Autistic Hedgehog

We spew hate? We spew hate? I don’t think you know what hate is. 

Hate is being burned to death on your 18th birthday because you’re autistic. 

Hate is being drowned at the age of four because you’re autistic.

Hate is a long list of people like you who were killed for that same thing that makes them like you.

Hate is the way we’re taught that everything about us is wrong, abnormal, broken, dangerous. 

Hate is the way therapies like ABA are used on us, forcing us to do things we don’t want to do, things that are painful and even traumatizing, so we can behave in a way deemed “acceptable.”

Hate is parents who hold us down or hit us when we have meltdowns, who punish us and allow us to be punished for behavior that is perfectly normal to us. 

Hate is people who spread lies about what causes autism, hate is anti-vaccers who would rather see children dead than autistic. 

Hate is people who want to “fix” us, to “cure” us, to wipe us off the face of the planet without ever asking us how we feel about it first. Hate is dismissing us, silencing us when we say “No, we’re not ashamed of who we are.”

Hate is whining incessantly about your autistic brother/sister/cousin/whatever without ever trying to understand them. Hate is ignoring people who are actually autistic and who know what they’re talking about, because somehow being the sibling of an autistic child makes you a bigger expert on the subject. 

Hate is using autism as a slur, calling people who like My Little Pony or Pokemon or any number of things autistic as an insult. 

Hate is you having the fucking gall to come here and try to tell me how to act, think, and feel about the way people treat me every day of my life.

I’ll tell you what hate isn’t, though. Hate isn’t oppressed people being unwilling to coddle your poor widdle feelings. Hate isn’t oppressed people refusing to let you stomp all over them and silence them. Hate isn’t oppressed people refusing to let you stigmatize them, stereotype them, or support the idea of wiping them off the face of the earth.

No, that’s just you getting what was coming to you for your intolerance. For your hate. Piss off.