Victim Blaming: A Sudden Realisation

The reason I write this blog is because it's a way to use my limited time and skills the best way I can in autism advocacy. Any dealings in the world of autism will inevitably cross over into the mental health world although autism in itself isn't a mental health condition - it's just a difference in brain structure. It can also cross over into the way people treat each other and the way we raise our kids. This week's blog post isn't directly about autism other than being about the personal experience of an autistic person, but it does address my treatment at school and the issues it has caused. It's something that I suddenly realised today (although there is a delay of a few weeks between me writing this post and its scheduled publishing date) and it's something that the more I think about it the more I'm really unhappy about it. That being the heavy level of victim blaming that I was put through during my school years.

As a kid I was always bullied. Badly. On the surface of it, it was mostly for being overweight but I think I might have mentioned in a previous post that although I was severely overweight I wonder whether I would have been bullied anywhere near as much if I was neurotypical. It's clear to me that nobody knew I was autistic at the time but I must have been outwardly "autistic enough" to show some sort of difference or weirdness, and although they couldn't pin it on anything specific as they didn't know I was autistic they still saw fit to harass me for it. Targeting my weight was just the most obvious and easiest way they could do that. Why else would the autistic fat kid get bullied when the neurotypical fat kids were all treated absolutely fine? I tried countless times to get help to stop the bullying but my school did nothing about it. I was simply told to ignore the bullies and they'll stop. So I ignored them. They didn't stop. There were at least a couple of times when the bullying got so bad and/or I'd put up with it for so long that I reached breaking point (which takes A LOT for me) and I snapped and I physically lashed out at the bullies. Each time I reached breaking point and got into a fight the school would tell my parents "I'm not surprised, it's been a long time coming" and even "It's been heartbreaking to watch how the other kids treat him." Yet they were happy to punish me after they sat back, watched the abuse that the other kids put me through and did absolutely nothing about it. These teachers at my school were the so-called responsible adults whose care I was under. This is neglect and victim blaming, and it's absolutely not OK in any way, shape or form. It wasn't OK at the time and it'll never be OK due to the lasting damage that it's done to me, even now 16 years after I left school (I'm 32 - that's half my life!).

Because of the victim blaming I was put through I now feel like everything is my fault, or at least is going to get turned around and used against me. If there's something I don't agree with or where I should put my point across I don't, simply because growing up I was always told to ignore these things, encouraged to bottle it up, and then punished when it caused me to lash out. What kind of message does that send to a child at school age? It does nothing but show that their thoughts, their feelings, their opinions don't matter, and that when they reach out for help they'll either be ignored or have it turned around against them. If I'm completely honest I don't know which is worse. And yet people always wonder why I'm the quiet one and keep myself to myself. Your childhood is where you and your view of the world are shaped in preparation for adulthood. If your school can't (or in my case won't) set you up properly for adulthood then not only is it setting you up for failure in later life, but the school itself is failing in its duty of care.

I've always had a hard enough time talking to people and building relationships since I'm autistic but my experience at school certainly didn't help matters. The vast majority of my bullies at school were boys and I'm convinced that this is the reason I've always got on a lot better with girls. In fact, I'd even go as far as saying that I often feel intimidated by men to a certain degree, especially the ones who are overly laddish, macho and full of bravado. I would also partly blame this for my difficulty in forming romantic relationships as well. Because I always got on better with the girls I almost always found myself friend zoned when I hoped for something more. I'll leave the relationship side of it there because I've already addressed it in my previous post on Sexuality. Feel free to check it out if you want to delve deeper.

I have to wonder if things would have been different had it been known I was autistic. Both my primary and secondary school were equally guilty of ignoring the bullying that I went through, but looking back I think there was 1 teacher at my primary school who went as far as bullying me himself. I can't remember much about that part of my life but what I do remember is how he made it obvious that he didn't like me. I remember being put in detention a lot specifically by him although I really can't remember the reasons for it, and I'm not convinced that I knew/understood the reasons at the time. Based on what I can remember I think he probably just didn't like me because I was different, and I'm guessing that there was something I used to do that he saw as acting out when in fact it was most likely just autistic child behaviour. Either way, the way he treated me as well as the way my bullying was handled were unacceptable. I can't help thinking about whether this would have happened if the schools knew I was autistic? Would both primary and secondary schools have done more to protect me if they knew I was autistic? But then on the other hand, would an autism diagnosis have just given the bullies 1 more thing to target me for and made things worse? Would school have done more to establish and accommodate my needs outside of the bullying if they knew?

It's a shame that these questions will never be answered, and it's even more shameful that my experience at school has left me with these scars that I'll have for the rest of my life when they could have easily been prevented. It's strange how I never even thought about it this deeply until I saw a post on Twitter recently about a school that was guilty of victim blaming and it resonated with me so much. It's also strange how even though I always knew what happened at school it never really occurred to me how bad it really was until it got given the name victim blaming. I really wish that there was something I could do about it in terms of the specific schools I went to, but at least by blogging about my experience as well as about autism as a whole I'm raising awareness and educating so that hopefully the same kind of thing doesn't happen to other people.

It's been a bit of an emotional one this week but I hope it's helped put some things into perspective and helped your understanding. As always, feel free to comment if you've got any thoughts to share, and don't forget to follow the blog with the "Subscribe" button at the top of the page as well as following me on Twitter @DepictDave.

5 Gifts For Autistics

Christmas is only 68 sleeps away and whenever people ask me what I want for Christmas or birthdays I've never known what I wanted, but since being diagnosed autistic I've come to realise that there are quite a few different things that I could do with. This could be either because it's beneficial, or just because I like it. So here's a list of a few ideas that you could buy for the autistic in your life. Please also be aware that this post contains Amazon Associate links, which means that if you purchase the items via the links I will earn a small commission. The exception to this is the very first link, which is to Chewigem, not Amazon, so it's not part of any affiliate program.

Chew Toys
Last Christmas is where I really started to realise that I had a problem with chewing. When I say "problem" I only mean in the sense that because I'd never had a chew toy at that point I resorted to biting my fingers and left them in a pretty bad state. At the time I didn't know what was available for a chewing need like mine, so I asked in a Facebook group and people suggested a few different places. The one I ended up going with was Chewigem who sell a whole variety of chew toys as well as other things like noise cancelling ear plugs for example. I'll leave the link here for the button necklace I've got from them, but obviously it's best to have a look at their full range and see what you/the person your buying for might prefer. One bit of advice to bear in mind is that each chewable item they sell shows the durability, flexibility and firmness of the item you're looking at. You'll need to check these to make sure you get a chewer that's right for you/them. I didn't know about this when I ordered my first chewer and got one that I chewed through pretty quickly because I'm a heavier chewer than I realised.

[Image description: My button necklace chew toy. It's circular and grey with a scaly pattern. The cord is black with a clasp in the middle and wrapped around in a circle-shape. The cord is tied to the chew toy through a small hole near the edge. The whole thing is sat on a wooden table.]

Fidget Toys
Some of Chewigem's items do cross over into the fidget category, but when I say fidget toys I mean things like fidget spinners, fidget cubes, stress balls, squishy putty and a whole lot more. One of my mutuals on Twitter posted a short video of her playing with some Thinking Putty which caught my eye as it looks great to play with. Another mutual uploaded a link to an Infinity Cube which also looks fun. There's a picture down below, and the link to the pictured Infinity Cube is here.

[Image description: A black Infinity Cube on a white background. The cube resembles a 4x4 Rubik's Cube and all the segments are joined by small hinges so that it can be unfolded, separated and played with.]

Sensory Aids

Depending on the needs or preferences of the autistic person you're buying for they may need any of a number of items to help with their sensory needs, and a lot of them fall within a reasonable gifting price range. The most common things are sunglasses and sound cancelling headphones but autistics can have a whole host of sensory issues so it's worth speaking to the person you're buying for if you're not sure what sensory preferences they have. It could be something as simple as loose fitting clothing for example.

[Image description: Sunglasses shown from the front on a plain background. The frames are thick and black, and the lenses are tinted blue.]

Weighted Blanket

This one tends to be quite expensive, but they can be quite helpful to a lot of people, not just autistics. My weighted blanket definitely helps me sleep, which is something I need since I work late and get up early with the kids. In fact, ever since my wife bought me it as an early birthday present a few months ago I've slept under it every night instead of our duvet. She got me it in the middle of summer when it's been quite warm, but I'm sure I'll use it a bit more in winter when I could do with a blanket while I work or while I play video games. My wife got me it quite cheap (we're talking under £30, as opposed to the usual hundreds) from a shop on Amazon that was quite new so they obviously wanted to get their foot in the door and some good ratings on the page. It's gone up in price since then as the shop gained more traction, but you can find my specific blanket here.

[Image description: My weighted blanket laid out neatly across my bed. It's a king-size bed with stripy, flowery bedding in grey and white. The blanket is dark grey with a soft and slightly fluffy top side.]

Special Interest Gifts

This one is pretty obvious, but any autistic loved one would be over the moon any gifts related to their special interest. Everyone has different interests but mine is professional wrestling. Last year one of the presents my wife got me for Christmas was a Becky Lynch action figure after I saw one in a shop and posted a picture of it on Twitter. This went alongside the John Cena figure I already had, and since then I've added Tyler Breeze and Alexa Bliss to the small collection. I'd be more than happy with almost any wrestling-related gifts. The kid in me would love a replica Universal Championship belt, but they're far too expensive and we've got nowhere to put one so that's not going to happen.

[Image description: The photo of the Becky Lynch figure that I posted on Twitter. It's from the Elite Collection and is from before her "The Man" gimmick as she's wearing her steampunk gear in the form of a long, black coat and brown top hat with goggles and a feather attached to it.]

These are my 5 gift ideas that you could buy for your autistic loved one(s). With any luck it's been helpful and given you some inspiration if you've been stuck on what to buy for them. As always, don't forget to follow me by hitting the "Subscribe" button at the top of the page, or on Twitter @DepictDave. It helps me out a lot!

Pablo Thinks Differently

This week I wanted to talk about something that I could have included in my Autistic Parenting post the other week, but didn't think about it until afterwards. It's something that with being both autistic and a parent I feel strongly in support of. That being the kids' TV show Pablo on CBeebies (or RTÉ Jr in reland).

The show follows the adventures of an autistic 7 year-old named Pablo as he tries to tackle life's difficulties from an autistic perspective with the help of his animal friends in his imaginary art world. The show starts and ends with live-action footage and has a cartoon animated middle portion as Pablo enjoys drawing and it's the animal characters and art world that he draws that help him work through his problems. Each of his animal friends represents a different autistic trait as alluded to by the theme song:

Ren is a canary who represents stimming - mainly in the form of flapping as she's a bird.

Noasaurus (often shortened to Noa) is a dinosaur who represents the anxiety that often comes with autism.

Draff is a giraffe and represents the intense interests and hyper focus side of autism through his knowledge about lots of things and his catchphrase "In point of fact."

Tang is an orangutan who represents difficulty reading cues and social awkwardness. He's also quite clumsy which is common in autistics.

Mouse is a mouse (as the name implies) who represents hypersensitivity to sensory input.

Llama (again, as the name implies) is a llama who represents echolalia. She doesn't have any of her own lines but repeats bits of what the other characters say.

Pablo has an all-autistic cast, which is a first in TV history. The aim of the show is to humanise autism to its target audience (children from 0 to 6 years) and shows Pablo dealing with his problems in a way that children can understand so as to increase understanding and acceptance. For example, the episode "The Fiona" shows Pablo meeting his mum's friend Fiona and trying to process and piece together all the parts of her appearance to work out who she is. His hyper focus makes him see her curly ginger hair, her bright green top and its big red buttons etc. My favourite part of this episode is while everyone tries to work out "What's a Fiona?" Llama is seen bouncing around repeating "Fiona, Fiona, Fiona, Fiona..." The point that the show gets across is that Pablo tackles all of his problems himself and works out a solution in the end, showing that autistics are not only autonomous but also capable of making decisions and problem solving for ourselves. This is driven home even more by the fact that although Pablo is completely verbal in his art world, in the real world he is rarely verbal. In fact, in the whole of series 1 I think he's only been given 2 lines in the real world segments but I could be wrong about that.

All in all I think Pablo as a TV show is a fantastic concept that's much needed in today's world, and the execution of is brilliant from all involved. I would highly recommend checking it out, even if you don't have kids! If you're interested in autism at all it can give a good insight into an autistic child's mind. Series 2 started this past Monday, and it's also on Netflix so there's plenty of opportunity to have a look at it.

So that's my post about Pablo. Not the longest post I've written but it would have just been added onto the Autistic Parenting post had I thought of it at the time. As always, don't forget to click the "Follow" button in the side bar and the "Subscribe" button at the top, as well as following me on Twitter @DepictDave.

The Term "Asperger's"

Asperger's Syndrome has been a controversial term in the autism world for a while now. Because of this controversy it's being phased out slowly from the medical diagnosis model of autism, and therefore eventually from the autistic community as a whole. Before I was diagnosed just 10 months ago (exactly 10 months today, in fact) I identified and self-diagnosed as an aspie. The reason for this is because I was still quite early into my journey of learning about the world of autism that I'd unknowingly been a part of for over 31 years prior to diagnosis. And it was also because although I'd heard of the disturbing truth about Hans Asperger which I'll get onto shortly, I tend to avoid big and heavy topics like that so I didn't look into it much until recently.

I considered myself to be a person with Asperger's Syndrome due to the misconception that Asperger's is essentially "high-functioning autism" and as far as I could tell I didn't have any particular sensory needs or atypical thought processes, and in social terms I must have been able to pass for neurotypical otherwise surely I'd have been been diagnosed a lot younger than 31, right? I always struggled with my social skills (or lack thereof) and found it hard to make friends and build relationships when my peers always seemed to do it naturally and effortlessly. I always felt different because of that but I always just put it down to being shy. In reality, functioning and grading labels such as "high/low functioning" or "severe/mild" autism are inaccurate. The bottom line is that if you're autistic you're autistic. Functioning labels only serve to express how other people experience your autism. So if you're like me and slipped under the radar until well into adulthood you'd be classed by most of society as high functioning when in fact you're no more or less autistic than somebody who might have severe (read: noticeable) sensory difficulties or someone who is unable to live independently. There are no different levels of autism, it's just that everybody is different so their autism will manifest in different ways - some more externally obvious than others. It's this increase in understanding of how functioning labels are irrelevant that initially lead to Asperger's being phased out. When I was finally diagnosed in December the diagnosis given to me was the umbrella term of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and it was briefly explained to me about Asperger's and functioning labels being no longer used.

Now this is where it gets a bit heavy as we start to look at the other - possibly more urgent - reason for Asperger's being faded out. Asperger's Syndrome was named after the Austrian doctor Hans Asperger who was closely involved with autism in children during the 1930's and 40's. I want to first state that it's undeniable that without some of the work that Asperger did we wouldn't have the diagnostic criteria that we have today, and as a knock-on effect we most likely wouldn't have the understanding and acceptance of autism that we have today. That's not to say that society's understanding and acceptance of autism is anywhere near where it needs to be, but it certainly would be a lot worse without Asperger's work. With that said, there is a very, very dark side to the work he did. It was brought to light in a report early last year by Herwig Czech of Vienna's Medical University that Hans Asperger was heavily involved in the Nazi regime. While on the surface he maintained an image of a hero and saviour to many autistic and disabled children, it turned out that underneath this image was a horrible and vile supporter of the Nazi's eugenics program meaning that he strove to create a genetically uniform society eliminating perceived weakness and disability. Asperger was responsible for sending children into a euthanasia program who were deemed unfit to live or who were considered a burden. These children were the ones who weren't seen as valuable enough to train and recruit as soldiers into the Nazi regime.

Presumably, his public image of being a saviour to autistic kids comes partly from him working closely with the ones he kept alive. Their recruitment must have been presented in a way that made it look like he was giving them purpose and a place in life, when in fact it was those individuals who appeared to be lacking in things like empathy or emotion, and those who were easily controlled who were the ones recruited - their qualities theoretically making them perfect soldiers. They were obviously used by the Nazis for their own gains and with no concern over whether these autistics were killed during the war effort.

So that's briefly the dark history of Hans Asperger and the origin of his Syndrome. This post is not to say that identifying as an aspie is wrong in any way. In fact far from it. Although Asperger's Syndrome is a phrase that's considered to be tainted by many people, at the end of the day it's down to each individual as to whether they identify as Aspergic (if that's even a word?) or not. There is no right or wrong answer and a lot of people who were diagnosed with Asperger's would prefer to stick by the diagnosis given to them, whereas a lot of others have most likely stopped identifying that way and started identifying as autistc. Realistically there is no difference as I discussed earlier. Some may choose to see the positives in Asperger's work that lead us to where we are today, and others may choose to see the negatives in his Nazi affiliation. I guess it's the dilemma of separating the art from the artist. A bit like after the Michael Jackson documentary Leaving Neverland aired on Channel 4, it left lots of people pondering whether it's still ok to listen to Michael's music because at the end of the day he was a brilliant musician despite the horrible things he did behind closed doors. It's definitely a grey area but it's all down to personal perspective and preference, and the purpose of me writing this is to provide information so that you can all make your own minds up.

I hope this post has been informative and interesting for you. Please make sure to hit the "Subscribe" button at the top of the page to keep up to date with all my posts. Equally, make sure to follow me on Twitter @DepictDave for more content.

[Image description: Black and white photo of Hans Asperger sat at a desk with papers in front of him. He appears to be explaining something, indicated by his hand gesture where they're held out slightly in front of his face.]