observer of times

As someone who grew up feeling like a misfit, I can understand how someone autistic might take hope from autistic role models. Lists of historical figures who tick boxes for autism (a term coined in 1911 by Swiss psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler to describe a symptom of severe schizophrenia) feature genius: Einstein, Tesla, Lewis Carroll, Emily Dickinson, Darwin, Jefferson, Newton, Michelangelo and Hildegard von Bingen, for starters. Does such conjecture comfort parents who wonder if their challenged child might yet grow up to be God’s gift to the arts or science? Or are those lists compiled to empower the diagnosed?

No doubt both. Hence autism advocates ignore less intellectually gifted subjects of posthumous diagnosis, like J Edgar Hoover or Robespierre. Or Hitler, even though DNA analysis of his blood showed a polygenic score (estimated genetic predisposition for a given trait or condition, often used as a predictor) in the top 1% for autism. As Tim Nicholls notes in his response to that Channel 4 doco, ‘Autistic people, along with other disabled people, were specifically targeted and murdered by the Nazis, just for who they were.’ Clearly, Hitler didn’t fit ’40s autism criteria. Diagnosis has come a long way since Asperger’s day.

As an outsider to the autism discourse, despite academic interest, I tend to find the logic of such guesswork unconvincing. Introverted, eccentric, socially awkward, intensely focused loners? And the abandon with which retrospective assessments are issued mirrors the looseness of lists of autistic signs and symptoms. What does autism look like in girls? The Autism Association of Australia explains. But ‘a strong imagination’ sounds a lot like an artist, novelist, actor, auteur, choreographer, poet, composer, inventor or speculator. ‘A desire to arrange and organise objects’ needn’t be pathological either. Sculptor? Florist? Commercial photographer? Landscaper? Urban planner? Window-dresser? Set designer? Curator? Interior decorator? And surely ‘While boys are more likely to have outwardly challenging behaviours, girls with autism are more vulnerable to internalising problems’ is true of neurotypicals too? Defining characteristics are missing from the list. Ditto the adult trait of ‘Too-strong attention to detail’. Can a microsurgeon, flight engineer, tax accountant or proofreader overdo it?

While the question of why figures for autism (or its diagnosis) have risen so much in such a short time is hotly contested by both experts and laypeople, who can dispute that our culture has lost its way? And something akin has occurred re the rise in gender diversity. Debates rage over whether autism and gender dysphoria/nonconformity are growing more prevalent or just getting more attention, but both domains are rent by conflicts over diagnostic protocols, therapeutic interventions, PC terminology etc. Our collective obsession with identity owes much of its force to the dominance of digital technology that enables massive corporate profit through maximisation of identity-driven engagement. Big Tech doesn’t care what your identity is: autistic white supremacist, black trans man, cis queer, femcel, TERF… It’s all the same to the broligarchs at the end of the 24-hour day. And to the extent that they follow algorithmic paths of least resistance, users are locked in a vicious circle: the more of their vital energy they devote to the virtual, the more atomised society – and their psyches – become, thus the more importance identity assumes and the larger the argument for [insert your preferred ideology] looms.

Like other high earners in our society, medical professionals tend to project an air of authority. Take Dr Brad McKay, quoted above. Yet no studies of whether or not vaccines cause autism predate 1998. Why the absurd exaggeration? If the Autism Association of Australia holds him up as credible, why shouldn’t the public distrust not just the heavy childhood vaccination schedule, but the wisdom of getting shots at all? And experts who invoke Science to validate their assertions, reciting mindnumbingly dumbed-down accounts of how or why spike proteins/Ritalin/puberty blockers save lives can sound as if they’ve fallen hostage to an ideology. Genuine science doesn’t prostitute itself to identity politics.

Yet ever more of us rush to embrace medicalised identities, which will, whether as case histories or social media disclosures, persist for longer than some of us might wish. We’ve created such a toxic, alienating culture that growing numbers struggle to function, and having stigmatised them to no avail, the system now hastens to indulge them, even if preferential treatment falls short of the sort of support they need. A diagnosis of such a condition starts to look desirable, even beyond the relief of recognition for one’s child’s or one’s own problems, when it confers an aura of specialness. Now others are obliged to tread carefully around the sacred identity. Donning the neurodivergent mantle is akin to tribal initiation.

Still, even if I can relate to multiple traits associated with today’s neurodiverse revolution, as do many (if not yet all) of my friends and neighbours, do I really want to be defined by the graceless, sterile language and dissective conceptual baggage of science? And yet clinical autism professionals are stretched. Wait times can run to years, not just weeks or months. Like most advocacy groups, the Autism Association of Australia condones self-diagnosis. So I wrote to them to say that for a while during my twenties, I strongly identified with all the signs in adults they list, but since I was psychotic then, not autistic, I thought their list left room for confusion or false conclusions. Their failure to respond, I feel confident, doesn’t reflect lack of concern, but rather the extremely high demand for their services.