@actuallyautistic
I had an interesting conversation with a good friend about states that require diagnosis of #autism to be registered with the state and the future implications this could have paired with laws that restrict access to care for #autistic people. I’m only familiar with a couple of states that require registration and that’s New Jersey and North Dakota. #audhd
How does one go about screening and hiring new carers? We've never asked anyone who Flip didn't already know well to help at home or watch him while we go out, and all but one of them still live back in Wellington.
I'm nervous about the prospect, and while R likes visitors, separation transitions are touchy; it was often an anxious time even when we went out and left him with friends for a few hours on weekends.
I wanted to share a couple of the violent and homophobic responses I received after talking about my spouse of 20 years. We are an Out, Queer, Neurodivergent couple—this will not be the first or the last time I receive comments like this. This sort of behavior is not acceptable and the community should be aware of these screen names. #queer#lgbtqia#pride#autistic#adhd
My queer platonic partner Luke and I are both trans, neurodivergent, and disabled. We are currently homeless and living out of our van with our two cats.
We are in need of mutual aid donations to help us be able to afford food, gas, and other necessities, along with our phone bill on the 4th of $100.
I'm trying to put together a short list of the basic concepts that are essential to understanding the #ActuallyAutistic experience of life. These can be helpful for explaining things to allistics/neurotypicals, but also for seeing ourselves from our own perspective instead of how we are failed NTs. I think it's just a few (albeit big) concepts. Here's my basic list:
#AskingAutistics Do you have your own short list of concepts for understanding or explaining #autism? What are the big ideas that shape your experience of #autistic life?
Almost unilaterally, non-autistic people began describing themselves in terms of their relationships to others– if they were a parent, a spouse, what their career was, where they lived, what their religion is, and what their roles were related to others (sister to a Senator, military brat, pastor’s wife, soccer mom, etc.).
And, almost unilaterally, #Autistic people described themselves as what they loved to do, what their values were, and what they had experienced. Many even said this, having intuited the basis of the theory. Among the answers were, “I am a verb,” or “I am what I love,” or “Who I am is what I do.” Autistics would answer, “Lover of Justice,” or “Dreamer,” or “One who values autonomy.” Some would describe themselves as a “lover of” or “obsessed with” an intense passion, like trains, lichen and fungi, or theoretical physics and black holes.'
What a beautiful, wise and heartfelt article by Holly Smale on why #autistic people can find it so difficult to date. It's a minefield for NTs; add the stress of masking and the fear of showing who you "really" are, and it's easy to see why many people give up. Big love to Holly and to every #neurodivergent person finds it hard to find "the one" ❤️
ps - I wouldn't normally link to the Mail, but I thought the article's worth it!
Hallo! I’m trying to get a bit more social interaction in my life, so here I am writing an #introduction post on #Mastodon. :moogle_peek:
I’m Jaden (though I go by different names in different circles :bulbasaur_confused:). I have a silly potato (@nuz) and a silly sausage (#sillyDoggy). I’m fairly socially awkward, a bit #autistic and very #ADHD. :ms_neurodiversity: Sometimes I say very little and sometimes I say a whole heck of a lot, depending on the topic. I’ll probably be posting random facts or videos that I find particularly cool/amusing~ :cat_wow:
I love science (and have a PhD in #physics, but was it really worth it? :frog_think:) and maker videos that try to bring comic books and fiction to life (shoutout to #Hacksmith and #JLazerVideos, amazing folks)! I also really love technology (in particular, I really like #LTT / #LinusTechTips, although I know he can be a bit problematic :shiba_hide:).
I'm also an avid video gamer! :gaming_love: I play a lot of #RPG, #Survival, and #Automation games. Some of the ones that I've really enjoyed and/or played recently are:
Feel free to say hello, boost, follow, or any combo of the above! I'd love to make new friends on here, but I feel awkward a lot, so I might just end up favoriting your posts if I can't figure out what to say :panda_derp: (but I appreciate you nonetheless! :blob_heart:)
First off, @evan sees this from the perspective of someone who's co-authored #ActivityPub. It's his job to spur and enable adoption -- and that's something he's done exceptionally well for 20 years. Of course he wants to help Meta abide by open standards. Which, even if you dislike Meta, you would hope they would do.
My perspective is as one who is building products that compete with Meta. Ideally, I would like people who use Meta to migrate away from there and instead use #Calckey, #GreatApe, and the numerous options available on #SpaceHost.
But even from the perspective of a competitor, I want interoperability with #Barcelona. And even more, I want interoperability based on open standards.
Yes, yes, yes -- "embrace, extend, extinguish". At this point, that phrase is a broken record.
But every time that phrase comes up, I keep asking folks: when has the "extinguish" part of "embrace, extend, extinguish" ever worked?
People say #RSS, but RSS is still here and I use it every day. Hell, Calckey even has an RSS widget and it works like a charm. RSS is not extinguished.
People also say #XMPP, but I can run an XMPP server right now -- no problems. People say XMPP "died" because it's no longer as popular now, but is it because Meta and Google dropped support, or is it because Slack, Discord, Signal, WhatsApp, and even Matrix have come along to eclipse it in popularity? Regardless, even if XMPP is no longer so popular, it's not extinguished.
The most ludicrous example of "extinguish" people bring up is Gmail's dominance of email. But email is the most popular communications technology we have today, even though it's 50 years old. What's more, look at the raw stats. Gmail is only 18% of the email server market -- that's no monopoly. Go have a look at the stats for yourselves:
The pessimistic notion that we will "lose" by allowing Meta to interoperate with ActivityPub -- again, an open standard -- just doesn't convince me. In fact, if Meta is adopting standard ActivityPub, I think "losing" is impossible.
With Meta adopting ActivityPub, we're not losing. We're winning. We're not conceding to Meta by adopting their proprietary APIs for interoperability. They're conceding to us by adopting ActivityPub.
Again, I'm not saying you should all federate with #Barcelona. I'm saying that Meta adopting an open standard that allows for interoperability is a win because, remember, they're adopting our standard. We're not adopting theirs.
Some also ask, "But what if Meta does a bait-and-switch and drops ActivityPub support?"
Well, there's kind of precedence for that.
Not enough people realize this, but Google once adopted the predecessor of ActivityPub. Specifically, they used OStatus for Google Buzz. Certainly, like many Google products, Google Buzz shuttered.
But the development for an open social media protocol lived on, and we all use what was developed right now.
No doubt, if Barcelona becomes Meta's Google Buzz, ActivityPub will live on. It will still be developed. We'll keep using it.
In the meantime, I'll consider ways to help Meta users migrate to platforms that I believe are better.
> Of course he wants to help Meta abide by open standards. Which, even if you dislike Meta, you would hope they would do.
I mentioned it before, this is the disconnect between the #1stGen (2008–2015) and #2ndGen (2016–Present) #Fediverse users.
Us, 1st Gen, our concern is to bring the down the walls and enable a decentralised and federated #SocialWeb. The idea itself is older than the fediverse, there were many names involved and who pioneered the pushed for it and are now forgotten.
Even me, to this day, I do welcome them federating even if they already did something EEE-like before (for example, FB Messenger federating and then defederating from #xmpp).
While I do want people to migrate over to a fediverse service made for it by developers who believes in it, the main goal is still to bring down the walls, and get them to federate … permanently.
It's why I also I welcome #Flickr and #Tumblr into the fold (and waiting for them to do so).
And for someone like me who was banned from #Instagram for no reason at all other than because I am #Autistic (I rarely use my Instagram, and when I do, it was to upload a work of mine, so clearly there were no violations), having them federate would enable me to communicate with Instagram users once again.
Please tell people about this, it really helps me out!
My book "The New Normal: Autistic musings on the threat of a broken society" is currently available on kindle on the UK and US for ⅓ of it's usual price.
You can use the links below to get it. If not, a share is appreciated.
#NicheSupportGroup idea: meeting for quiet people who were reprimanded a few hundred too many times for being "rude" as a child, and as a result are terrified of conversations.
I find the conversation around autism awareness versus autism acceptance interesting. I'm still mulling it over, trying to understand why they are presented as opposing views. I feel like awareness is at one end of the continuum, with acceptance on the other. You do not always have to understand something to respect it, but you need to know it exists to accept and appreciate it with intention. Do you have any thoughts on this? #audhd#autistic#autism
Do you think that your shutdown could be controlled in any way?
Like a "controlled shutdown"? (I probably don't know what I'm talking about since many things in the #ActuallyAutistic community I still don't know about...it's been at least more than 10 years being diagnosed #Autistic and ie. I still don't completely understand what a #stim is and I think I've began grasping some things in me that I could think of as "#stims")
Thank you so much for the $25 and $100 donations for shelter!!! 💖
Can anyone match either of these? 🙏🏻
After rent our most urgent goals are our pain, psych, & seizure meds ($200 for both of ours), groceries ($100), our storage unit + late fees ($100), and our phone bill ($55)! 😟
Please keep boosting, y'all rock, thank you so much!!! 🥺