Archive for February, 2011

your dreams will be reduced down to breathing, and you will be grateful

The thing about not-being-a-person is: They will say those people and the price of being a person is to nod and agree that yes, those people aren’t people at all. They will have no idea who they are talking to. You yourself will start to forget, too. They will say a million small things that sow the seeds for violence done against you, and you will smile and let them. You will do math, constantly. How much do I want to be a person today? How much do I want this project to succeed? How much honesty can I afford? How much dishonesty will kill me? What is the cost of coming out? Is there a way to delay, soften, transmute? How long can I survive as half a person? Ever since the world ended ... I don't go out as much. People that I once befriended, just don't bother to stay in touch. Things that used to seem so splendid, don't really matter today. It's just as well the world ended -- it wasn't working anyway. Your dreams will be reduced down to breathing. [Read More]

on 03/5/12 | 2 Comments | Read More

Seldom Asked Questions

In the previous post ‘Rulers of Celephais,’ a Ms. Hanna J. has asked me some questions about this blog which I will address in post length for the benefit of all readers.  Here is her original...[Read More]

on 02/28/11 | No Comments | Read More

Call for Submissions: An Anthology of Poetry and Prose by Autistics in Mid-Life (final call)

Statement of Purpose I plan to publish an anthology of poetry and prose by people on the autism spectrum, aged 35 and over.  I welcome all pieces of writing about your feelings about being aut...[Read More]

on 02/28/11 | No Comments | Read More

From the Link Cellar This Week (plenty)

Fresh, resurrected, or newly discovered links from across the internet and the dusty reaches of Shift Journal's archives. • • • • • • • via Steve Silberman on Twi...[Read More]

on 02/28/11 | No Comments | Read More

The Ghosts That Haunt the Human Mind

It is, I think, a pretty standard practice among those who take the social model of disability seriously to evaluate observations about autism against the background of our own “real” experience w...[Read More]

on 02/25/11 | 2 Comments | Read More

The Autism Gene: Maybe Not So Scary

The eugenic annihilation scenario has been giving the autistic community nightmares for the past six years, ever since Dr. Joseph Buxbaum predicted in a notorious article that genetic research would l...[Read More]

on 02/23/11 | 4 Comments | Read More

From the Link Cellar This Week

Fresh, resurrected, or newly discovered links from across the internet and the dusty reaches of Shift Journal's archives. • • • • • • • From Time Magazine's Healt...[Read More]

on 02/21/11 | 1 Comment | Read More

LEEEEEEEEEROY!!!!1!!!

It is with some relief that I remind myself it is not my job to convince others that I am right. If I've not changed any minds though, this past couple weeks on the site have been rewarding in othe...[Read More]

on 02/18/11 | 9 Comments | Read More

Elephant on the Loose

As Shift Journal’s sidebar indicates, we spend a lot of time around here discussing alternative ways of defining autism.  That discussion got particularly lively over the past two weeks, with mu...[Read More]

on 02/16/11 | 5 Comments | Read More

New Thread (If Not Us, Then Who?)

[continued from previous] I've said that I see a lot of thoughtful attention here; I'd like to also say that everyone (hi Diane, welcome; thanks for coming by) seems to be making sound arguments, o...[Read More]

on 02/15/11 | 6 Comments | Read More

From the Link Cellar This Week

Fresh, resurrected, or newly discovered links from across the internet and the dusty reaches of Shift Journal's archives. • • • • • • • via Steve Silberman's Twit...[Read More]

on 02/14/11 | No Comments | Read More

If Not Us, Then Who?

Lots of nutritious back and forth in comments this week, with Rachel and Stephanie each taking exception to my post last Friday.  Before diving back in to the fray, I'd like to lay out one context in...[Read More]

on 02/11/11 | 10 Comments | Read More

On My Solitary Way

One of the enduring patterns of my life is my on-again, off-again relationship with large, conventionally structured organizations of all kinds: corporate, political, and religious. In the on-again...[Read More]

on 02/10/11 | 1 Comment | Read More

Action Words

Among the many ideas that have been put forward in recent years to explain an apparent increase in the autistic population is the concept of assortative mating.  According to this hypothesis, today�...[Read More]

on 02/9/11 | No Comments | Read More

Picking Up the “Oops!”

When I first started studying how to be a parent, I read a lot of claims regarding the importance of monitoring, limiting, or disallowing television and video watching.  However, when Willy first sta...[Read More]

on 02/8/11 | 3 Comments | Read More

Introverts, Extroverts, and Exercise

As one who habitually works out, I am constantly asked. “Isn’t it boring?” “Where do you get the willpower from?” I try to explain that I enjoy it for its own sake.  But the response is ...[Read More]

on 02/7/11 | 2 Comments | Read More

From the Link Cellar This Week

Fresh, resurrected, or newly discovered links from across the internet and the dusty reaches of Shift Journal's archives. • • • • • • • • Tyler Cowen •  ...[Read More]

on 02/7/11 | No Comments | Read More

This Too Is Autism

I'm usually content to allow Gwen McKay's light touch and considerable gift for understatement work their magic on their own but her most recent post titled Fault Lines touched a nerve for me, and I w...[Read More]

on 02/4/11 | 15 Comments | Read More

Fault Lines

Those of us who have raised children know what often happens after pointing out muddy footprints on the floor, dishes left on the table from an afternoon snack, or some other dereliction of duty.  Wi...[Read More]

on 02/2/11 | 5 Comments | Read More

WARNING! Oxytocin the xenophobia drug!

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has published online ahead of full publication a science journal paper with the title Oxytocin promotes human ethnocentrism See the abstract ...[Read More]

on 02/1/11 | 2 Comments | Read More