AstralAutism

~ Unperson, Nothing But Thieves (intro under cut)

- we need to completely abolish the idea that anyone needs to have a job (or contribute to any set standard) in order to have their needs met and be considered a worthwhile and productive member of society. Everyone should be able to have stable living needs without having to have a job and without being considered something horrible. What’s important is looking at what someone can and is comfortable doing, and then finding ways for them to help their community that still accommodate them and their needs. Doesn’t matter how much or little someone can do.

- with that said, we still need low effort/skill jobs so people with disabilities of all kinds can still work and contribute without having to overexert and hurt themselves in order to achieve what’s needed. And in general we need low effort/skill jobs so that people have safe and comfortable environments to be in, because not everyone can do a hard job. We need them so people can actually train, and get entry level experience.

For instance, I realized I was never taught how to clean a brush or comb. It didn’t even like register to me that I would need to clean them until recently when my not cleaning them was causing my hair to get really greasy after I showered and brushed.

So I asked my mom “how come we never clean our brushes?”

Her response to that was “I clean my brushes every week.”

So then I’m confused. “Why did you never show me how to clean my brushes?”

And then she says “well I didn’t think you cared about being clean.”

Like please tell me I’m not the only person who sees how bullshit that is? I was a kid I didn’t know it needed to be cleaned!! I know it’s embarrassing and I’m stupid for not realizing that brushes needed to be cleaned sooner but like I can’t rlly blame myself because my parents just automatically assumed that I just. Idk preferred to be gross and have greasy hair?? Like fuck man that was just. Really hurt me. And then she got mad at me when I told her that it hurts me to know she thinks I just don’t care about being clean. She knows hygiene is a genuine struggle for me and yet she just doesn’t care.

But this idea of them thinking I ‘didn’t care’ or ‘wouldn’t do it’ or ‘didn’t want to know’ is so persistent. They didnt bother to put together any sort of college fund because they decided to believe me in kindergarten that I didn’t want to go to college. They explicitly said they could and started too but stopped when I ‘made it clear I wasn’t going to do it’ BITCH I WAS SX!! WHY DID YOU LISTEN TO A SIX YEAR OLD!!

There’s so many things I find that they just never bothered to even mention to me because they just assumed I would be adverse to it, snd when I tell them that’s not the truth they get mad at me. Yet they don’t realize that they never even gave me the chance to be advswrse to anything because they just never showed me. They never taught me shit.

My parents have always been the kind of people who think they can just register their animal as an ESA and then get all the rights to do anything they want with our dog in public, and call the management when someone says that actually isn’t how it works. Our extremely untrained and NOT people-safe dog. The one we have literally never been able to get into a building that isn’t our house or the neighbors because he has such bad anxiety. The one who lunges at every child he sees and is so strong that none of us can hold him back. The one who has never bitten anyone, but we all know he will when he feels threatened enough (which is quite an easy thing to do considering how terrible his anxiety is). The one they refuse to get trained because they are so convinced they don’t need any help and can do it all by themselves under the wisdom of the great Cesar Milan YouTube channel. (Except they would never ‘stoop so low’ aka destroy their ego by needing help. My mom just doesn’t care but my dad is convinced that he can do it because he raised farm dogs as a kid. Because those skills transfer over to a house dog in the suburbs, obviously).

I have tried for actual years to stop them, and get my parents to understand why it is wrong and not ok what they are attempting to do. However they don’t care, they refuse to listen to me and the laws about service animals. It doesn’t help that pretty much all of their friends with dogs are trying to do the exact same thing. They so genuinely believe that they should be able to do anything they want with this dog, and that he is just as good and trained as any other dog (which he’s Not). Recently I have overheard them talking about getting him a service animal vest and just trying to fake it until they can get him actually registered (which they won’t be able to, because they refuse to get him trained and at this point I don’t think he even can be trained. They do not understand how service animals work in any capacity).