Many non-autistic people think of themselves as autism allies.
Most of them care about autism during Autism Acceptance Month, which they may know as Autism Awareness Month.
Few of them actually support autistic people.
Maybe they fell into it because of Atypical or Heartbreak High.
Here are my tips to avoid being THAT person during April, or year-round, so you genuinely support the people you claim to care about.
How to be an ally to autistic people
1. Acknowledge your privilege as an allistic person—and know your place within the community.
You were born into a world dominated by allistic people.
Sure, Einstein was analyzed to be autistic, along with many other historical figures, but much of society still sees autism as a bad thing.
Regardless of whether you do, your privilege leads your opinion to be redundant in this case.
Allistics are part of the autism community, meaning you do not get to decide anything about the autistic community.
If you’re not in a minority’s group (autistic community), you haven’t a say.
Even as I type this, I can understand how off-putting and shitty it sounds, but it’s true.
Feel free to compare it to cis men having a say over cis women’s bodies, if it helps you visualize better your stance in the communities.
Stop flaunting the puzzle piece about to represent autism.
Unlearn what you were taught wrong about us.
2. Respect terminology used in the autistic community.
Stop calling yourself an “autism ____”.
There is nothing to fight except the divide. There should be no politics over whose life is superior/inferior to another’s, whether a minority community deserves to live/reproduce/etc.—the list goes on.
Calling yourself an “autism” anything as an allistic person takes attention from voices of minorities and puts the allistic people at the authority level.
The only autism experts, regardless of how much research has been done by an allistic person, are autistic people.
Autistics are the only genuine autism experts.
Autistic people are autism experts.
Non-autistic people are not autism experts—period.
Moreover, if an autistic person chooses identity-first language, respect it.
Do not continue to use person-first language unless in regards to an autistic person who has explicitly told you to refer to them that way.
When you continue to disrespect an autistic person’s language preference, it makes you look bad and is, essentially, talking over an autistic person—which is not ally behavior. Which brings me to this:
Do not speak over autistics; do not dismiss autistics.
Autistic Hoya wrote a great piece on what an ally isn’t.
Also: Don’t call yourself an ally.
Don’t scream your allyhood from the rooftops—we’ll determine allies for ourselves, thank you.
The best allies needn’t a label, however, or to be reassured.
3. Raise voices of minorities, and watch what you say.
Don’t focus the conversation back on you. Use your position in society to lift the voices of minorities.
- Post links to their blogs on social media
- Retweet their tweets
- Publicly and respectfully validate their thoughts and feelings without giving yours
- Don’t exploit your child during any it, tell us we’re not like your child (we are), and/or put your child down to prove a point
- Don’t pick fights with us; respect our thoughts and opinions in discussions regarding autism
Use your position to bring attention to members of the actually autistic community, because our voices are often buried and ignored.
I read the comments and discussions regarding autism on other sites; I’m similar to your kid—but all grown up. My mom kept a blog; she didn’t expect me to find it—didn’t think I would.
4. Support organizations that actually include autistic people in everything they do.
Organizations like Autism Speaks ignores and goes to extreme measures to avoid actually autistic people from sharing what we think about them.
Many actually autistic bloggers and vloggers have been scared into silence to not talk, many actually autistic people have been blocked on Twitter for speaking out against their tweets (even when it wasn’t attack-like)—the list goes on.
Don’t support “autism mom/warrior/etc.” groups, but instead groups created by and for autistics.
If you want to go the extra mile, support actually autistic people.
If you can’t shell out anything monetarily, again: raise their voices!
Read blogs and articles written by autistic people instead.
As an allistic person, you have the power to do things we can only dream of right now. People listen to you, so help guide people to us.
5. Strive for acceptance, not “awareness”.
Awareness creates resistance. It’s what you do for cancer and things that are a danger to society, like serial killers.
Autism does not need awareness; autistic people need acceptance from non-autistic people.
6. Speak for us only if we permit you to.
If you’re speaking for your child, you should still be careful not to allow your voice more value over an actually autistic person.
This one, though, is more towards what your ultimate purpose should be:
It is not the job of autistic people to fight for/convince others of their rights, but for allistic people to remind the world of our humanity, too.
Fighting is exhausting.
I can’t always do it, even if I feel like I need to.
I shouldn’t feel this way. I shouldn’t feel like I’m not doing “enough” if I’m not pushing myself to tears advocating for myself and others, either.
Allies should raise our voices, because we cannot always do it, because we cannot always fight back, because we feel spent much more than we’d like.
It’s a path to autistic burnout.
Stand up for us by defending us. Stop hesitating in the wings.
Sometimes all it takes is standing up to a fellow allistic person by saying, ”
“Listen to this autistic person. You’re not part of the autistic community. You don’t know what their experience is like firsthand. Stop invalidating autistic people and their experiences just because you find caring for them a burden.”
It’s not perfect, but the idea I’m trying to make, I hope, is there.
It’s exhausting to fight for ourselves all the time. It hurts.
Every time I post something about my autism here on my blog, I’m met with some kind of backlash over how someone from the autism community thinks I shouldn’t have a say because I don’t know what it’s like caring for someone like me—because I am the burden in their lives.
I shouldn’t have to prove my worth as a human to horrible humans. I shouldn’t have to solve your “burden” issues just because I am a member of the community you deem a burden.
I shouldn’t have to fight for myself when I’m feeling like I’m back in my old room in Forney, wrestled around on the floor by my mother for the torture of myself and entertainment of my stepfather.
You want to be an ally?
If you’re not with us, you’re against us.
You have to include us in everything you do in your autism activism, otherwise you bring harm to us.
If that is hard to understand, perhaps you should learn about allism.
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