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Talk for UOB College of Arts & Law Mental Health Champions Network
14 November 2023

Background: Welcome! If you’ve come here for the first time, I’m very happy to have you. In case what you’ve read here or heard me share in a talk arouses your curiousity and you’d like to have a chat, I’ll just make a few brief requests of you here. As you’ll see, I’ve included quite a lot of links below amidst the text which I’ve vetted ahead of time. I’d be very grateful if you were able to take time to do a bit of reading and self-education before coming to me with questions. A good baseline might be to try and read at least two things I’ve referenced below before emailing or setting up a meeting and then we’ll even have something specific to open up a chat. Take note – I’ve also put up a variety of posts on this blog which reflect my stream-of-consciousness as I go about the work of academia in a variety of contexts over the past couple years. This is deliberate so that folks have a safe place for some learning-oriented voyeurism. I’ll emphasise that this is all exclusively my context and that it will not be even remotely similar to many other neurodivergent people, so take it all with a bit of a grain of salt. For one-to-one, I’d like to reserve my energy particularly for other ND folx and unpacking these details with friends whom I haven’t had a long disclosing conversation with yet. So if you’re an ally and we haven’t spent a lot of time together before, I’m delighted you’re here! But please do maybe start with reading and learning indirectly rather than going straight to the source. 🙂 I am very happy to offer training, reverse mentorship and one-to-one conversations, but I do need to balance my energy so I can’t respond to everything, so I may divert you to another colleague (we have a “speakers bureau” within the Staff ND group).

Thanks so much to everyone for coming today, and to the network for the invitation to share today. I’m mindful that there are many friends here from whom I’ve learned so much, and with whom I’ve collaborated on student support, research projects, and had arguments about University policy. I’m think it’s probably the same for my co-presenter. I’ve never spoken publicly about my autism and this is for a variety of reasons, some of which I’ll get into below and others which my co-presenter is going to share a bit about. But just to open for the record: I’m a late dx autistic adult who doesn’t tick the stereotypical “on the spectrum” boxes, and it has taken me years to come to terms with this part of my identity, develop a disability identity, and today marks a bit of a “coming out” which, if I’m being honest, feels more than a little terrifying. We have a non-official staff neurodiversity network that I’m a part of. Though there are many ND folks here, it is totally expected that, like me, most of you wouldn’t have chosen to disclose that as a disability or even to pursue diagnosis which can be hard to access and traumatic. But the ND staff network is a fantastic safe space, and if you’re looking for one, we’d very much welcome you with open arms!

So, with that preamble out of the way, I thought it might be helpful to share with you a “day in the life of Jeremy” with some behind-the-scenes access that you wouldn’t ordinarily have. I’ve been trained from birth in masking – the work of concealing my unique traits at all costs, so you probably wouldn’t notice any of this without some insider knowledge. You might relate to some parts of this story, but maybe not some others. I’d say that diversity is all around us, and we often conceal our own differences. But I’d probably want to resist the suggestion that people sometimes make when they feel solidarity that “we’re all a bit autistic.” As you’ll see, there are some pretty unique and sharp edges to my experience and while I love solidarity from allies, I think it’s important to grapple with your own divergence in careful ways that don’t appropriate the struggles that my co-presenter and I have had in our day to day.

I attended a training a few months ago. It was on a topic that I’m quite passionate about and interested in, so I was excited to do some learning alongside interesting and interested colleagues. This workshop was also a bit unique in that I’d only recently decided to start “coming out” or “unmasking,” that is, sharing about my autism with specific people in contexts where it seemed safe and inconsequential to do so (for more on this see Devon Price, 2022 below). For this event, I ticked the box on the registration form regarding accessibility needs and wrote out my request to the facilitator to send me information about the plan for the day ahead of the session. Autistic brains tend to work on the basis of focal attention and inertia, so some types of workshop structure can feel really hostile if someone is jumping around topics really quickly and not taking time to do deep dives. The flip side of this is that once I’ve started working on a particular project, I can sustain unusual levels of focus and concentration. When daily activities and thought experiments can’t be consolidated, I’ll need to prepare myself in advance so my discomfort doesn’t derail the activity and I can find some useful outlet for the torrent of thoughts that will result. Starting a bunch of small unrelated or non-premeditated tasks in succession can take a lot of extra emotional and mental work for me, to an extent that (as I’ve been learning) being forced to do this can make me unwell. So I’ve learned to take steps to mitigate that impact where I can. If I can get a “preview” of coming attractions for a session I can make some plans around parts that I might sit out on, or doing some advance preparation so that I can prepare mentally quickly if we’re switching around a lot. I also wrote on the form that I’d be arriving early to check out the accessibility of the room. My autistic body-mind is pretty sensitive to sensory inputs, so smells, sounds, lighting, and room configuration can make the difference between a super “cozy” session or meeting where I feel comfortable and engaged, able to bring myself fully, and a session where I’m having to navigate levels of stress bordering on panic and only able to bring little fragments of myself. The facilitator never responded to my request, which I later realised was the result of a clerical error that wasn’t their fault and they’d never seen my request. But I wasn’t worried as I knew from experience that processes of accommodation are often an afterthought, designed by people who don’t understand what they’re accommodating, and can break down as no one is monitoring their usefulness or the impacts of their implementation. I had planned to arrive early and figured I could have a quick private conversation ahead of the start time.

Because this is Britain, trains were late and cancelled, so I arrived a half hour late. This meant walking into a room full of people who stared at me, not in an unfriendly way, but actually many friends who offered smiles of welcome, as I struggled to find a seat. It was an uncomfortably hot summer day, so the organisers had set up two large fans at the front which were blowing loudly. Given that I’m really not able to filter out white noise, this was not ideal. Actually, to be honest, fans are one of my worst sounds. The lighting in the room was also harsh, so I also felt blasted by visual and auditory noise. I can also struggle to process auditory information (this is called CAPD), especially when I’m under stress, so I’ve begun to experiment with headphones and live closed capitioning in meetings. But this is not easy to do discretely, and this felt like an experience best begun “off the radar”.

The seating was configured in a semi-circle so that we were all facing each other and uncomfortably close. As a larger adult I barely had enough elbow room to avoid bumping into the person next to me, so as I sat I was uncomfortably aware of my own presence and the proximity of others. For reasons that neuropsychologists don’t fully understand, autistic people can sometimes find direct eye contact uncomfortable. In my case, facial expressions and body language are another kind of noise that I’m soaking up, and sometimes this is exhiliarating and other times it can be uncomfortable and overwhelming. This alterity is very useful in some cases as I will tend to intuit the emotional state of each individual in a room based on posture cues and micro-expressions I just can’t really filter out. (note for interested parties: I’ve put up a separate post on the blog for those who might be curious around how to adapt to support folx who are aversive to staring or can sometimes find it overwhelming).

Feeling already overwhelmed and uncomfortable, I tried to sit a row back from the circle but the facilitator asked me to change seats so that I could “join the community” and sit in the circle. I was too disoriented and tired to put up a fight and a quick mental cost-benefit analysis told me that I’d not be able to discretely signal my need for accommodation without uncomfortable disclosure in front of strangers. So I moved and tried to deflect attention with a comment about how I’d “not wanted to disturb the group” with my late arrival. Determined to make the most of this session, I settled back into my seat and tried to discretely review the materials we’d been given which included a community “agreement”. As I settled into my seat, I winced from pain in my neck and lower back. This flares up occasionally as I have several prolapsed discs. I haven’t ever experienced a traumatic injury, but I’ve learned that “the body keeps the score”, and have noticed that the many neurodivergent members of my extended family all have injuries and chronic conditions related to the sustained holding of bodily tension. This is common for autistic people, with very high levels of co-occurring medical conditions (for more on co-occuring conditions and the bodily impacts of stress and trauma, I’d recommend reading Price, 2022 or van der Kolk 2014 listed below).

This was proving to be a bad day. But just to be clear, I experience at least one of these every month, at an all school away-day, cross-cutting research workshops, in my own lectures, project budget meetings, etc. etc. Sometimes meltdowns coalesce into longer term burnout. This is pretty common for Autistic folks.

The facilitator made some pretty concerning claims about mental health in the session, which I took down verbatim as I was already taking notes for the session. In talking about the ways that it can be hard to overcome personality disorder, they observed at one point: “some people have an investment in being unwell” and a bit later in the morning in sharing unqualified observations about schizophrenia that: “we don’t know whether, just living around someone [with schizophrenia] can have an impact…” Actually, we do know that conflating risk factors with causality is generally a bad idea, I wanted to say, but I remained polite and quiet as I didn’t want to get flagged early as a non-compliant participant and knew that there would come a time when I’d need to release the flood of thoughts I was holding in. This process of holding back can often be really uncomfortable, even traumatic for a lot of communities who think in ways that are divergent, and is part of the trauma we hold. It’s also the reason that finding community with a group of fellow autists can be so important as it’s a space where we can “infodump” and quickly get into a flow of familiar conversation safely.

After two hours of grating noise, sharp light, bodily pain, and being assaulted by the intense emotions of 20 people feeling their ordinary feelings, something had to give. I was teetering on the edge of a panic attack.

Now, for some people, this might be a cause of major concern, but I experience meltdowns on a regular basis, sometimes multiple times in a single day. My experience of repeated challenges and persistent forms of acute stress and trauma have led me to develop a sophisticated suite of coping skills. Many people who have never experienced anxiety before can find their first experience of serious anxiety, however small it may be, to be completely disabling. Like many other neurodiverse persons, I eat small forms of anxiety for breakfast. Friends and family who are not aware that I am autistic have observed that I can be unusually calm under pressure and able to handle what seem like massive amounts of stress without slowing down.

By the time we’d gotten to the lunch break, I could barely concentrate on anything much less hold a coherent conversation, so I grabbed some food and took the elevator outside to see if I could find a quiet sensory environment to collect my thoughts and prepare for the afternoon. I also, at this point paused to judge whether this particular workshop was a safe space disclose a disability around neurodivergence. It’s rare for me to find signs that a facilitator or programme, even in the best of cases, shows signs of proactive disability awareness (I’ll be doing a later blog post on how to passively signal you are an ally, so check the blog in coming weeks for more on this), but I do still scan for signs every time I start some new social interaction.

Here’s how my scan had gone: The course pack which was about mental health made no references to neurodivergence at all, outside of some very oblique references to disability justice in a section on personality disorders, which was terse and tokenistic. The facilitator had handed out a set of “standards” for conduct indicating how they hoped we could do the session together, but again, I noticed that there wasn’t really any way to challenge these without being quite open and disclosive. The facilitator had mentioned that anyone could step out at any time if they needed to, but the room arrangement required any person who did this to interrupt the session by walking in front of the entire group. The facilitator also specified that taking a break needed to be less than 5 minutes, which in my experience is not enough time to recover from a meltdown or overload and certainly not enough of a help to justify a public exit from the room. I had a sense that there was a desire to make accommodations but not a lot of thought about how these might need to work based on lived experience.

So I spent the lunch break downing some more ibuprofen, practing deep breathing and walking outside with noise cancelling headphones on and found stress levels to be coming back down. When I returned to the room, I discretely changed my seating position to be a few rows back, out of the circle. To be clear: I understand the reasons for the circle. As a (masked autistic) workshop facilitator, I’ve frequently used this configuration for sessions based on the assumption that it can instill a sense of intimacy and connection across participants. Though I knew this was unlikely, I was desperately hopeful that the facilitator would register my repeated attempts to get out of the “limelight” for what they were and leave me alone. This was not to be the case. I was again asked to move. This time I’d come prepared with a deflection, so in as unconfrontational way as I could attempt, I quietly responded by saying “I think this is what I would prefer to do right now”. This was embarrasing, but manageable, as I’d been prepared for it. And as a note to the other facilitators here, if someone seems to register discomfort, rather than see it as defiance, it may be helpful to open up access for the whole group: “…it is quite hot in here, I wonder if anyone else if feeling like it might be helpful to anyone else if we shifted our seating a bit?” Based on my hyper-awareness, I’d already noticed at least one other person in that group who had also been attempting to shift seats, but was less willing than me to engage in confrontation. After I made this statement, the facilitator verbally registered their displeasure to the whole group regarding my decision. Then, thankfully, they moved on with the session. It was humiliating, but not unexpected. At the next break, I left as continued participation was untenable. As I walked to the train, I felt jarred by the whole experience, but it was not unfamiliar. What was new was that I’d made a choice to step away and tried to register some of my needs publicly. It was disempowering to have them rebuffed and shamed, but felt like a consolidation of something important to have done it.

This is my personal experience, and I’m reluctant to suggest this is a good template for understanding the experiences of other neurodivergent colleagues here at UOB. But it gives you at least a small sample of what it’s like being covertly autistic at UOB. On one hand, there are many features of being part of academic staff here which are a dream. I’m expected to pursue my passions with tenacity and speak about them to others. I’m allowed to work flexibly, conslidating tasks to some extent in ways that work around my cognitive preference for focal attention and flow.

However, I’m also aware that there are colleagues who work at this University whose specific research into autism which will result in forms of oppression for my people, designing programmes of eugenics and conversion therapy (e.g. ABA). I’m regularly subjected to policies and work relationships which invite forms of surveillance and control which cause dangerous levels of stress and trauma for me. Our environments here are rarely adapted for sensory sensitivities, and often technology we use and communication channels we set up are explicitly oriented around allistic preferences (you can read a bit more on the blog for some of my thoughts around digital accessiblity and oppression).

Different kinds of neurodivergence come in for different kinds of treatment, and I won’t presume to speak for my ADHD, bipolar, schizophrenic, or personality disorder labelled colleagues. Public attitudes towards some forms of neurodivergence are less hostile, particularly if there is a sense that uncomfortable forms of difference can be dampened by medication and that those persons aren’t terribly antisocial. But I think it’s fair to say that autistic people are often placed in the category of “uncomfortable” or even dangerous. I’d encourage you to look into the Cara Lisette’s #IAmNotDangerous campaign and campaigns highlighting the disproportionate levels of incarceration and punishment directed at autistic people if you’d like to learn more. In conversations I have at least every other week, a colleague or aquaintence associates a difficult or dangerous person with autism. This makes me aware that being “out” will leave me either (1) navigating forms of implicit bias or (2) responsible for educating colleagues before we can have a basis for conversation about how I am different from them. I enjoy teaching, so this really isn’t so bad, but I do get tired sometimes of having to put a lot of my already limited energy into deconstructing stereotypes.

Colleagues in Edinburgh did a study of autistic experiences with mental health support and they came to the conclusion that people…

> were being routinely denied access to mental health support purely for being autistic, as well as being disbelieved by mental health professionals when they were in distress, and finding services just inaccessible even when they were offered support. (https://medium.com/@sonnyhallett/counselling-for-different-ways-of-being-b89730c6ca2)

This really maps onto my experience here. Of the 20 or so times I’ve shared about my autism with colleagues, or of the many more times I’ve spoken more generically about distress in the workplace, some of those times I’ve been met with disbelief or (unwitting) condescension. I have found forms of support that are putatively offered for people like me on campus to be radically inaccessible, often fine-tuned to manage the workloads of those offering support and not foremost around the vulnerability of those they are intended for. But perhaps most of all, our support policies are often designed by people who do not have lived experience of disabilities. It’s a tricky balance we’ve discussed in the ND network between trying to bring experience into the foreground to enable more careful planning and help educate eager allies (we love and are grateful for you!), whilst being careful not to drain ourselves dry psychologically.

I’ve mentioned this whole being out in public thing is quite new to me. Thankfully there are some other braver colleagues who are ahead of me on this. But if anyone here wants to chat a bit more about things I’ve raised here, or draw some representation into a committee, I am happy to have a chat and offer my perspective. If I could make one small request, it might be that before you make this kind of request, that you re-read this presentation (I’ll make it available on my blog) and also read at least one of the resources I’ve included below. Then we’ll have some shared learning we can process and discuss together, side by side.

I don’t know what my story means for this group, and I’l be eager to hear from you about your own experiences and learn together as we explore this theme today. I’m delighted that people are coming together to speak passionately about mental health on our campus and open up conversations that have been stifled for way too long. And I can also see that while that conversation is mobilising, it’s also early days for the ways we speak about and carry awareness of mental wellbeing and especially neurodivergence.

 

Some useful references:

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If you’re going to be around a table, bring some options for people to fidget or an activity that uses your hands (and warn people / encourage others to do the same in advance) so there’s no need to sit around staring at one another:

  • you can do  figet toys for the entire group at the meeting (fidget toys are awesome for everyone!) or something like build legos.

Or consider changing format / venue:

  • take your meeting “on a walk,” and talk while you walk (medical research has found that ambulatory movement can be very helpful for anyone who is trying to think out a problem!)
  • find a place where it’s normal to sit side by side: some of my best conversations have been sitting next to someone enjoying a view on a bench or in side-by-side chairs drinking coffee

And generally:

  • create opportunities for people to indicate different needs or deflect without cost; one very easy one is to encourage people to have laptops with them so they can “look stuff up”. I’ll often have my laptop out while I’m listening. Somteimes I’ll use this for closed captioning audio so I can read what people are saying when it’s hard to hear. Sometimes, I’ll be chasing down ideas that are inspired by what we’re talking about in greater depth than the conversation format will allow. Sometimes I need to step away from focal attention, tuning out for 5 minutes so I can regroup and rejoin the conversation. I don’t usually lose track of the flow of conversation as I can monitor it passively rather than actively and this kind of switching from active to passive can make participation easier

But remember two things: (1) it’s ok. We’ve done this before, and this one meeting isn’t going to be the thing that ends us and (2) the worst case scenario is having someone single you out and try to plan was to meet your needs on the spot in public.

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I’ve been thinking today about how it can sometimes be really hard to communicate with people. And this is sometimes just a double-empathy thing and we need to do work to try and meet people in the middle. But then there are those instances where actually, someone just wants you to think that you’re being difficult because…

All text below is quoted verbatim from https://consilienceproject.org/the-endgames-of-bad-faith-communication/:

Good Faith Communication

Discourse oriented towards mutual understanding and coordinated action, with the result of increasing the faith that participants have in the value of communicating.

Some Signs of Good Faith Communication:

  • Expressions of humility and curiosity
  • Openings for changes in position based on new information
  • Disagreements welcomed; group learning valued
  • Steelmanning the position of others
  • Respect maintained during disagreement
  • Sufficient time given to open discussion and other
    aspects of fair process
  • Use of careful clarifications and evidence
  • Attempts at finding shared base realities and values
  • Emergence of new positions, integrations, and nuance

Note: All signs of good faith communication can be “faked” in bad faith.

Bad Faith Communication

Discourse that is intended to achieve behavioral outcomes (including consensus, agreement, “likes”) irrespective of achieving true mutual understanding, with the result of decreasing the faith participants have in the value of communicating.

Some Signs of Bad Faith Communication:

  • Expressions of hubris and lack of curiosity in opposing views
  • Refusing changes in position based on new information
  • Disagreements unwelcomed; consensus overstated
  • Strawmanning the position of others
  • Disrespect included as part of disagreement
  • Insufficient time and other aspects of unfair process
  • Avoidance or omission of careful clarifications and evidence
  • No attempts to find shared base realities and values
  • Emergence of stalemates, polarization, and simplifications

Note: All signs of bad faith communication can be disguised and denied.

Common Strategies of Bad Faith Communication

Misleading with facts
Presenting an argument containing factual information, which is used intentionally to lead others to draw a conclusion that is not entirely accurate.

White hat bias
Presuming one’s own moral and intellectual correctness, then using that assumption as righteous justification for communications that are intentionally deceptive and manipulative.

Strawman arguments
Presenting the arguments of opponents in their weakest forms, and after dismissing those, claiming to have discredited their position as a whole.

Ad hominem dismissal
Disparaging the character or person of others, and in so doing acting as if this also invalidated their arguments.

Moving the goalposts
Establishing an agreed standard (criteria or data) for accepting others’ views, but once this is provided or met, the prior agreement is not mentioned, and a new standard is set. [The reverse case also applies, i.e., when one cannot meet the agreed standards, these standards are forgotten, and new ones are established.]

Sanctimony
Acting as if oneself and/or group is unquestionably morally superior and more intelligent than specific disagreeable individuals or groups, and thereby devaluing the members and delegitimating all the views of that group.

Appeals to authority
Deeming that one’s own authority, that of a favorite expert, or that of an associated institution, definitively establishes positions currently being contested, therefore no further communication or explanation is needed and the arguments of the disagreeable parties can be dismissed.  

Dehumanizing language
Deploying language that characterizes groups as irredeemably unreasonable and not worthy of consideration, and thereby suggesting such groups should not be engaged in good faith.

Undue social pressure
Making arguments in ways that signal that disagreement will result in removal or disparagement from the in-group, as demands for behavioral conformity override the power of reason and evidence. This includes “canceling ,” deplatforming, unfollowing, blocking, boycotting, trolling, etc.

Pejorative representations
Employing openly insulting and dismissive language when describing the persons, ideas, or practices of disagreeable groups, thereby justifying the discounting of their arguments without earnest consideration.

Faking empathy and respect
Pretending to feel empathy and respect for disagreeable others in a manner that undermines their actual experiences and beliefs— “strawman empathy.”

Equivocations and false logics
Engaging involved and detailed forms of argument that are nevertheless fallacious and misleading due to subtle (and not so subtle) logical mistakes, such as strategically conflating and misusing terms (equivocation).

Manipulative framing
Using metaphors and emotional frames to lead preemptively to conclusions that are not fully suggested by the details of the argument.

Villainization
Creating the image of an “anti-hero” who epitomizes the worst of the disagreeable group, and contrasts with the best qualities of one’s own, then characterizing all members of the other group as if they were identical to that image.

Oversimplification
Intentionally focusing on only a few (or the wrong) variables when drawing conclusions about complex systems, while also dismissing as irrelevant or misleading the views of those seeking to include more variables for consideration.

Complexity smoke screen
Bringing an overwhelming amount of complex information to an argument and in so doing strategically downplaying a smaller, less complex set of variables that are actually more meaningful to the topic under discussion.

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(with a h/t to Jessica Coblentz’ “Dust in the Blood: A Theology of Life With Depression”)

…that the aetiology of depression is just as much of a hot mess as it is for autism. The best minds have basically concluded that it could be caused by about a half dozen things and given up trying to arbitrate which is the right one. It could be particular gene expressions, hormones composing in a certain way, a particular mix of gut bacteria (yep, the tiny creatures sharing your body in your microbiome can change your mood!), brain chemistry, or none of these things. This is the case to such an extent that the DSM (diagnostic manual for psychologists in the USA) gave up completely since 1980 (this is referred to as “causal agnosticism”) and was revised to simply focus on symptoms. But then this is also a bit of a mess, as the DSM originally had an exclusion for major losses (so it might be considered normal to feel depressed for several months after losing a parent or spouse, this is the “bereavement specifier”), but bracketed out other non-bereavement losses (e.g. end of a significant romantic relationship, job loss, etc.) which might not be quite so culturally-sanctioned as “loss” and then the diagnostic manual was even further revised to exclude even bereavement as well. So context doesn’t matter either!

With that said, if you are feeling depressed, do please feel free to give me a shout. It’s part of my life and that of many other scholars and friends and while we’re not experts (lol, like there can be such a thing anyway apparently!) we are happy to share from our experience of getting through and navigating low mood as part of your lifeworld.

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I was listening to radio coverage of the COVID-19 inquiry yesterday and it was remarkable to hear suddenly revealed sentiments by people who were secretly expressing their horror at the incompetence or cruelty of the people they were working with or under whilst Britain tried to mobilize an effective social response to the pandemic. The radio commentator quipped that academics everywhere are reconsidering their use of whatsapp. But I think there’s another opportunity here.

I was struck by the symmetries between that dysfunction which has been revealed over the past decade within the government and health service and my experience of working in higher education. As I’ve drifted into executive leadership in various professional roles I’ve been, with increasing frequency, confronted by policy design that causes oppression to others. When we discuss these things, the group consensus is often, “yes, we all agree it’s not great, but right now it’s too costly to be seen as noncompliant or it’s simply impossible to make changes here so I need to save my energy for another fight later” In some cases I’d expected disagreement, but instead I found some form of fear, apathy or tactics of non-confrontation. By extension, our organisations, especially in non-profit sector, are often saturated by a culture of excessive compliance. This is so pronounced that our organisational risk aversion can even result in the phenomenon of over-compliance (see the “Tickell report” for more on this).

It’s worth noting how this posture can arise from a variety of contexts as I’ve already hinted above. Some people may be deploying compliance as a tactic of resistance, e.g. choosing battles strategically or trying to stay under the radar where hostile opposition is imagined. In other cases, this can be a result of a firm belief in incremental progress (a small-c conservative value with which I’m very familiar). Or, in some cases, there may be a sense by a person that I’m too tired and traumatized to fight anymore, so I’m just keeping my head down as I need to be able to buy groceries and pay for my mortgage.

My research in ethics tends to focus on analysis of the genealogy of contemporary moral philosophy inasmuch as it conveys symmetries and dissymmetries with the 20th century. And what I’ve found is that as we survey the various forms of violence which were mobilized decisively in that age of technological and economic progress, we can see that in many cases evil arose from fear, apathy and tactics designed to avoid confrontation. It is particularly striking to observe the ways that national socialism in Germany and other fascist movements around Europe were cultivated in Universities through the introduction of small incremental policies designed to create a “hostile environment,” for “weird” folk like me, enhance fear of non-compliance, and magnify the sense of risk hovering at the gates. I’ve also observed that right alongside cultures of compliance, there were adjacent outlier movements which sought to capture idea of non-compliance as a specifically fascist ideal, situating it within the very movements that we might seek to resist, and perhaps magnifying the “everyday” discomfort with this form of action.

About four years ago, I was looking at statistics around representation in my own scholarly discipline and feeling righteous and enraged that more hadn’t been done. And as I began to look around at who I might cast blame upon for this situation, it dawned on me that in spite of my continuing awareness of my own precarity, I now occupied the elite category. In some ways, there were almost no elite categories above me in my organisation. Grappling with this led me to make a decision that when I am confronted by a policy or phenomenon that causes violence and harm to others and I cannot identify someone with more power than me who is active in confronting it, I will make it my problem.

I’ve started in some quite modest ways. People who know me well will appreciate that I am not a “fast mover”. Nevertheless, even the work of asking questions and observing problems has made my life more and not less difficult. I’ve been accused of bullying or of defiance and subversive intentions. Some former collaborators quietly disappeared, and others began to more frequently resist even ordinary requests. I’ve been accused of laziness. And I’ve done a lot of apologizing. I’ve been confronted with the quite intense levels of anxiety that flood in when you stop seeking shelter.

Reflecting on this all this weekend, it felt like it might be time to report on what I’ve learned and what’s next. Here are six conclusions I’ve arrived at:

This work may not be safe to undertake for many people: I do not underestimate the ways that colleagues, especially when they are navigating some form of un-concealable difference, precarity, or vulnerability, might find this kind of work exposes them to forms of surveillance, control, anxiety and fear that are too much to navigate. I know many people are actively seeking employment in other sectors and places (but also discovering that this form of experience is more widespread than they had anticipated).

You need friends: One of the most crucial things has been the formation of mutual aid networks, in some cases formed by friends who recognised the need to create a safe space for others. It’s crucial to have people to speak to about the things you discover, register your concern, and test out whether your reactions are warranted. In some cases, it’s a matter of friends telling you to slow down, work strategically, and helping you to expand your network in strategic ways. But I think as the narratives around resilience become more intense, it’s important to observe that the formation of support networks really isn’t enough. We need to find the energy and develop the skill to speak truthfully in places where it will be uncomfortable.

Conflict is not abuse: But people will often think it is. This phrase comes from Sarah Schulman’s book, “Conflict Is Not Abuse: Overstating Harm, Community Responsibility, and the Duty of Repair” (with a h/t to Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò’s “Elite Capture” for directing me to it). You will frequently experience contexts where other people will find the mere presence of overt disagreement and the initiation of conflict as abusive. Sometimes this will lead to disengagement. In other cases you may find yourself unexpectedly suffering sanction or surveillance as a “subversive” agent, for daring to express disagreement or frustration, especially if it is outside of an expressly interpersonal space.

Less antagonism… we’re not enemies: I’ve learned here from Chantal Mouffe, who foregrounds the work of “agonism” as a contrast to “antagonism”. I’d describe the former as “disagreement which is sustained for the sake of some mutual work”. Far too often people assume that you are trying to be antagonistic because they conflate conflict with abuse. And to be fair, many of our movements of resistance do veer towards antagonism far too often and forget the work of organising needs to be maximally inclusive (because of rage, oppression, or learning yet to be done). For me, this means that, at least in terms of how we procedurally approach our organisations, there are no enemies. If we organise our work around simple binaries of “good person” and “bad person,” “workers” and “management” it’s really quite hard to engage in the work of agonism. There isn’t always good faith in working with specific individuals, but the concept here is that we’re striving to develop social infrastructure where disagreement can be heard and changes approached as a form of discursive activity.

Sometimes we need to work on the margins and in the undercommons: I’m grateful to scholar and activist Nick Anim for directing me to Vincent W. Lloyd’s book, “Black Dignity: The Struggle against Domination.” Lloyd is unflinching in his diagnosis of modern universities, concluding that they may have become spaces where political deliberation and justice is simply impossible. Pressing for matters of justice and equality can seem quite hopeless in cultures of compliance, so Lloyd observes – drawing on the wisdom of Black activists in the USA in the 20th century – that we may need to create (tuition-free, nonhierarchical) spaces which are adjacent to the University so that we can begin to engage in these kinds of conversations. Just like there may be insurmountable barriers to conversations about repair and reform within our institutions, so too, these kinds of truthful conversations about justice and equity I am suggesting here may simply be impossible, the enclosure of our intellectual spaces may be too complete.

We are inexperienced: Finally, and perhaps most of all, I’ve learned that doing the work is hard. Especially in mainstream spaces, we have long since discarded and lost access to generational knowledge which might inform mature forms of mutual aid and agonism. I have gotten things wrong, emphasised my point too strenuously, underestimated the vulnerability of others, and caused unnecessary discomfort for collaborators. I’ve also learned so much about the unexpected challenges that wait in store for us when we start to form communities of collective support and deliberation. Our internal arguments with allies can be far more rancorous and draining, and we need to be prepared to proactively pace ourselves and care for one another as we learn. This learning is a mutual process, which requires some level of self-disclosure and vulnerability.

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So I think this might be a good summary of an ND preferences wrt/ digital systems. The author doesn’t claim to be autistic, but I certainly shout “amen” like every other line. Would love to know if others relate: https://catgirl.ai/log/comfy-software/

I also think that customisability is important because it’s often the only way that many of us can getting software accessibility. Eg by making it that way ourselves. So I’m a hacker because I like to play with digital tools, but am also starting to realize that I HAD to become a bit geeky or I would have been left behind in a zillion ways. Get to the front of the pack so you don’t get left behind…

The HackerNews comment thread for that article is also a hot and interesting mess – highlighting the ways that different ND flavours and generational cultures frame how we are allowed to speak. I found myself wondering if it was a suitable proxy for what we might find if at UOB we could pull back the curtain… c/w: discussions of depression, suicide, ablism, and generally insensitivity: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33053144

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Now that I’ve started paying attention I’ve realised there are hundreds of little papercuts slicing in at me from a hundred directions in my workplace (zero choice in software, short-notice (and often pointless) policy changes, 300 newsletters a year I have to read, module timetabling nightmares, construction noise, random beeping sounds everywhere, nightmare venues, a zillion pointless interruptions just the minute I get into the flow), and I’m really not sure where to get started. The few times I’ve brought something up informally, reactions have been either confused or defensive. I did push for a formal flexible work plan and managed to get a compressed teaching timetable, but the whole process took two years, a half dozen meetings, three separate forms, a huge input of energy, and left me feeling like I was supposed to be deferent and grateful for that systems had been temporarily shifted to run a different way on my behalf. I had colleagues who helped me with this process who were totally amazing about it all, but the process was still pretty deflating, and the end result really wasn’t what I’d asked for, rather it got shifted to a model that other people thought I needed.

What this has left me wodnering about if a useful shift in our approach to accommodation within our organisations is not to emphasise privacy and procedure, but to be relational, discursive and perhaps find ways to draw in a mentor or more experienced self-advocate with lived experience of disability as part of the actual process (e.g. sitting in meetings with you, commenting occasioally, posing questions etc.). My main problem is that as soon as things start to get difficult, I begin to doubt myself and wonder if I’m just special pleading (and there are systems and cultures which press us into this kind of thinking). Having someone with similar experience of the world to sense check a process might be quite useful. And for other people with less tenure and experience than me, I can imagine it might be even more vital.

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What tools and techniques do you use to preserve the flow (e.g. work around interruptions), lean in on your monotropic self, and mitigate challenges brought about by co-occurring bits (mood, anxiety, etc.)?

Here’s a first one to get us started: I find it takes a lot of emotional and mental energy to set up meetings. And it’s one of those things which comes at you interrupts flow and requires setup each time. And the consequence of this was that it was taking ages for me to jump in and get stuff organised even for simple one-to-ones. So I started using an online scheduling tool (first calendly.com then cal.com when calendly jacked up prices and went in a non-open direction). I created profiles for my time (e.g. when I don’t want to be interrupted, and also consolidating certain types of conversation so I can get in the flow with a series of meetings).

Using the tool had a learning curve – there were a few months where I had twice as many meetings as I could really handle in a particular interval and I had to tweak. I also found that I needed to create “public” style meeting options and “private” ones, so that friends could book in really any time they wanted with a much less restricted set of options, and certain less exciting work tasks could be put in a very specific bin. It has made a huge difference for my workflow and energy levels each week. I’ve also been pleasantly surprised to see how many (some neurodivergent) friends, colleagues and students were also really grateful to have a low-friction way of setting something up.

Cal.com opens up a website for people to click on date and time to set things up, and then automatically puts it on my digital calendar along with any special information I’ve asked for (which is very useful for one-to-one meetings with students so I don’t forget what they want to talk about). It can also do automatic reminders to people so they don’t forget the meeting and then it’s a robot nagging them and not me which is also nice.

At our University IT services migrated to a new off-premise exchange server setup last year and in the space of a week turned off all access to our calendars for external tools without warning or consultation (at least not any that I’d seen – and I would have provided a response if I’d been asked!). My attempts to explain what a severe impact this had on me fell on deaf ears. So I had three months where my diary and life were in total disarray last Spring. So I don’t use exchange for my calendar anymore. I’ve got another one offsite I use (on my own server if you’re curious). I put a message in my diary for every day of the year which warns people that I don’t use outlook for my diary. The downside is that it’s a pain for colleagues doing meeting requests in exchange. Upside is that I don’t have to worry about IT changing policies on me without consultation in the future, which I’m sure they will do.