7:51am May 13, 2014

Allistic

When you say allistic to mean nonautistic…

What you’re actually saying, is that autistic means self-oriented and that its opposite means other-oriented. So you’re saying that autistic people are essentially self-centered, and that nonautistic people are other-centered.

You may not actually know that, because you may not know that aut means self and all means other. But that’s precisely how they came up with the word. I was there. As in, I was actually there, arguing against it, from the beginning of the time that the word was first thought up and propagated.

I understand, more than most people who talk about language on tumblr, that language moves on and that most people who use language aren’t thinking about its origins, or even aware of its origins.

But before you ever use the word allistic, remember how it was created. Remember that if the person had wanted to coin a word with less offensive connotations, then they could have. Then make your own decisions.

I will never, ever use it. Ever. Because I am extremely offended by the idea that autistic people are more self-oriented, self-centered, or selfish than nonautistic people, and that nonautistic people are therefore more other-oriented, other-centered, or aware of others. These are not generalizations that stand up to anything.

I’ll use autistic because it’s the only word we’ve got, and because practically nobody who uses it these days thinks too hard about where the word came from. But allistic is a neologism, it was coined for a purpose, and its connotations are entirely deliberate. You won't ever catch me using that word, because I couldn’t agree less with what it means.

Fortunately nonautistic has been around longer than allistic has, means the same thing, and isn’t offensive, not to mention more people can tell what you’re actually trying to say.

Understand I’m not telling you what words you have to use. If you’re going to continue using allistic, that’s fine with me. I’m just explaining, in detail, why I not just don't use the word allistic, but find the entire premise behind the word offensive.

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