just a reminder that insulting the way people speak because it’s “weird” (i.e. too fast, too slow, too monotone, too animated, slurred, etc) is ableist. many of us with intellectual disabilities, developmental disorders, autism, traumatic brain injuries, physical disabilities, and other conditions speak “weird” because of our conditions.
i see posts all the time like “POV you’re talking to that person who talks like they’re in an anime” or “people who speak monotone are so creepy, they’re like robots” or “people who slur their speech gross me out”. it’s ableist and dehumanizing. insulting the way “certain people” speak may seem harmless on the surface but under the surface those “certain people” are almost always disabled, and these traits are just traits of our disabilities.
Where are all the "slow" kids, the challenged kids, the burnouts from birth, the burden to have in class? Where are the autists who can't mask, who self harm, who are loud and can't stop stimming? The NDs with processing disorders, brain damage, brain fog? The ones with down syndrome, FAS, and other conditions that people treat like curses or defects. I hardly ever see them past 18 and I know they don't just dissolve once they become adults.
happy Pride month ! ! here is your reminder that intensely / severely / big / whatever word wanna use Mentally Disabled people CAN use whatever label/exoression they want because they have the same autonomy as You !
yes this includes Kink
includes Gender
includes HRT
includes Sexuality
includes Romance
includes Neo/Xeno labels
includes those who Can't understand gender sexuality etc because STILL have autonomy to do whatever want
includes EVERYTHING & EVERYONE
!
My take on people reclaiming the r slur, as someone with cognitive and developmental disabilities. Warning, I will be referring to a racial slur in this post. It will be censored.
The r slur means slow. It is made specifically to mock "slow" people like me, people with a specific group of disabilities that impair us in a very specific way. Unless you are someone who is slow, that word does not apply to you and your cannot reclaim it. Honestly, even I hesitate to say it because while I have one of those specific disabilities, I am not intellectually disabled and so my ability to use that slur, to me, is not promised and I do not want to offend.
"Who are you to tell me I can't reclaim a slur used on me?"
Okay, so here's the thing. I'm Irish. Back in the day, racists used to call the Irish white n-words. That slur has been used against the Irish just as the r slur has been used against you. For the Irish, people hurled the meanest thing they could think of at us, and to them, comparing us to Black people was the worst thing they could possibly do. Similarly, ableists have referred to you as the r slur because they think that comparing you to people with intellectual disability is the worst possible insult they can hurl in your direction. Are you following?
Do the Irish have the right to reclaim the n-word just because it was used against us to "insult" us by comparing us to Black people? No, of course not. Because even though that word was used against us, it's a slur against Black people. Irish people who aren't Black don't get to reclaim that slur. Only Black people can reclaim it.
Similarly, if a straight man who was just a bit too queer-looking is bullied and called the f slur, because comparing him to gay people is the worst insult his bullies can think of, does he have the right to reclaim the f slur? No. The slur doesn't apply to him. It's been hurled in his direction but at the end of the day, he isn't gay. Just like the Irish aren't Black, and you are not intellectually disabled.
The r slur was made specifically to target people with intellectual disability. Outside of people with intellectual disability, there are very few groups to whom that word applies.
You can't reclaim a slur that doesn't apply to you. Even if it was used against you, there's a difference between being insulted by being compared to someone like me and actually having that word hurled at you because you are like me. I'm sorry people were ableist to you, but that's not your slur to reclaim. There are ones that apply to you. Ableists were very thorough. Please reclaim one that applies to you.
Consider these
People with personality disorders are not inherently abusive. Yeah, even people with NPD and ASPD (why do I have to say that?) There is no such thing a narcissistic abuse. People with ASPD are not serial killers. They are people, stop putting them down for no reason. People with personality disorders are welcome here. All of them.
Armchair diagnosing is bad. I don't care how shit someone is, if you call them a narcissist, a psychopath, a sociopath, a compulsive/pathological liar, or literally any other disorder that they haven't been professionally diagnosed with, you're a dick. You can't know what's going on in their head. You are not their doctor and are not qualified to diagnose them. And it's just a dick move to diagnose Casey Anthony as someone with a heavily-stigmatized symptom THAT I ALSO HAVE HAD
Stop. Tagging. Your. Writing. With. Disability. Tags. The PTSD tag is nearly unusable because everyone tags their fics as PTSD. Stop it. That space is not for you. It's for us.
People with intellectual, developmental, cognitive, whatever disability deserve to be heard.
As do semispeaking and nonspeaking autistics.
Yes, we do need to listen to caretakers, they're how some people communicate. No one is invalid because they're a caretaker, they're invalid when they're an ableist caretaker.
If the autism "cure" were to exist right now, it would mean eugenics. I don't give a shit if you want it, it would mean eugenics. Society is way too anti-autism for us to trust non-autistics with a cure. I won't get into my rant about the concept of a cure unless asked, it doesn't matter. What does matter is that if that cure is created, it will be forced on people, even those who vehemently oppose it, so it can't exist yet without putting people in danger.
Autism Speaks is shit. So is National Autistic Society. So is the Autism Society. ASAN is on thin fucking ice.
Stop tagging political posts with NPD, ASPD, compulsive liar, or no empathy. You're being ableist and armchair diagnosing. And putting that shit on our feeds.
ABA is bad. Yes, always. All of it. I lost a friend to ABA and I will not budge on this. All pro-ABA people will be blocked, I do not give a shit.
I do not care about syscourse. I am not a system and am not qualified to have an opinion on it.
If you point out typos, grammar mistakes, or whatever when the other person hasn't explicitly said it's okay, stop. You're being ableist.
Stop using TBI as an insult. Yes, I was dropped on my head (okay, I fell, but still,) as a baby. Fuck you too.
This is a safe place for systems and I'm firmly anti-Split.
Autistic and intellectually disabled people are allowed to transition, be queer, get tattoos, drink, have sex, whatever, should they so want.
Mental age is bullshit. He doesn't have the mind of a two-year-old, he has the mind of an adult with IDD.
The posts of disabled people are not an excuse for you to trauma-dump. I don't care what your ex did, that person with NPD wasn't talking about them and it's a dick move to bring that up on their unrelated post.
People should not have to work to live. No one. Ever. Period.
Healthcare should be free
Caretakers need to stop killing their disabled charges
Autism Mommies (TM) are shitty people.
Don't even get me started on Fathering Autism (bitch, you aren't fathering autism, you're fathering ABBY)
Disabled people deserve dignity and privacy. All of them. Yes, even those ones. We're still people. You don't need to know how we go to the toilet.
Fiction does not determine morality and sending people anon hate telling them to kill themselves is a shitty thing.
Telling people to kill themselves in general is a shitty thing. What are you gonna do if they actually do it and you get arrested for manslaughter?
Trans kids deserve to transition, intersex kids deserve to not be mutilated and forced onto HRT when they can't or don't consent, children can and will be queer
Actual sex education needs to be standard
Label policing LGBT+ identities is bad
Devotees and "transableds" are not allowed here
Children and disabled people deserve to exist in public, even if you don't like us
Stop. Saying. Retard. Stop using autistic as an insult. Stop it and go to hell.
I'm pro-choice and I know you don't actually care about fetuses with Down Syndrome, you're just trying to guilt me.
I will reblog with more takes as they occur to me
And, most importantly, listen to ALL disabled voices. All of them. Every single one. We stand together or we don't stand a chance.
a way you can help some i/dd and cognitively disabled people is by clarifying what kind of response you want if you're not open to any kind of response
like, specifying that you want comfort or advice or solidarity or some other kind of acknowledgement, or if you want just an emoji or to change the subject, or if you want to close the conversation, like
just fucking communicate. give us feedback. tell us what you want
if you need clarification ask for it. if you need us to rephrase ask for it
we're communicating or verbalizing the only way we know how. and if you're not like this you can't even begin to scrape the fucking surface of understanding how hard it is