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Criticisms of the Neurodiversity Movement

Updated: Jul 12, 2023

Authors: Caroline Cannistra and Anya Fogel


Intro

The neurodiversity movement has received a considerable amount of criticism in its first several years of existence. Some of this criticism comes from people pushing against the movement as a whole, arguing that the concerns of the neurodiversity movement are misguided or too radical. Other critics sympathize with the goals of the movement, but question its current trajectory in terms of how it represents all neurodivergent people, including the most marginalized voices. As the movement grows, we need to engage with this criticism instead of immediately dismissing it as illegitimate. In this article, we will present some common criticisms of the neurodiversity movement, where that criticism comes from, and how members of the movement have engaged with that criticism.


Within the disabled community

Many criticisms come from within the neurodiversity movement. Some of these stem from the hierarchy of disability. Hierarchy of disability is the idea that some disabilities are more disabling than others. Intentionally or not, some people in activist spaces spread the fallacy that “less disabled” people are more worth listening to than “more disabled” people. The voices of those with low support needs drown out those with high support needs. Within the current support system, disabled people who can speak for themselves are easier to hear, and many neurodivergent people don’t have access to mainstream communication methods like verbal speech. The voices of people with minimal support needs are also amplified because they are more acceptable in the public eye. As a result, when we think of neurodiversity, we often think of people with low support autism, ADHD, or learning disabilities like dyslexia. Rarely do we consider those with intellectual disabilities, though they fall within the definition of neurodiversity. Ivanova Smith writes about the neurodiversity movement’s failures to accommodate people with intellectual disabilities and how it can do better in the future: “I tried to talk to a prof who is a big ND activist that has a[n] autism program at their college, and they wanted to enforce a no clapping rule… Intellectually disabled autistics that clap and make noises and run around should be welcome too, not just quiet Autistics. I am tired of vocal Autistics that use vocal stims being shamed and treated as less-than by ND conferences, and this needs to be called out!” (Smith 2019)


Even within the autistic community specifically, there are people who promote a hierarchy of “high-functioning” people on top and “low-functioning” people on the bottom. Some self-identified “aspies” (refers to the outdated diagnosis of Asperger’s syndrome, which was considered a “milder” form of autism before it was absorbed into the more general diagnostic category of autism spectrum disorder) advocate for their own rights and acceptance into society while distancing themselves from other autistic people. Activist Mel Baggs discussed the issue of “aspie supremacists” on their blog: “I am referring to “aspies” who think they are superior to other autistics, or to “AS/HFA” [Asperger’s syndrome/high-functioning autism] who think they are superior to “LFA” [low-functioning autism]. In practice this means, “We aspies are just different but autistics are defective”. “AS/HFA is part of human diversity but LFA has no value”. It’s the Carleys of the world cringing at the very idea of sharing a label with people who wear diapers (the joke’s on them as many “aspies” wear diapers too). It’s any and every way that the value and contributions of “AS” and/or “HFA” people a[re] put above the value and contributions of “autistic” and/or “LFA” people” (Baggs 2010).


The neurodiversity movement is also overwhelmingly white. Scholar Morénike Giwa Onaiwu has analyzed the microaggressions that neurodivergent People of Color experience. She points out that white neurodivergent individuals are sometimes upset when the obstacles faced by neurodivergent POC are put in the spotlight. They argue that white ND people are marginalized, too, but fail to acknowledge that ND POC are at an intersection of marginalization. (See some of our other articles for more information.) Although People of Color are diagnosed with the same disabilities as white people, they do not have the same experience. Under the social model of disability, people are disabled not by their impairment, but by societal barriers. People of Color face additional obstacles in our society, especially those who are disabled. Even when other determining factors are statistically controlled for, a white child is significantly more likely to receive an autism diagnosis than a child of color. Children of color are more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD, Conduct Disorder, or Oppositional Defiant Disorder (Davis-Pierre, n.d.). While a white adult having an autistic meltdown in public will likely attract stares, a Black adult is more likely to be detained by the police, or be killed like Elijah McClain (Giwa Onaiwu 2020).


To address these issues, the neurodiversity movement must include People of Color, and according to an open letter to the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network (ASAN) in 2021 written by several former ASAN members of color, organizations such as ASAN fail to properly represent and support autistic Black and Indigenous people of color (BIPOC) and autistic people with intellectual disabilities (ID). The letter alleges that ASAN’s board of directors does not fully represent the autistic community because there are few BIPOC members and few members with ID (Giwa Onaiwu et. al. 2021). Some of the letter authors were BIPOC/people with ID who had resigned from ASAN in protest of certain recruitment decisions and public responses to criticism. ASAN has a public strategic plan to involve the community more deeply in its decisions, but the efficacy of this plan is still unclear. While ASAN does not represent the entire neurodiversity movement, it is the most well-known advocacy organization associated with the movement, so criticisms of the organization are relevant to this discussion.


Medical and social models of disability

There are also criticisms from outside the neurodiversity movement, often from people who do not identify as disabled. Many critics subscribe to the medical model of disability, which views disability as a biological limitation that should be cured. This manifests in different ways. Some people are uncomfortable with disabled people forming a movement that promotes acceptance and believes disability cannot be separated from identity. Those who promote applied behavior analysis (ABA) often clash with the neurodiversity movement (Leaf et. al. 2022). Doctors and scientists who study disability are sometimes incredulous because they value scientific evidence over lived experience. Criticism can also come from those close to disabled people. In recent years, a movement made primarily of parents of autistic children has come into conflict with the neurodiversity movement. They are accused by neurodiversity proponents of subscribing to the charity model of disability, where disability is a problem that should be pitied (Dwyer 2022).


However, not all critics of the social model of disability are uncritical supporters of the medical model. In fact, many disabled people, including neurodivergent people, dispute the idea that all struggles associated with disability are merely due to societal factors. Emily Paige Ballou writes about this shortcoming of the social model in her blog post “What the Neurodiversity Movement Does–and Doesn’t–Offer”:

There are aspects of being autistic, for me, that I doubt it’s possible for society to accommodate perfectly. That, even if society did a substantially better job at accommodating autistic people, being autistic would still markedly affect how I live, and will always leave me expending more effort than the non-autistic people around me just to get by. These experiences aren’t superficial, and they are never going away. (Ballou 2018). Many scholars and leaders, including neurodiversity proponents, promote a compromise between the medical and social model, saying that disability is made of a combination of biological, environmental, and societal factors (Dwyer 2022).


On a related note, some critics say that the neurodiversity movement has a kind of toxic positivity problem, where people are pressured not to talk about their conditions in a negative way, or else they will be accused of opposing the movement. This relates back to the criticism that the neurodiversity movement prioritizes “high-functioning” people over more severely impaired people. Twilah Hiari writes in a blog post that the neurodiversity movement “emphasizes the many positive qualities associated with some presentations of autism—creativity, increased tolerance for repetition, enhanced empathy, superior ability to master content in specific subject areas, and exceptional memory—while erasing or minimizing the experiences of autistics who are severely disabled” (Hiari 2018). However, not all high-support autistic people agree with this, and many of the most well-known proponents of neurodiversity, such as Mel Baggs, creator of the well-known video “In My Language”, have high support needs. Emily Paige Ballou writes, “from its inception, not only did the neurodiversity movement’s values include the most significantly disabled, but that those individuals themselves were among our earliest pioneers” (Ballou 2018).


Conclusion

Criticism of the neurodiversity movement, like with the disability rights movement and other social movements, is widespread and comes from many different perspectives. It can be easy for supporters to treat all critics as anti-progressive and intolerant of people they consider to be different, but this isn’t always true. Indeed, many critics are people who have a relationship to the movement, but are treated as outsiders by other neurodiversity proponents, often because of other forms of prejudice like racism. Neurodivergent people are just as prone to bigotry as neurotypical people, and the most dominant voices who control the conversation are not always correct. As the movement continues to grow, we must make an active effort to understand who is being included in the movement and who is being excluded, whether on an institutional level or through social pressure. Together, we can make the neurodiversity movement move in a direction that benefits everyone, not just the most privileged of us.


References

Baggs, Mel. “Aspie Supremacy can kill.” Ballastexistenz (2010). https://ballastexistenz.wordpress.com/2010/03/07/aspie-supremacy-can-kill/. Published 7 March 2010. Accessed 20 May 2023.


Ballou, Emily Paige. “What the Neurodiversity Movement Does– and Doesn’t– Offer.” Thinking Person’s Autism Guide (2018). https://thinkingautismguide.com/2018/02/what-neurodiversity-movement-doesand.html. Published 6 February 2018. Accessed 20 May 2023.


Davis-Pierre, M. “Black children and evaluator bias with Dr. Linda McGee.” Autism

in Black Podcast (n.d.). https://www.autisminblack.org/podcast/.


Dwyer, Patrick. “The Neurodiversity Approach(es): What Are They and What Do They Mean for Researchers?.” Human development vol. 66,2 (2022): 73-92. doi:10.1159/000523723


Giwa Onaiwu, Morénike. "I, Too, Sing Neurodiversity," Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture: Vol. 2: Iss. 1, Article 10 (2020). DOI: 10.9707/2833-1508.1048. https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/ought/vol2/iss1/10.


Giwa Onaiwu, Morénike; Montgomery, Cal; Latimer, Oswin; Brown, Lydia X. Z.; Gardiner, Finn; other anonymous authors. “Hear Our Cry: Call for Solidarity with Autistic BIPoC and Autistic People with Intellectual Disabilities: Demands presented to the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network (ASAN) for their June 20th Board Meeting”. Blog of Morénike Giwa Onaiwu (2021). https://morenikego.com/memo-to-asan-2021/. Published 20 June 2021. Accessed 20 May 2023.


Hiari, Twilah. “Neurodiversity is Dead. Now What?” Mad in America (2018). https://www.madinamerica.com/2018/04/neurodiversity-dead-now-what/. Published 8 April 2018. Accessed 20 May 2023.


Leaf, Justin B et al. “Concerns About ABA-Based Intervention: An Evaluation and Recommendations.” Journal of autism and developmental disorders vol. 52,6 (2022): 2838-2853. doi:10.1007/s10803-021-05137-y


Smith, Ivanova; and Shannon Des Roches Rosa. “You Can’t Have Neurodiversity Without People With Intellectual Disabilities.” Thinking Person’s Autism Guide (2019). https://thinkingautismguide.com/2019/09/you-cant-have-neurodiversity-without.html. Published 13 September 2019. Accessed 20 May 2023.





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