Q: I don't understand where the hostility towards neurodivergents is coming from
Another one of my discussions of "systems vs individuals" ...
I posted the following MEME on Facebook, and one of my friends made the comment: “I don't understand where the hostility towards neurodivergents is coming from.”
See also: Allism Spectrum Disorders: A Parody
It is only recently in my life I have come to a better understanding of that question. I would observe hostility towards people who were deemed “different” in some way, and the hostility didn’t make sense to me.
While I have come to an understanding, I have also come to understand that I can’t always share what I have learned as it offends some people.
In my mind the core problem is worldviews which include Individualism. I don’t even agree with how most English texts describe Individualism, as Individualism is so engrained into Anglosphere worldviews that dictionaries and wikipedia articles read like propaganda rather than ideologically neutral descriptions.
Many people have included individualism into their personal identity, such that any questioning of individualism is interpreted as a questioning of that person, their personal identity, their culture, their nationality, and so-on. I have written about the related phenomenon of “White fragility” in the context of non-racialized people, and I have equally observed “Individualism fragility” in the context of people who have internalized this ideology within their identity.
Language clarity: When using terms such as neurodiversity or neurodivergence, I use: NEURODIVERSITY: SOME BASIC TERMS & DEFINITIONS by Nick Walker, PhD
1948 United Nations: Individual Rights vs Collective Rights
One way to observe this dynamic playing out is within human rights instruments created in 1948 within the United Nations that had only recently been created in 1945. While not everyone notices it, there is a very different articulation of human rights within the so-called “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” (UN-UDHR) which is narrowly focused on Individual Rights, and collective rights discussed within the Genocide Convention.
Unfortunately, there are some so deeply adherent to Individuality that they believe the Genocide Convention is focused on the efficient mass murder of individuals. They don’t notice the Collective Rights clarified within the critical phrase “as such”.
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
I believe it is critical to understand the importance of “as such”, the narrow focus on individualism within the mislabeled UN-UDHR which was never universal, as well as how newer human rights instruments such as the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) are a critical step towards a more Universal understanding of Human Rights. Canada lobbied to weaken the Genocide Convention, and was one of 4 countries that voted against UNDRIP. Canada promotes its involvement in the individualistic UN-UDHR, but is never fully honest about its true position on Human Rights.
Even though the 1948 human rights instruments were created in the aftermath of World War 2, where there were many groups including what was claimed to be “disabled” people treated similar to specific religious groups (Shoah), the list in the genocide convention is treated by some governments and interest groups as prescriptive rather than illustrative.
Why aren’t you talking about neurodivergent people?
Thank you for reading this far if you feel like I’m not answering the question, but this is my answer. I don’t see the reality of diversity in Neurotypes to be any different than diversity in gender, sexual orientation, ancestral continent or region of origin and related physical attributes (melanin, etc), diversity in religions, or any of the other ways which some groups want to exclude other groups.
My point is that this is about groups and not individuals at all, so I don’t see how a conversation about why some individual seem to be hostile to some other individual is a question that makes sense or can ever be answered.
The real question is: why do some groups with specific worldviews as part of their identity feel hostility towards other groups?
In this I think using neurodivergency is illustrative. For hostility toward other groups, it is even more commonly religious or other culturally specific ideologies that generate hostility towards any group that doesn’t fit within those ideologies.
When you hear someone insisting on using “functioning” labels in the context of neurodivergence, it is helpful to understand the meaning of “functioning” in that context. What they are really talking about is compatibility with the ideologies of Individualism and Capitalism. These persons don’t fit well into either of these related ideologies, but do fit in quite well if you have a more collective (and I believe, more scientific) concept of humans and our relations to other humans as well as more-than-humans. (Mitakuye Oyasin, Ne-iikaanigaana, Wahkotowin)
For most of my life I would have been considered “High Functioning” because, while I was considered awkward and my intentions regularly misunderstood, my existence (as a human with intrinsic value) didn’t challenge the ideologies of Individualism or Capitalism. I had skills that were considered valuable within Capitalism, and while there were complexities throughout my career, I had a career. Other people who aren’t able to be fully “independent” aren’t considered compatible with Individualism, and people who can’t maintain a job as well as I did aren’t considered compatible with Capitalism, and thus the “Low Functioning” label is thrown at them.
At this point in my life my alleged “disability” in the eyes of Western worldviews has meant that I’m now forced to be “retired”. With the combination of Lyme Disease and Autistic Burnout, I’m no longer gong to be considered “High Functioning” as I’m no longer sufficiently compatible with Individualism or Capitalism.
The very existence of people who don’t fit within those narrow ideologies are considered a threat to groups who have internalized those ideologies into their cultural identity and values.
These differences generate hostility which remains about groups, even if a specific “event” may appear to be one person being hostile towards another person.
Are you saying nothing can or should be done?
If you are trying to understand, or seeking to reduce this hostility, focusing on individuals will never be helpful. There is no value in naming, shaming, or otherwise seeking to punish individuals for following the “rules” and being successful within specific social hierarchies as created by specific social constructs. All that does is cause the incorrectly targeted person to double-down on their identification with the social construct.
If we recognize a problem, and want to solve the problem, we need to focus on the social construct. I recognize that individualism displaces people from time (fiscal quarters or human lifespans rather than Seven Generations minimum) and place (disconnection from more-than-humans), and provides cover for social constructs and other systems, which is why Individualism is itself such a problematic ideology.
