Talk Guidelines and references to disability

[OneFrenchEgg]

Hi MN

I know there have been ongoing comments and posts so apologies for adding to them.
would it be possible to update the Talk Guidelines? I can see reference to ‘hate speech’ but maybe a reference that due to the diversity of membership and desire to create an inclusive environment posters are asked to avoid stereotypes or lazy diagnosis? It could help to avoid the responses referencing Neurodiversity (could they have autism because they are <insert annoying thing>) but also leave people free to explore concerns about possible conditions if they are suspecting this? I’m always happy to chat about concerns about behaviour if someone suspects eg adhd but not things like ‘I’m a bit OCD’ ‘she’s a bit on the spectrum’ ‘could your annoying neighbour have dementia’ etc?

www.mumsnet.com/i/netiquette

Ok, this argument you are making is completely bonkers. For whatever reason you have to completely ignore the extremely well established evidence base of a range of conditions and the manifestation of these behaviours due to these conditions, to enable you to sustain your position. The fact that you need to do this shows your position is actually unsustainable. You obviously have your own personal reasons for doing this, but your position is now clearly so detached from reason and evidence and reality that there is nothing to be gained by engaging further with you, so I won't.

But in the example you are giving they are not saying ' they are autistic' . They are saying ' maybe', they are offering it up as a possibility

Heres another corker… what about if a white family moved in next door shortly before my car was broken into. I’m not saying the fact that they are white means they are thieves. I’m offering it as a possibility…

We okay with that? What about if the family was…

black?
jewish?
gypsy?
chinese?
autistic?

ANY intolerant thinking comes from a place of bigotry. If one form of lazy stereotype is not okay (and I think we can all agree that it isn’t) okay), then neither should any other be.

Anyone who claims that the final category is somehow different to the others is looking for excuses to maintain a lazy stereotypical mindset.

You obviously have your own personal reasons for doing this, but your position is now clearly so detached from reason and evidence and reality that there is nothing to be gained by engaging further with you, so I won't

Jolly good.

These threads get so tedious and I'm saying that as someone who is both neurodivergent and physically disabled.

I'm happy to call out hateful bollocks but that doesn't include people having sincere conversations asking sincere questions about underlying conditions. Those posts I might engage with in good faith if I disagree with them BUT I won't try and shut down honest discussion. I'm under no illusions that my neurodivergence and physical impairment affects my loved ones.

Some posters need to stop the victim Olympics and DARVO bollocks. Or better yet find a new hyperfocus. I recommend cats and Cross-stitch. Both are quite soothing. I can hyperfocus on them forever

I do agree with this.

Yep. Discussion helps. Part of my self-diagnosis of ADHD came from Mumsnet discussion threads. I then made the decision to have that confirmed by a Psychiatrist.

The problem with that @SquirrelSoShiny is that the “genuine questions” tend to escalate rapidly into insults and barely-disguised bigotry towards ND people. See also: every thread about the traveling community and/or channel migrants. The main difference is that those threads get deleted.

imvho MN should treat both equally. It tends to be much more trigger-happy with one and laissez-faire with the other. Completely illogical.

Well said. And Mumsnet is so hair trigger delete happy when it comes to disability threads/posts, it's hilarious that anyone says the opposite. If only they deleted racist posts as quickly as they delete any discussion on disabilities/ASD.

That's not my experience but may be yours. When in doubt, I always report individual posts.

Okay I am going to address the point, because it comes up a lot,
that (a) other people do these bad behaviours too, so they are therefore not autistic/ dementia/ whatever-condition behaviours.

This argument is relying on the false premise that a behaviour can only be an autistic/ dementia related, if ONLY autistic people./ people with dementia do it. I hope that point alone is enough to show the falsehood of that position. There are only a limited range of human behaviours. There are not special ones just for certain conditions. Certain behaviours are associated with certain conditions, not exclusive to them. It can still be true that certain behaviours and traits are typical (not universal) of people with certain conditions and caused by those conditions.

We all forget things. Some people will be forgetting things due to early stage dementia. The fact that other people forget things does not negate the fact that some are forgetting due to their dementia. A white person who forgets things does not do so because they are white. They might be doing so because they are demented,. There is no evidence base that forgetfulness is caused by whiteness. There is an evidence base that it can be caused by dementia (to answer this inevitable false comparison, which I always think is a sign of the desperation of a truly weak case).

Many of us get emotionally disregulated. Some will be emotionally disregulated because of their autism. There are behaviours which are associated with certain conditions, however inconvenient some may find that truth.

Goodnight.

@SquirrelSoShiny It is my experience tbh. Maybe this is analagous to the BBC constantly being accused of left/right wing bias. The fact they’re accused of both equally possibly means the balance is about right… 🤷🏻‍♀️

On that we can agree 👍

I think that some online groups are giving people a harmful belief that the world should be a 'safe space' from ever being challenged or offended. It makes reality painful for them when they step outside their online bubble and this makes them feel madly oppressed.

We can try to make the world a little softer edged but there are limits. In an ideal world I would always fall over onto a crash mat but in reality concrete remains concrete 😬

Trust me @SquirrelSoShiny ive been on the receiving end of some hateful abuse from self-described autism advocates who objected to me using the term “classic autism”. Both words are offensive. Together they warrant a firing squad apparently. So I agree with your second paragraph.

I also think that ableist language is used with greater impunity on MN than other forms of hate speech and I would like to see a more consistent approach. There is plainly a subset of MN’ers who are capable of nuance and measured consideration of the interaction between (certain) behaviours and (certain) NDiversity. However, a large minority are not and it can become open season for the type of inflammatory remarks described in the OP.

🤣🤣🤣

Also - what's davro?

God, the bat signal definitely went out for this one, didn't it? 😂😂