10 Years Since “I Am Jack” aired - and the world looks very different.
"I am Jack" is an episode of #AustralianStory that has not aged particularly well in light of the Neurodiversity Movement.
You can watch it below, on the ABC website.
“I Am Jack: Australian Story, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2014".
I fiercely hope that Jack finds the #NeurodiversityMovement on his own, and Neurodivergent people. He is part of us. He will always be. As always will be, his likely Neurodivergent parents. Autism is intergenerational. We know that now.
The apple rarely falls far from the tree. And the tree is beautiful. #Neurokin are neurokin.
[Image Description: An apple tree in an orchard.]
It's funny, you know. There are so many well-known #AutismMums who, when you read their stories closely, are obviously Autistic themselves. Singer is a key example. In the stories of these mothers, you hear and see it clearly:
‘Pushy. Demanding. Outspoken. Marches to the beat of her own drum. Focuses on her child to the exclusion of everything else. Driven and obsessive. Razor-sharp researcher and pattern spotter. Knows everything about Autism very soon after her child is diagnosed (cough, special interest, cough).’
What I have just described is one of the most common presentations of an Autistic mother. It isn’t the only one; but it is common.
I have no problem saying this openly because being Autistic is not a bad thing. In fact, it is a very good thing and a wonderful way to be in the world. To say that I think someone is Autistic is a compliment, not a derogation of them.
Unfortunately, some of these high-masking mothers have used their brilliant #monotropic focus to pursue the promotion of ABA in the UK, US and Australia. As an Autistic mother, I grieve for them as my peers. I wish them peace and self-acceptance.
Every Autistic person deserves this. It is liberation.
A number of members of the ANPA are adults who are now parents and grew up in ABA therapy as children. This is not something that is widely known about #TheANPA. Many people wrongly assume that we are not like their "profoundly Autistic" children.
Wrong.
We cherish our members who have experienced ABA and hope our association is a safe place for them, a shelter. Nobody within the ANPA will ask them to be less Autistic. In the ANPA we self-determine and we protect each other.
At a couple of our meetings, these members shared their experiences of ABA and similar "interventions" and how it has impacted them as adults and as parents. To be able to honour their stories and celebrate them as cycle breakers is a privilege and a feat of solidarity that probably none of their ‘therapists’ would have predicted. Their children are not being put through the same.
These parents, despite what they have endured, are treading brave new paths with no model; only their parental instinct to protect their child’s personhood and wholeness to guide them and the (often, few) supports they have built around them.
When you think about it, that’s quite breathtaking courage. We should all be in awe of them, frankly.
[Image description: A parent and child standing together, outside. You can see just their feet.]
The world is moving on from behaviourism. We are in the change right now, and it is painful. Governments are fighting it, tooth and nail, because we are going into territory that is unknown.
None of us have really lived in a world where psychosocial Disability is celebrated, accepted, and supported respectfully. Some cultures, at some points, have done well with our people. But on the whole, the world has always been a brutal and dangerous place for us.
So we are doing these things right now for the first time.
If they feel hard as a result, that is reasonable, I think; we are creating culture by fighting for a rightful place in the world where we are entitled to exist unchanged. Birthing things is painful! (And I say that as someone who has given birth to a whole human child).
No matter the resistance, the Neurodiversity movement is here to stay. It cannot be reversed. Thank goodness for that; may this be one of the last generations where overt, systemic and internalised ableism runs our lives and determines futures without serious challenge.
As parents, we, of course, do the best we can with what we have at the time and what we know. Ableism unconsciously shapes parenting, often. We don't all build private #ABA companies that make 15.4 million dollars a year from it though - which the Lizard Centre does. Capital is also responsible for a lot.
This is a key difference between Nicole and myself, and my friends. My child was born Autistic and into poverty. Hers was not. There is a strong class element to the wider struggle of The ANPA. We are the mad poor, not the wealthy poor. Solidarity is how we survive, services are how we survive. Individualism, and capital, are not.
Nicole may have been among the people who brought ABA to Australia; Alison may be one of those fighting hard to establish it as the norm in the USA; but they will live to see it peter out and fade from significance.
I hope The ANPA is a small part of the healing wave that serves to wash it away. I hope my legacy is contributing to the end of this great harm to us as a people.
I hope also to be part of building something new, safe, and most importantly:
Liberated.
<3
[Image description: Dandelion seeds flying on the wind]
