this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2025
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I will argue that the mild part of the autism spectrum, what we call functional autism, is not a mental illness, not a disorder.
It's like being left handed, not the most common thing, it can cause troubles in a world made for right handed people, specially if being left handed is not accepted. But by itself is just another way of being just as "healthy" and "normal" as being right handed.
I think this is an open debate. Some folks prefer it being considered an illness because they want diagnosis and treatment. Others, like me, just love to be this way, and there's nothing I think is wrong with me. The only problem is that the world is not accommodated for people like me, just like it wasn't accommodated for left-handed people not so long ago. But as soon as it's 100% accepted as something normal I don't see it causing any trouble, so if there's no harm there's no illness we can talk about.
The tldr for this is Neurodiversity
Almost all disabilities exist only within the context of a culture. They are a human applied label.
I recon most disabled people can do more advanced complex tasks than any animal/pet. Yet we do don't think of our pets as disabled.
We are all born with a useless appendix, which can potentially burst and kill us. If someone was born without. Would we all have a disability compared to them.
Someone with only one arm is considered disabled, extra fingers? If its not the default it’s considered disabled.
Now imagine a humanoid alien race with only 1 arm and a hand with 6 fingers. And imagine what their keyboards may look like. A normal human in their society would be considered disabled. Not because you cant use the keyboard but because you would struggle using a tool not designed for you.
Now the reason why you still want a diagnosis even when you agree with the above is simple. Society has not evolved this perspective. We can accommodate almost all disabilities but they key to getting that help is by first bureaucratically “registering” yourself as disabled by a medical professional.
We din't need a register of left handed people to start making left handed scissors.
I think society can accommodate without the need for medicalize it. That's the difference I wanted to make, an illness need to be medicalized. A different way of being does not.
For instance, my lighter skin complexion makes so I have to wear more sunscreen that people with darker complexions. But no one would think of it as something to be medicalized. It's just "oh, I usually get burned by the sun, I better buy some sunscreen" or "oh, I'm left handed I better put my mouse in left handed mode", or "oh, I'm gay, I'd better go find someone of my same gender to love". Something like that. Simple, easy and widely accepted.
Forgive me for asking but are you actually left handed though?
Everywhere i go the default scissors are molded for right hand. On my job (which is very accommodating in a general sense) if you ask they have an additional shitty type which is still right handed in terms of the blades but at least the handle more symmetrical.
For computer mice, those aren’t usually very symmetrical anymore either. Especially if those extra side buttons seem useful there is exactly one on the entire market that i know. This is why the vast majority of lefties use their mouse right handed.
There have been very real situations at my job where could not accomplish a task alone because left handed tools where not available and i was just going to hurt myself. Same thing at home because left handed tools are rarely affordable but are just have to bite the bullet and hurt myself to get the job done.
Don't even get me started on walking in class room and seeing this:
And then they complain about lefties handwritten being bad.
We are tolerated and accommodation exists but these are still fairly new. My grandpa literally got beaten the left handness out of him. We still face daily disadvantages.
About your sunscreen, i am pretty sure if you would ask a doctor they could point you to the most appropriate sunscreen. My point was not to medicalize everything but to break the illusion of the medical perspective. People have different needs and they need those needs accommodated without unnecessary hoops to jump trough.
Of course neither left handed or fair skinned is of a similar complexity as neurodivergence or autism. Many accommodation i need for my autism are outside my price range, they will only give them to me if i first proof they are required. I disagree with the system but the system is all i got to work with.
Good scissors actually work either way. Blade-wise, that is, not when it comes to moulded handles: With proper blade geometry you do not need lateral pressure from the fingers for them to cut instead of passing each other, and even the exact "wrong" type of lateral pressure works fine. Scissor blades should only ever be loose when the scissors are opened impractically far to cut with. Don't need to be expensive, only need to be not cheap.
Those chairs should be outlawed for a whole lot of reasons, not just that they're ignoring lefties.
Note on handwriting, btw: Ball points are a bad habit if you want to develop proper technique, it's very easy to use too much force, cramp up, etc, even without noticing. Over here kids write with pencils until they have the dexterity to move on to fountain pens: Breaking a pencil tip and having to resharpen is just the right amount of annoying to develop good habits.
A note in left-handedness:
In primary school, I first learned to write with a pencil and then with a fountainpen, as you describe (I grew up in Europe). This has made no difference to my experience with writing whatsoever, because our language/cursive/alphabet is designed for right-handed people. I could talk for hours on the subject, but it would involve much swearing — I will spare you the pain. Just know that we should be writing top-to-bottom instead of left to write, and should re-design our alphabet, cursive, fountain pen nibs, and how we teach lefties to write.
The problem with “symmetrical” standard scissors is that you can’t see where you are making the cut properly.
Many lefties who are like me and got used to symmetrical scissors may not even be aware properly pointing blades make it easier of an angle to see what you’re doing.
Vision is the outlier on this. More people wear glasses than not. This of course goes both ways and in various degrees, but I think the average is slightly nearsighted. It's easily correctable, so nothing is done to make anything more easily accessible for vision impaired people.
However, neurodiversity is not easily correctable, so perhaps we ought to accept that with the rise in diagnosises that perhaps it's actually rather normal and adjust our expectations for what people can actually do, instead of calling a majority of people "sick".
I mean, look at attention disorders like ADHD. They're perfectly healthy and can do all kinds of stuff. They just can't do it for 8 hours straight between 9-17.. its the expectations that need to change. It's sick.
Absolutely! In fact, I'd argue that this is true for many conditions that we treat as disabilities, like dyslexia (which is rarely disabling) and the aforementioned autism. Both of these conditions have disadvantages and advantages. The situation is not black and white; simply because society was designed one way, does not mean that everyone who does not perfectly fit in is disabled or has a illness.
What’s an advantage of dyslexia?
Too much to cover in a comment! Here's a good book on the subject: https://www.dyslexicadvantage.org/
Edit: wait, that may be the wrong link. Here's the book I meant: https://www.amazon.com/Dyslexic-Advantage-Unlocking-Hidden-Potential/dp/0452297923 (sorry for using an Amazon link)
You could give one or two examples before the ad.
I was short on time but wanted to recommend a book that drastically changed my life and improved my mental health. I have no moral issues recommending it; one can always look up a summary, or easily read it free of cost using shadow libraries (not that I recommend that).
However, I will humor you, and include a short summary here:
Hope this helps.