Not everyone likes or agrees with them, and they are no more acceptable to force on others than any other label

Not everyone knows how to apply them to themselves, as that requires specific self knowledge or someone you trust to judge it for you, and can be vague, complicated, and subject to change

High support is not synonymous with nonverbal or intellectually disabled, and none of those things mean "people you should pity/rhetorical point for showing how terrible autism is"

Low support doesn't mean no support or that you're not really disabled, and also doesn't mean "people who should shut up about autism"

Mid support actually exists and also means none of those things

Hello!

I can’t tell you what your support level is, usually that’s determined based on the way your autistic traits affect your functioning level (such as being able to live alone, drive yourself places, make your own food, use the bathroom by yourself, etc.).

Someone defined as a low support needs autistic person would generally be able to live alone, has little to no difficulty with IADLS and BADLS, and generally doesn’t need lots of support in daily life.

A medium support needs autistic person may be able to live mostly on their own, or they may be unable to live completely independent(ly?), they may struggle with some BADLS and IADLS, and will need more support than a low support needs person.

A high support needs autistic person is usually unable to live on their own, may struggle with many or all IADLS/BADLS, and will require quite a lot of support.

Hiya! I wouldn’t say there’s different severities. It’s impossible to put autistic people into catagories because we all experience things differently. For example someone might have really bad sensory issues but be able to socialize well and someone might really struggle with socializing but not have many sensory issues etc. It’s not accurate to have a line with high functioning on one end and low functioning on the other, the autistic spectrum looks more like this:

That’s part of the problem with functioning labels: there are no clear guidelines on what distinguishes a person as high functioning or low functioning. Sometimes, the age a child learned to talk is the distinguishing factor. Sometimes, a person’s ability to care for themselves is what is used. Other times, it’s how well a person can blend in. Still other times, it is how well a person succeeds by neurotypical, ablebodied standards. There are plenty of other things that may be used as well. 

The problem is, how do you label someone who is completely nonverbal and cannot care for themselves but has a successful career? Are they high or low functioning? What about a person who can speak eloquently but needs to wear diapers because they can’t tell when they need to use the bathroom? What about a person who can live independently but uses AAC to communicate?

Autism is a diverse spectrum. Each autistic person has a unique mix of traits and abilities that may not always make sense to others. I hold down a 40 hour a week job that provides the sole income for my family. I speak eloquently and have even traveled around giving presentations that relied fully on my speaking capabilities. But, I haven’t showered in over a week and before that shower it had been about two weeks. I haven’t brushed my teeth in days. My bedroom is so messy that it actually stresses me out because I haven’t been able to put away the clean clothes or deal with the mess of dirty clothes. Loud noises send me into a panic. I will sit for hours doing basically nothing because I can’t figure out how to make myself do the things that need to be done, even things I genuinely want to do. I stim openly. I am often noticeably not neurotypical. When I get emotional, I lose the ability to speak. When I meltdown, I hit myself and bang my head and bite myself. Am I high functioning or low functioning?

Aside from the inherent ableism in functioning labels, there remains the fact that functioning labels are completely useless and meaningless. Saying that a person is high functioning doesn’t actually tell us anything about that person. It doesn’t tell us their strengths and abilities nor their needs. These labels are a short hand way to pass judgement on autistic people. It allows people to quickly say “I view this person as a person and don’t think they need help” (high functioning) or “I don’t view this person as a person and will ignore their abilities” (low functioning). 

Support levels have started to grow in popularity as a replacement for functioning labels. Support levels reference how much help an autistic person needs in day-to-day life. A low support autistic is someone who doesn’t need much assistance and high support would be someone who needs a lot of daily help. However, support levels are basically a re-branding of functioning labels. They still try to generalize a person’s abilities, difficulties, and experiences into one label as judged by allistic people. I think that they are definitely better than functioning labels, but they are far from perfect. 

I hope this answers your question!