Why so much hostility toward reasonable adjustments for autistic/ADHD students/workers?

[KeenTaupeDog]

I keep seeing backlash whenever someone with autism/ADHD asks for reasonable adjustments. Things like:
• being accused of cheating or getting “special treatment”
• people assuming you're lying or gaming the system
• resentment for accommodations that simply level the playing field

Why do so many people react this way?
Is it ignorance about what these conditions actually mean?
Envy?
Fear that fairness is “zero-sum”?
Or something deeper around stigma toward invisible disabilities?

Would be interested in honest perspectives — especially from those who’ve witnessed or experienced this dynamic.

If you dont think adhders etc. should be employed if they cant stay in work due to their adhd, then are you happy with them sitting at home and claiming benefits? Or dying of hunger?

Not looking to fight — just trying to understand where this reaction comes from.
Am a apsergers sufferer and people at uni accused me of cheating when they found out i had remote exams

On paper, this is all valid. But let's unpick each one in the real world:

e.g. the company authortises the disabled person to work less hours but also take a pay cut for doing so rather than firing them

Theoretically - absolutely perfect. part itme worker, part time pay, everyone is happy. In reality however, the company doesn't do this well - if the job needs to be full time but the company doesn't want to/can't afford to hire an extra person to cover the other hours (eg, to do one job as a job share, it's often the case that you need two people each working 3 days a week). In this case, the other employees are expected to pick up the slack and have a heavier workload as a result.

or
e.g. an autistic person is less productive than normal at handling calls, so he does data analysis instead for other teammates who handle his calls

Again, fine, in theory, perfect. BUT, this assumes that the person who is now picking up more calls is happy with that and does not want to do the data analysis. In that happy scenario, it's a fantastic example of each team member playing to their strengths and preferences. But too often, the person who is now picking up extra calls would actually prefer to be doing the job he/she is employed to do, with the more "normal" split between calls and data analysis.

or
e.g. a dyslexic person gets grammarly to help them write emails to a normal person's standard instead of being sent home and claiming benefits
I'd be shocked if there's an organisation anywhere that would have an issue withthis. Even in schools, they are routinely encouraging children to use voice-to-speech tools for homework when they are struggling with writing etc.
At the same time, lots of people who are not dyslexic are still benefiting from improved technology that allows writing/grammar/spelling to be improved, so there's no reason this would be limited to the dyslexic person.

I don't know a lot about this but I believe it's to do with different types of intelligence.

eg I remember I did a weird assessment thing when I was in high school. It turned out that my ability to work out the 3D shapes was very high - I got 100% of the questions I answered correct. But I didn't answer all of them. The assessor told my parents that this was unusual.

I think a lot of school or university work is about ensuring you understand the underlying subject matter. Speed then becomes less of an issue because it's about the concepts.

In other cases, speed is important because they're also testing working memory or ability to adapt or whatever. Most of us learn the concepts of addition and subtraction and a test with extra time would allow us to prove that. But if (back in the day when we didn't all have a calculator and computer on us) you were working on a market stall, you'd need speed of calculation, not just the understanding of the concept.

My point is that ND people may not have a choice about being part time. Many NT people, too! The problem is that part time can lead to complete career freeze ( not just progressing at a proportional rate, which would be fair). This means that sounds much talent / skill is being wasted.

Same with job interviews. One of my star co workers was awful at job interviews. It was only by luck that they got a position, and we were very lucky to benefit from those strengths. By insisting on relying heavily on interviews for all positions without substantial accommodations, you can miss a lot of talent.

It should never be about creating the perfect job, or putting people into jobs they just can't do. It's about removing some of the arbitrary barriers. There's a lot of parallels with getting women into the workforce.

They're not "arbitrary" barriers though! Businesses are run and jobs are structured in specific ways for a reason.

It depends. Politics and social pressures skew results.

I'm talking about a researcher archetype. Half of the job is choosing the inputs.

You are imagining an archetypical practitioner. It's more about managing people.

You don't have to be a great practitioner to be a great researcher, and vice versa.

Reasons like the reason that women had to leave the workplace once they get married, because of course they now need to care for their husband / do the housework. That's how things were done!

Of course there are reasons, embedded in our social structures. But these "reasons" are excluding more and more people, fueling to the explosion in diagnoses. The current system excludes non - average brains the way the old one excluded women.

I can only speak for myself, but I’m no slower than anyone else at actually working something out once it gets to my brain - it’s the getting information to and from my brain that’s slower.

It’s almost like the inputs are all written in code, so I have to decode it before I can work out the answer, and then recode the answer as an output, if that makes sense as an analogy? Plus I have a poor working memory, so I need to go back and check “did that say 64 or 67” more than most - which also needs the decoding / recoding process.

I strongly disagree. Fewer are being excluded from work than ever before. The "reasons" are reasons, and every job cannot be tailored to everyone's whims or "needs". That isn't realistic or affordable and it is not the same as women (or black people as per previous example) being systematically excluded.

No, businesses aren't charities. But the thing is, ND people do get rejected for jobs even when in reality they're the best candidate, because there is so much prejudice and misunderstanding out there that many employers will not consider the ND person to be the best qualified, and this will be be purely because they are ND. Particularly if they will need accommodations that the employer doesn't want the faff of providing.

It's naive in the extreme to assume that if the ND person is the best qualified they will get the job.

That's the most painfully abelist thing I've ever heard.

My needs are not a whim.

When they were not accommodated, I was utterly non functional. Couldn't leave the house for months.

With accommodations, I am a leader in my field.

I was systemically excluded for decades. It was my diagnosis that allowed me to overcome it.

I guess you must be the type of person that tells people that "it isn't that bad" when they experience racism?

I'm not the type of person who says racism "isn't that bad" at all. Racism is systemic oppression and hate. Employers not wanting, or being able to accommodate everyone isn't.
It's great that you have managed to overcome your barriers and find work that can accommodate you. That doesn't mean it is always reasonable, or possible or on purpose.
It isn't the same as systemic racism or sexism. It just is not.

Exactly.

One example is that job selection relies on job interviews, which are notoriously unreliable, because they often don't really have much at all to do with the actual job. They test the ability to use social niceties in a very artificial situation. One that feels disproportionately false and wrong to a lot of ND people.

My point is that ND people may not have a choice about being part time. Many NT people, too! The problem is that part time can lead to complete career freeze ( not just progressing at a proportional rate, which would be fair). This means that sounds much talent / skill is being wasted.

being a woman and having babies did that for me.

of course people should be supported into work. But not at the expense of other people who have to pick up the slack.

I'm following the example that was given, where someone with "an interest" in law who doesn't deal well with people could be some sort of lawyer of theory.

My point is that law isn't theoretical and objective like, say, higher physics is (ok quantum physics isn't strictly objctive but let's skip over that)

Law is about people. It exists for people to manage problems between people. That's why we have judges not just rulebooks. If a person doesn't see those things as important, doesn't take input from people and consider the messy motivation of people, their understanding and reasoning about law will be flawed.

Physics no, but law yes.

How is it not the same?

I'm not saying that all barriers can be overcome. There are still jobs that would be very hard or practically impossible for me to do due to my sex (and resulting physique).

There are jobs that it would not be culturally appropriate for me to be in due to my race / cultural background.

What I'm saying is that the barriers that kept me out of work were artificial and unreasonable. I did not "overcome" them. I was simply finally allowed a fair chance.

The painful thing is seeing that all those barriers still exist for others, and people insisting on denying that they exist.

Christ. We all want a day off in the middle of the week. I don't think being knackered is saved for aspergers (we shouldnt use this term btw) autistic people. I agree with your employer. You're basically causing a problem just so you can have a rest. Work pt if that's the case? Do 2 or 3 days? OR do what I did (genuinely disabled also autistic) went self employed so I could control how much work I wanted to do.

Anyone running a small business these days is screwed if they're employing people demanded x y and z. Would also raise a red flag for me as I'd then presume (probably unfairly) that you were going to be flakey.

OK, first of all, law academics do exist.

Secondly, autism does not necessarily mean that you cannot deal with people. Undiagnosed autism rates in psychiatrists are startlingly high. It's that the style of social communication is different, not that there's no social communication.

The obvious issue though is that there is rarely a single objective 'best qualified' person for the job. Most jobs have requirements that extend beyond objective qualifications and stray into territory around soft skills, productivity, creativity and motivation. These things can't really be quantified and are subjective in nature hence we could sit through the same interviews with the same criteria and score people quite differently. It would be very difficult in most cases to prove that the ND candidate was objectively the best and they missed out on a role due to discrimination.

Also ultimately most employers are looking for someone that can do the work they need doing as effectively and efficiently as possible. This is often the issue for those that are looking for accommodations that ultimately make them less efficient or less effective. It will make them a difference and potentially make the ND candidate less suited to the role than a NT candidate that can operate at full capacity and effectiveness more often. You can't really argue that the ND candidate is the objective best candidate for the role in this context. If we start to do this then it unpicks the whole process of recruitment and selection. What actually makes anyone better at a job than anyone else if it's isn't efficiency and effectiveness?

I know that sounds harsh but I think most people who hire people to do work for them in a domestic setting do the same. Very few people would be willing to pay the extra for a cleaner that took a lot more time and needed lots of expensive accommodations or a builder that took twice the amount of time to build an extension and a lot more money because they were ND.

The barriers that kept you out of work weren't specifically designed to keep autistic people out of work. That's why it is different. It is not the same thing.

Why are you so determined to think everybody is jealous of you?

If it's a legitimate business requirement, yes, obviously. But some businesses insist on certain hours purely out of presenteeism, and that's not helpful.

Looking at your posts on this thread, though, you do seem quite cynical about accommodations, which I realise might mean this issue is being handled badly at your particular workplace. In general, though, surely you'd agree it's better for everyone if those who need accommodations are able to have said accommodations put in place so they can work?

I have had deadlines but never quotas. Ive just not found them that consistently onerous and requiring fast, just efficient, or thar inflexible compared to some people's jobs like surgeon or barrister or teacher where i assume its a lot tougher.

There has generally been a tolerance and fluctuations so some days had slack so someone slower would have been fine, then at pinch points I been able to prepare for, seek support or just had a crap day but it wasnt sustained.

That was supposed to qoute somone who asked whether i really hadn't had time pressured jobs

One example - I have a friend who is measurably the best in the workplace at her job. She's socially pleasant, polite, professional, and autistically direct. She's being edged out of her workplace, despite being the best worker, just due to the old social exclusion that is almost inevitable for ND people.

No one is suggesting that accommodations should involve doubling the length of a build ( although sacrificing everything, including quality, on the altar of efficiency is a key failing of western capitalsim ). It's things like people being deeply offended by the cleaner wanting to wear earbuds while she cleans that are the problem.

Barriers to women working weren't specifically designed, either. They were just a product of social moores, structures, and priorities.

Yes. But what I was responding to was a suggestion made for a theoretical someone who does have that disability. Did you read it to get the context before replying to me?