I don’t like being referred to as a “person with autism”. I can’t just set it down, it’s not something I can remove. It is fundamental to the way I interact with the world, right down to how stim enters my brain. If my brain has types of inputs no allistic person can even approach, and methods of processing inherently different, it is an existence no allistic person can reach. There is no version of me that is not autistic.
A “cure” is the same as shooting me and replacing me with someone else.
The type of person I am is autistic. I am autistic.
I know it is a big trend in leftist spaces to use person first language, but in many situations that just sounds like eugenics to me. Personhood is not some distinct universal experience. There is no “ideal human mind” floating out there in the aether for them to recognize in me.
I get that person first language helps some people recognize that thoughts happen behind my eyes, but if the only way they can do that is by imagining I’m them, I don’t care.
I can’t directly relate. I strongly prefer ‘person with schizophrenia’ to ‘schizophrenic’ (or similar, worse terms). I feel that, first and foremost, I am a person, as are all people, neurodivergent or not.
But also, I support you in being referred to as you want. I don’t need to relate to your experience to just, refer to you as an autist (when I would need to refer to it at all), after you tell me you prefer that.
Yeah I really don’t agree with this thread and i don’t like the language discourse prescribing to others how I should be referred to. OP prefers “autist,” I prefer the exact opposite. I can’t relate to wanting my identity to be defined by autism rather than be referred to as a person who experiences it.
Can’t wait to be called an asshole in the future because i disagree with others telling me how to speak, especially in reference to something that affects me directly