Welcome to Neurodiversenby
My name is Red. I am a nonbinary autistic adult who also has ADHD and a number of co-morbid chronic illnesses including hEDS, POTS and the Fragile X Premutation.
I write particularly on personal experiences with chronic illness and disability in my other blog, Down With the Sickness. While I will keep writing there, I wanted to start a new blog particularly for my advocacy work related to neurodiversity and gender, where DWTS focuses more on disability and chronic illness.
Some of what is posted here will be intended as educational resources for trans and gender-variant folks and/or autistic, ADHD and other neurodiverse adults to share to educate cishetero and/or neurotypical people around them, including but not limited to parents of neurodiverse or trans/gender-variant children. Frankly, I have ended up writing broadly the same things so often to educate people in that I started saving them to my GDocs! Then I thought I should perhaps put them out there for others to access and use as they see fit.
I am white, so while I will reference things related to racism here sometimes, mostly it will be about amplifying the voices of BIPOC activists, particularly trans and neurodiverse BIPOC people in general.
If you find my work helpful and would like to compensate me for my labour and ongoing advocacy work, you could buy me a coffee here. Thanks!
My Latest Posts
- The NHS Nurses’ Strike, Medical Disableism and Abuse, and the Subtle Ways Intersectional Disableism Affects Us Under CapitalismDue to support for the NHS nurses’ strike in the UK population, there is a huge outpouring of stuff about “our NHS” and “our nurses” which is, however, also currently being used to really beat and dogpile with abuse anyone who speaks up about shitty treatment, including medical disableism, they’ve received from nurses and otherContinue reading “The NHS Nurses’ Strike, Medical Disableism and Abuse, and the Subtle Ways Intersectional Disableism Affects Us Under Capitalism”
- We Do Not “fight stigma” by Displacing It onto More Marginalised PeopleIf I could just have a day in the online autistic community where I didn’t have to deal with privileged autistics using the R word to denigrate autistics with intellectual/learning disability or speaking about “fighting stigma” by ”educating people that autism isn’t a learning/intellectual disability”, that would be a good day. No, autism isn’t aContinue reading “We Do Not “fight stigma” by Displacing It onto More Marginalised People”
- Beyond “ACAB” – what are our alternatives?Being from the UK, it absolutely terrifies me that pretty much every time I read the words “police wellness check” in a US context it’s also in the context “BIPOC and/or trans and/or disabled person was killed by police during” and yet people keep doing it. Honestly, I’d be unlikely to do it in aContinue reading “Beyond “ACAB” – what are our alternatives?”
- “Quiet Quitting” and Ridicule as a Tool of Ideological ResistanceI have been incredibly heartened to see the widespread ridicule of the phrase “quiet quitting” across social media. What the capitalist class were trying to do by publicising the phrase and trying to sneak it into the wider lexicon – particularly in the neoliberal press – was trying to continue to gaslight the working populationContinue reading ““Quiet Quitting” and Ridicule as a Tool of Ideological Resistance”
- The Power of Depictions of the Queer PastDepictions of our past as queers are so fucking important. There’s this constant movement to cut us off from our past – to denigrate nonbinary genders as “middle school confusion” and bisexuality as “uni experimentation”. TERFs trying to pretend trans folk – esp trans women – are a 2010s phenomenon 🤨 It’s utter BS. WeContinue reading “The Power of Depictions of the Queer Past”
- OverloadedOne common experience of disability all across the board – relating to everything from learning/intellectual disability to neurodiversity to physical impairment to chronic illness – is the way that “one little thing” can make everything – work performance, school performance, ability to communicate etc – go right off the rails and collapse. This is anContinue reading “Overloaded”
- Why “Like Wheelchair User” Comparisons Are HarmfulI frequently see various things floating around social media and other parts of the internet stating that refusing accommodations helpful to neurodivergent or mentally ill, or even “invisibly disabled” people are “no different to denying a ramp to a wheelchair” (perhaps notably, very rarely “wheelchair user), or that criticising neurodivergent people for having various featuresContinue reading “Why “Like Wheelchair User” Comparisons Are Harmful”
- “Reverse Ableism Isn’t A Thing” and Other Common Misunderstandings of Structural DiscriminationRecently I’ve found myself seeing lots of pushback and angry shouting from neurotypical people whenever a space is set up only for neurodivergent people. Whether this is homeschooling families of neurodivergent children looking to create groups where their children can socialise in greater safety and with greater expectation of their needs being met, or neurodivergentContinue reading ““Reverse Ableism Isn’t A Thing” and Other Common Misunderstandings of Structural Discrimination”
- There’s No Such Thing as “Profound Autism”Cross-posted, with some additions, from my other blog, Down With the Sickness. This was actually the post that made me think I needed a separate blog for my writing on neurodiversity and gender. The title of DTWS was chosen some years ago as a bit of a dark joke (yes, autistic people can have aContinue reading “There’s No Such Thing as “Profound Autism””
- Identities, Not LabelsWritten as part of Pride 2021 🏳️🌈 I would like to ask people to talk about “identities” instead of “labels” when talking about descriptions of yourself or others that are self-chosen and proudly-carried. I am thoroughly sick of people talking about “why label yourself”; “I don’t want to label my child” etc when talking aboutContinue reading “Identities, Not Labels”
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