Your view makes sense and you’re free to believe it.
But many others have different views.
For example the comment of whoisearth described a negative experience with overinclusion. Their view is valid and to be considered.
You answered with “let’s just not try and gatekeep and we’re on the same page”, simply ignoring their point and asking them to unconditionally adopt your view.
You are free to only consider your view and ignore or even discredit others (as “gatekeeping”).
But do not act like you represent us.
Thanks. I just want to clarify on some things which might be obscure since autism and all:
- I accept that whoisearth made these experiences but I don’t come to the same conclusion.
simply ignoring their point and unconditionally adopting your view
No. That is not what I said. It just does not make sense to me to draw a conclusion like that from this experience. Also, the „silent masses“ is not an argument, no sources have been cited and it is an anecdotal fallacy. (I.e.: I made this experience so this is representative)
If you google „autism self diagnosis valid“ you will find many articles stating that in general, self diagnosis is a way of dealing with the very limited resources in autism healthcare and considered a more helpful strategy at this point.
We are talking about people harming themselves or worse because they are helpless and don’t know what to do. Gatekeeping cost’s lives.
Also, if someone wants to challenge me, attack the idea that invalidating self diagnosis is gatekeeping (which will probably fail) and not me personally because it shows lack of character.
The summary of this imo is that the experience of parents to autistic children to late/undiagnosed autistic adults could not be more different and we should probably just leave our pent up emotions at home and try to find common ground and accept eachother. What happens otherwise (which we have seen) is two sides usually living in their echo chambers and disresprecting the other side when they come in contact.
It’s pretty impossible for me to explain autistic thinking of an adult to anyone not on the spectrum because it’s night and day from allistic thinking.
I made this experience so this is representative
That is not what they claimed. They claimed to represent “many”, not everyone. Only you made that claim.
You can tell them that their argument is “an anecdotal fallacy” for which “no sources have been cited” and ask them to provide further evidence. That is not what you did. (You responded with your own sourceless anecdote, followed by the aforementioned.)
attack the idea that invalidating self diagnosis is gatekeeping (which will probably fail) and not me personally
You seem to have misunderstood my intent.
I don’t really have a strong opinion about people who self diagnose. It does not matter to me whether or not they’re freely included. As such, I do not intend to “attack the idea that invalidating self diagnosis is gatekeeping”. As I said, you’re free to have that opinion, I won’t challenge it.
The thing I do have an issue with is how you presented your opinion as without alternative, claiming to represent the autism community as a whole and disregarding others’ points of view.
You can try to invalidate my point, insulting me by saying that criticising your way of presenting and discussing views “shows lack of character”.
But that won’t stop me from telling you to please stop unreasonably misrepresenting and disregarding others in the future.
