Tag: nazis

Well, that went… badly

I got a free-to-review queer ebook, set in a summer camp for disabled kids. (The MC and LI were staff, not kids.)

I had to nope-out by halfway, after pervasive, persistent ableism.

(Oh, and one reference to the Gestapo, when the parents were seeing their disabled kids off. I guess the author doesn’t know – or doesn’t care – that the Nazis used disabled kids as their test subjects for the Final Solution. Thousands of them.)

Please, writers. Disabled and neurodivergent people don’t need you to labour every other page how much of an inconvenience we are, how ‘quirky’ our mannerisms are, how emotionally exhausting we are, how disgusting our bodily functions, how annoying our routines and dietary and sensory needs are. How we’re sucking the life from our families like vampires.

You never have to tell us. You never let us forget.

(No, I’m not going to name-drop the author or the book. I just need to vent.)

EDIT: I will add that this wasn’t just a ‘ugh, won’t read any more’ situation. This book gave me a severe anxiety spiral requiring a long hot bath with a Lush bath bomb, a valium, and I’ve been sitting here rocking most of the day, something I generally only do when my anxiety is most severe. I very, very rarely leave a book unfinished, but this was a ‘for my own safety’ situation. Ableism is toxic, y’all. Get a sensitivity reader. Not a professional, not a family member, but an actual disabled person who feels comfortable enough to call out your bullshit.

EDIT 2: The author contacted me and was really respectful and thankful for my review, so, guys, THAT IS HOW YOU DO IT when a marginalised person has genuine concrit of your thing, when you have asked for an-honest-review-for-free-book. Even if you don’t 100% agree with the reviewer, it costs you nothing to respect the feedback and the position of the reviewer as an expert in their own experience.

autasticanna:

“uwu but if there was a cure for autism nobody would force you to-

Bullshit. Yes the fuck they would.

Want to get hired? Oh, you have autism? Well, we can’t hire you unless you get cured.

Want to get paid? Oh, we’re legally allowed to pay you less because you’re autistic. We can pay you a reasonable amount when you get cured!

Need accommodations? Why don’t you just get cured instead? 

You know, you wouldn’t need all this therapy and assistance if you just got cured. You should just get cured!

We don’t need special care programs for autism! There’s a cure available! Just get it!

This isn’t covered by your healthcare because autism is a pre-existing condition, sorry!

My child was autistic and we didn’t want him to be, so we cured him! He didn’t want or ask for it, but we did! 

Look, autism can’t be cured. But if it could, that cure would would absolutely not be a choice. It would just be disguised as optional. 

Look at the danger already for people of colour, disabled people, women, nonbinary people, transpeople, etc. if they are labelled noncompliant by medical or benefits services. Tell me not consenting to be ‘cured’ wouldn’t land you in it. Tell me that they wouldn’t make being ‘cured’ conditional for lighter sentencing in the court system, the way some courts still, in 2018, make sterilisation an ‘option’ for people charged with repeat offences. Tell me they wouldn’t exclude uncured autistic people from public housing, education and support services. Tell me again, and then go and look at history. See if you can convince yourself it won’t happen again, when we have Nazis marching in the streets and eugenicists running for election who openly call for murder of disabled people because they’re a drain on resources. Tell me that if there was a cure, it wouldn’t become a genocide.