I’ve recently given up consuming the news. I’d been thinking about it for a while, and then the Guardian’s mobile website made the choice for me when it backed me into a corner and said ‘accept all of our cookies or buy a subscription’.

Cookies. What a friendly word for such an insidious invention. No thanks Grauniad.

As someone who would rather throw themselves in a skip that read the majority of British media, I’m left with nothing. I’ve always wanted to feel clued up, in the know, on the pulse of what’s going on in the world. And for what exactly? So I could feel my blood pressure climb, or worry about my eyes rolling too far and sticking? Nah, in all honesty it has felt good to be a bit ignorant these past few months. Yes, I know, it’s not good to be disengaged. How can I resist if I do not know what I am supposed to be resisting? But for now, I realised my brain needed a break. A mini-retirement, as the tech bros call it (it’s literally a holiday, you twats).

As an autistic person who thinks about autism far more than they reasonably should, this forced vacation from the daily news has given me time to think about how journalists write about autism and neurodiversity as a whole. It’s not good, folks.

I know we all know this, but I’ll just say it. Journalists do not know what autism is. Seriously, google ‘autism’ and read the smorgasbord of laughable misinterpretations and assumptions. I’m not going to link any of the trash examples I have read, I don’t want to give them clicks and advertising money.

If you were someone with no knowledge and you read an article about autism in the British media, you might be led to believe at least some of the following:

• Autism is a mental illness.

  Autism is not a mental illness. Autism describes the way some people perceive and interact with the world, which is different from most other people.

• Autistic people cannot have mental illnesses.

  You can be autistic and have a mental illness. The two are not mutually exclusive, nor are they one and the same. You can be autistic and have great mental health. However statistically, autistic people are more likely to experience poor mental health owing to, well, everything about living in a world not designed for autistic people.

• Autism is a learning disability.

  Wrong. According to Autistica, about 1 in 3 autistic people have a learning disability. (While we’re on the subject, we desperately more people with lived experience of both autism and a learning disability to be seen and heard in the media.)

• Autism is something that needs to be cured and a cure is most certainly a good thing. In fact, for many it is the end goal.

  I don’t think I need to warrant this with an actual reply. I know Space Karen has been Sieg Heiling all over the show for the last few months but his passion for eugenics should stay firmly inside his Neuralink chip. Autism is not an illness.

• We should feel really sorry for autistic people (or as they write it: people with autism).

  The deficit-based view of autism needs to die a death yesterday. Sure, autism is absolutely not without many challenges day in day out and they range in intensity from individual to individual. But we do not need your pity, it is completely redundant. Instead, we need your understanding, co-operation and empathy.

• Only children are really autistic and adults are making it up.

  I was a child who couldn’t start a conversation, had a set routine when eating my lunch everyday and who could not stand it when my mum used a certain type of detergent on my clothes because the smell would make me want to be sick. I grew up. I’m now an adult finds it exceptionally difficult to start a conversation (progress!), has a set routine when eating my lunch everyday and who can’t stand it if I accidentally buy and use a certain type of detergent on my clothes because the smell makes me want to be sick.

  
  I grew up. I’m still here. We grow up. We are still here and always will be.

Also, my personal favourite:

• The words ‘autism’ and ‘neurodiverse’ are interchangeable.

  Notice I wrote ‘neurodiverse’. Journalists absolutely cannot get their heads around the concept of ‘neurodivergence’ and how even neurotypicals are ‘neurodiverse’. We are all neurodiverse, that’s what diversity means. No, instead journalists look at the word ‘neurodiversity’ and think ‘Ah, that seems like a nice, palatable, cleansed word for autism. I’ll use that instead.’ Forgetting of course the myriad other neurotypes that fall under the banner of neurodiversity and neurodivergence.

  This constant use of ‘neurodiverse’ also leads people to infer that autism is a dirty word and something to be ashamed of. When you mean autism, say autism.

I’m tired.

One more thing, Mr/Ms Journalist (I’d put Mx but honestly non binary people wouldn’t do this shit). Stop saying we ‘suffer’ from autism.

Do you know what I suffer from? Late stage capitalism.

Until next time,

Ren

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