I phrased it the way I did not because of my following - not because of the internet - not because of some special way I had to frame it - but because I was being cognizant of others opinions on the subject and know that my opinion is only mine. This is anthropology at is core
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No I mean, I think I actually mean something different. Like my audience actually does not interpret things in the damaging way you're trying to protect against. I think you and I are coming from two extremely different schools of thought here.
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I mean ..... based on what I was seeing from some of your followers and people defending you on here, it sounds like they don’t understand the problematic nature of it.... because they are not apart of the group of people you’re talking about...?
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This is sort of central? I can feel myself getting frustrated at Twitter cause the things I properly want to explain will take up a lot of space. But I think your point is highlighting part of why I'm standing by what I'm doing.
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Wait which point? do you mean it’s central that your followers are majority abled and that’s part of why you’re posting things likethis? I don’t get how that makes it ok to torment others who aren’t your followers tho?
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But see there's this concept of 'torment' that I'm really careful to agree is happening. My understanding of an accusation like this is that it's a complicated minefield and historically has often been used in ways I strongly disagree with.
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As in, I came out of a very religious community who used similar concepts about 'causing pain' and 'hurting us' when the thing I was doing was just expressing my ideas. And like... they weren't wrong, but I learned that I need to have boundaries around that.
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That just because someone tells me I'm hurting them doesn't mean I'm... actually hurting them? Or, I am, but in the same way I hurt my old religious community, which is something that's an unfortunate side effect but I'm not going to change my behavior to appease them.
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So when I hear people on twitter saying "stop you're hurting us", how am I supposed to tell this apart from the arguments the religious people made to try to control me?
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At the very base of this - Please don’t think those of us offering criticisms are trying to control you - we aren’t - we are hoping you’ll hear us and consider what we are saying. Ultimately religious identity is a choice, and being autistic or having a genetic condition is not.
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Right, but my point here is not whether or not it's a choice, my point is that people are telling me that harm is being done, but I consider that harm to be a necessary aspect of my self expression.
I've gone public in other spheres about my leaving the faith and similarly got-
-a huge amount of emails from christians trying to tell me that I was wrong, that I needed to listen to them, that I needed to stop saying these things.
And like... no. I believe what I believe and I'm going to keep expressing my ideas on the world and my experiences of it.
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Much as I'm not *actually* hurting the religous people; I'm not punching them, removing their rights, burning their houses down, I'm also not *actually* hurting the autistic people. The pain they feel, while real and valid, comes out of *their* perspective on the world.
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Ah there is a lot of unpack here.... I didn’t think your point was about if it’s a choice, I was trying to give you some context as to why those two groups of people are different and that difference often lies in that one could leave the faith, we can not stop being different