The real problem with Word Crimes is that it sucks.

Word Crimes, the Weird Al Yankovic song where Weird Al Yankovic tries to pretend he is Nirvana or Lady Googoo or whoever trying to pretend they are him, bluntly put, sucks.

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Yes, I am calling you a retard. Live with it.

Before I get to the meat of the matter, I want to tell you about one of my favourite authors, George Orwell. Or Eric Arthur Blair as he was known to people around his home. Eric‘s biggest talent other than creating stories that were equally frustrating and compelling to read was writing about the cause-effect between how people behave and what they are taught to believe about themselves. His masterful way of writing is reflected in the fact that this relationship I have spoken of is indeed equally demonstrable no matter what order you write it in.

When things avoid intention, part two: The endlessly mobile goalpost

So, after admitting that (once again), my grand plan to off myself did not go to glory and I am still here, I decided to post a little bit about what motivated the “decision” in the first place. One thing that has made me question the value of not just my life but life in general has been the perceived propensity of persons in my life to change the rules based on what I have just said.

Offensive language. Real offensive language, I mean.

In the constant back and forth about the use of so-called “person first” language (that is, “person with autism” or the like), a dangerous gambit or concession emerges. The “person first” camp, with all of their smugness and self-entitled ignorance of the implications, like to tell us that it is up to what the individual prefers. This seems perfectly reasonable at first, in spite of how some of them attempt to use this as a platform from which to bully us into adopting it. But just like “person with blackness” or “person with Hebrew” or “person with Chineseness”, to cite just a few potential examples, are unacceptable and not a matter of preference, neither is “person with autism”. I do not care what you have to say for yourselves, “person first”ers. I could be the only autistic individual in the world who feels this way about your separationistic language. That would only mean I am right, and everyone else is wrong.