2:18am April 8, 2013

I can’t even fathom this right now.

There are people out there who actually think that the autistic community created the ‘myth’ that autistic people (like other disabled people, like other developmentally disabled people, etc.) are singled out to be killed.

I just… I can’t. Not right now. And I can’t imagine what imaginary world a person has to live in to miss the fact that these things happen to us all the time and specifically because we are disabled. This isn’t the first time it’s happened to me it’s not the first time I’ve seen it happen to a disabled person including an autistic person. And I’m undoubtedly one of the people she’d blame for “creating that myth”, I.e. reporting what I see, because I’m one of a few people who were extremely extremely concerned with making sure people knew about this, back in the day.

Idk. It’s late I’m exhausted and I’m on a bedpan and I can’t explain what’s going through my head right now. I just survived an attempt to make sure I die. Maybe not through overt violence but attempts to dissuade me from getting life saving medical care are still violence no matter how you slice it. And I can’t just say oh this would have happened to anyone disabled or not because its not fucking true.

This happened to me specifically because I’m disabled.

Because I’m autistic, because I’m physically disabled, because I have chronic illness and chronic pain, because I present to a lot of doctors as a worthless “retard” whether they claim to praise my intellect or not. Autistic people are an intimate part of the concept of a “retard” just as people with intellectual disabilities, cerebral palsy, and a few other things are. Being perceived as a “retard” is a great way to get killed in all kinds of ways.

This is real, people. For people who only believe shit they find in studies, look up stuff by Dick Sobsey, it’s been studied to fricking death. Autistic people aren’t unique in this way, but disabled people in general are the whole of it, and autistic people are part of a loose grouping of disabled people who are specifically targeted and singled out more than other disabled people might be.

To deny this is to make sure it keeps happening. I sometimes wish I had led the kind of life that would even make denying it possible. I can’t imagine it. I can’t imagine that kind of safety. I wish everyone had that kind of safety. And yet I wish nobody tried to convince people that the safety exists when it doesn’t.

This isn’t just a matter of semantics like so many debates are. There are dead bodies embedded in this one. I don’t want to become one of them so I can’t afford not to be aware of the dangers. Not to live in constant fear, but to be able to plan for them and fight them.

Autistic people, developmentally disabled people, anyone who’s been contained within the concept “retard” (which isn’t a diagnosis or a test score, it’s a way of looking at a person), that’s one high risk category among disabled people.

Getting a feeding tube puts me in another high risk category of disabled people. Because once you have a feeding tube, people consider that a form of artificial life support. It’s the first part of the living will where I was asked if I’d rather die than have it. People use it to put ppl in nursing homes, where we die more easily. People treat it as an optional medical treatment rather than an alternate way of eating. You become a little more expendable.

And just to confuse the issue as an autistic and otherwise disabled person they did their best to talk me out of a feeding tube because that would be saving my life and no point doing that.

Which is a form of killing even though they do their best not to admit it. And you bet it happened partly because I’m autistic and most of the rest of it around disability too.

Thanks to everyone who helped ensure I got the tube btw.

I’m rambling. It’s late. I don’t know how to say what I’m thinking. But this idea, this weird story that its all a myth and we are all safe and just like want to think we aren’t of something, that’s very dangerous. You can’t protect yourself if you don’t know the ranges. And we are in danger. Some of us more than others of course. And in different ways. But the danger is there. And it’s all tied in with disability in general, not specific to autism, but autism is part of a cluster of types of disabled people who are very likely to be the target of all this.

Problem is its complicated because .. These are words, and what I’m trying to say isn’t words, and I’m tired, and in pain, and physically uncomfortable in other ways. You can’t make nice neat categories like autistic people and apply things across the board. But yes yes yes yes yes we are at higher risk of killing this is not even debatable. Both outright murder and more socially acceptable ways, ones most people don’t know now to look for, still just as deadly, sometimes more so. Can’t imagine now many disabled people been talked out of the treatment that is saving my life at the moment. Not coincidence it’s disabled people.

Anyway I’m going to stop talking in circles and hopefully something I’ve said will make sense because I can’t make myself think in words.

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