front of 'ability'. Its up to you which word you like to use. But the term diffability has nothing to d owith 'disability'. It only has to do with 'ability'. And with difference.

If you prefer differt abilities or disabilities is a matter of perspective. different abilites takes a neutral stand, implying that NTs and Aspies have different abilities. That means both NTs and Aspies 'lack' some skills and have some other skills the other one does not have. The term disability just refers to an ability one has but the other has not. You can choose to say both NTs and Aspeis have some disability meassured by the other (neuro-)type, and you can say both NTs and Aspies both have different abilites. I like the later more. Its more positive, less discriminate.

Is it just me or is this discussion going round in circles?



dunc

I wonder how important words can be. So I ask, what does the word 'disability' do for you? How important are words for your personal identification e.g. Aspie, Asperger syndrome, autism, disorder, disabilty? Does it help you in terms of someone aknowledges the difficulties we face in every day life and being taken more seriously? How is the 'the right' important for you personally?

I think when you are speaking about words like "disability" or "disorder" a lot of people can not get past the fact that it is charged with negative connotations.

In my psychology class last night, we were discussing the film "Ma Vie en Rose," in which the child seems like he may have a Gender Identity Disorder. Many people in the class, however, were very reluctant to say he should be diagnosed, since they did not think that he had a "disorder," since most of his problems came from social stigma.

My teacher brought up a good point, which was "Do you think that the problem is you think of 'disorder' as a dirty word?"

I think that we are having the same issue here. I do not see "disability" or "disorder" as "dirty words," but it seems like others do.

I don't think anyone here who doesn't call autism a diffability is of the opinion that it is bad or that it should be cured. If you feel that calling autism a disability implies that, then we have a big misunderstanding here.


It isn't just you, I think... I am getting dizzy .


Exactly.

Don't know what you mean by "the right".

The term Asperger Syndrome is a convenience for me. If it helps, I'll use it - to explain myself to others, to get things I need, etc. But I think of myself as autistic.

Autism, to me, is the way I am. It is neutral. It makes me different. It sometimes makes me hated; but it isn't autism that causes hatred. People hate.

Disability is a word that connects me to all other people with disabilities - intellectual, physical, neurological. It makes me see how people are being shunned and segregated and oppressed for being different. It makes me see that disabled people and people who are being discriminated against and stigmatized based on other differences are, or should be, fighting the same battle. It makes me aware that "a community that excludes even one of its members isn't a community at all".

What disability to me is not is something that should be "prevented" (= killed), or cured, or overcome; it is simply something that is. It also doesn't mean not having the duty to try and live a good life. There are different ways to live a good life. It doesn't say much at all about what I can or cannot do; it says a lot about what others allow me to do.

No sign of life in this thread for a week now; it's moved to the second page. Question (asked by different parts of me with concern for its health, confusion, irritation, trepidation, and potential triumph):

Did I kill it??

No, you did not. It's just that the discussion seems to go on different levels. And in this matter, it may reflect what is going on in society.

By social convention, I may be odd. By legal status, I may be disabled in order to get serives. Psychologicaly, I think autism not a disability, but part of the normal diverstiy of people. Scientificly, I think autism does not exist - technically - because its defined purely by a list of socially unaccepted behaviour - and thus does not at all reflect the neurological/biological background of being different.

Also, when I say 'technically' it does not exist - or that everyone is a bit autistic in some degree - than people often feel offended, because they found help, understanding, identification and acknowledgment of their struggle. I don't want to question that in any way. Its just that I am into to monotropism theory.. for which I say, technically, autism is not a disability..