Let’s Talk! Autism and Dissociative Disorders in Media, Pt. 1
Hosted by Amanda Antell. Produced by the Let's Talk! Podcast Collective, show runner and lead producer Carrie Cantrell, and production assistant Miri Newman. Audio editing by Kylo Montez. Transcription by Carrie Cantrell. Webhosting by Eugene Holden.
Let’s Talk! Autism
Autism and Dissociative Disorders in Media, pt. 1
Amanda takes us on a tour of the various depictions of autism and dissociative disorders’ portrayal in media, and some of the harmful stereotypes that have spread from them.
Hosted By: Amanda Antell
Guest Speakers: Limes & Silver
Produced by: Let’s Talk! Podcast Collective
Released on: May 10th, 2024
Let’s Talk! Autism in the Media, Part 1
Ai Generated Transcripts edited by Carrie Cantrell
Introduction to Let’s Talk: A Space for Students with Disabilities
Naia Holte: You’re listening to Let’s Talk. Let’s Talk is a digital space for students at PCC experiencing disabilities to share their perspectives, ideas, and worldviews in an inclusive and accessible environment. The views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or positions of Portland Community College, PCC Foundation, or X Ray FM. We broadcast biweekly on our home website pcc. edu forward slash dca and on x ray 91. 1 FM and 107. 1 fm.
Exploring Autism and ADHD in Media: A Candid Discussion
Amanda Antell: Welcome to Let’s Talk Autism. My name is Amanda, the host and producer of this series, and I am very excited to introduce the topic of autism and ADHD in the media. This topic has been widely anticipated in the series for a while now, coming up multiple times in previous episodes. I was joined today by Silver and Limes, where we discussed our favorite and least favorite autistic or heavily implied autistic characters in the media. While different series were brought up between us, the consistency was that we appreciated characters that showed the intricacies of living with autism, like masking, passion, and special interests, and missing social cues in conversation. But we also agreed that extreme characterization of autistic traits is highly problematic. Please enjoy our discussion of good and bad autism representation in the media, and please pay extra attention as to why we consider these characters great examples and other characters to be terrible. Thank you, Silver, and Limes, for joining me today on our very exciting episode of Autism and ADHD in the Media. This has been a topic that has been mentioned in a bunch of other episodes beforehand, and I know everyone’s looking forward to this, and I definitely am, because quite frankly I get very annoyed by autism in the media a lot of times.
Meet the Panel: Personal Introductions and Backgrounds
Amanda Antell: So, let’s go ahead and start with intros. Please give your name, your gender, Slash pronouns, your major slash occupation, and whether you have autism, ADHD, or another neurodivergent condition, please.
Silver: Hello, I’m silver. I use they, them pronouns. I’m a gender nonconformist. I just switched my major to psychology and my minor is Russian. I’ve got diagnosed ADHD. I’m pretty certain I’ve got autism, but I’ve never had an assessment for that. I also have PTSD.
Limes: I am limes. I am currently a door dash driver, I go to PCC majoring in computer science, computer information systems ironically a “cis” degree for me. And I’ve been diagnosed with ADHD years ago but I’m very positive that I’m, on the autism spectrum. Yeah, from both me and other people in my life being like, no you’re autistic.
Amanda Antell: Thank you. So, my name is Amanda. I use she, her pronouns. I’m currently finishing up an animal science degree at Oregon State I was diagnosed with autism at age 31. But I’ve been autistic my whole life. I wish I had been diagnosed earlier, but I wasn’t, and I am just looking forward to this conversation today.
Favorite Representations of Autism and ADHD in Media
Amanda Antell: To start off, the first question I have for both of you is, what is your favorite autistic or ADHD characters in media? And that’s any medium, it can be movies, it can be manga, it can be books, it can be, anything. And do you feel that they represent the autistic or ADHD community? Why or why don’t they?
Silver: I think that Opal and Amethyst from Steven Universe are definitely ADHD autism representation, even though they’re not canonically set as anything. Because they’re like aliens. There’s beings of light. I also love Entrapta and Catra from She Ra as good representation, too. The creator of the cartoon said Entrapta, yes, was made by an autistic person to be autistic. I love that all of these characters are feminine also, like they’re not just white boys, so they’re really relatable to, me as an AFAB person. I love these four characters I think they’re more realistic and relatable and not just a punching down target.
Limes: I think a big one from when I was younger was, Abed from Community. I liked Abed a lot. I identified a lot with the learning how to people from TV. And with all the shortcomings that that can cause you as well. Two other characters I’m really fond of are the character stat from the Netflix show Q force who is a trans woman character, not only voiced by a trans woman, but I’m pretty sure she’s voiced by an autistic trans woman as well. And then Matilda from Everything’s Going to Be Okay also another character who’s actually played by someone who is on the spectrum. And I love all three of those stat, especially because, I’m real into computers. That’s the field I’m going into, and I enjoy the character and I enjoy that it’s actually voiced by someone who is the character. And then Matilda, it’s just really refreshing to see an actually autistic person play an autistic character., I think she does a really good job at, showing an autistic person as realistic because she is.
Silver: I should add that the She Ra I’m talking about is the new Netflix one, not the old school one, because it seemed like these personalities are very different from the original 80s cartoon.
Amanda Antell: That’s really interesting. I’ll be honest with you, I don’t have Netflix, I don’t know any of the Netflix shows, but I’ll totally believe both of you when you say that they’re a good representation. The Steven Universe one is interesting, because I have heard the autism and ADHD referred to with Amethyst and Opal as well, and I think Garnet with one of them as well, or maybe Sapphire and Ruby, but definitely Steven. I definitely see ADHD with Amethyst; I would definitely agree with that. Pearl reminds me more of OCD, just in my personal opinion, but I definitely can see autism with her as well. For me personally, my favorite autistic representations, I don’t know if either of you are familiar with this Disney show, but Owl House. Owl House was an amazing representation. First of all, it had some of the best L-G-B-T-Q pairings ever. Les and Amity. The reason why Les and Amity worked really well is because it was an organic development relationship. I feel like a lot of shows just put queer characters together just for the sake of checking a box. Amity started out as a bully and actually antagonistic towards the main character, but they actually grew into friendship, and then they formed an actual relationship that was really strong. And, to me, that’s 1 of the best representations of queerness I’ve ever seen in a show. So, I have a lot of complaints about Disney definitely, but they definitely did that right. But going back to the character Luz, she actually is autistic. Well, it wasn’t flat out said she was autistic, but it was heavily implied in one of the last episodes where it goes into a flashback of her and her mom. And one thing I really liked about that revelation of Luz becoming autistic is just the fact that it explained her quirks. It explained her obsession with Talesman, explained her obsession with escapism and not fitting into the box. and the flashback with the mom was really cool because it showed this principal and all these school officials talking down to the mom about just how different Luz was and how she had to be fixed. in fact, in the opening episode she was about to be sent off to a camp called, I think it was called thinking inside the box or something like that. Something pretty generic and obvious like that. I Just love that because it shows that parents are just beaten down by the system itself when they love their children, they love their children’s quirks, and they’re just told it’s wrong. And Luz’s mother was also revealed to be autistic, too. I don’t know, I really love that Owl House really earned my respect there. And the other best representation I’ve seen on a show personally, this is an older show, and I’m not sure if either of you have heard of this, but, if you’ve heard of IT Crowd, to me, Moss is the best autistic representation I’ve ever seen on a show. I’m sorry he beats out Abed by a mile. I’m sorry, Limes, no offense. And the reason why Moss beats out Abed, in my opinion, is because he definitely does miss a lot of social cues. He definitely gets hyper fixated. He definitely learns the behavior from media. I definitely agree with that. But Moss’s personality is just an everyday autistic person where you can just hear it in the interactions. You can hear it in the voice. And I just thought the writing was done very well with how they portrayed Moss’s autistic. And IT Crowd is genuinely a very funny show, it reminds me a lot of Big Bang Theory, but to me, it’s actually a lot funnier.
Limes: I’ve been meaning to check out the IT crowd, and that’s another ringing endorsement,
Amanda Antell: check out the British one.
Limes: Oh yeah, that and Matt Berry, I am sold.
Amanda Antell: Limes, you’re going to get into tech, so you’re going to love IT crowd. The very first opening line is, hello, IT, have you tried turning it off and on again? Because this character is just talking to this customer on the phone and he is trying to walk this person through how, turn on his computer. And he is like, you do know how a button works, right? That’s amazing. And I cannot wait for that to be my future., I love it. I don’t know why I find British shows really boring a lot of times, but it crowd just hits it out of the park, even with the British humor.
Silver: Yeah, I’ve really wanted to get into Owl House. I heard about it a couple of times, but I haven’t found it yet and then somebody brings it up again and I’m like, oh yeah, that was something I wanted to see.
Amanda Antell: Yeah. And beyond aspects I mentioned that I really liked about it with the autism and the genuine LGBTQIA plus couple that was actually good and well developed and actually is a real relationship. It actually has a lot of non-binary characters as well. It also has a lot of other, queer couples. It has straight couples as well. It One thing I like about Owl House a lot is that the characters are who they are. If that makes sense. It feels very organic, it feels very real, and very genuine, it’s not just, hey, this character happens to be bi, hey, this character happens to be gay, hey, this character happens to be trans, hey, this character happens to be non-binary, or we’re going to check as many boxes as possible to show we’re progressive. This is a show that was very well written. And has actually a really good story and plot line, and they’re not just throwing in all this crap just for the sake of proving they’re progressive or whatever. Unfortunately, Disney did cut it off when it got super good at the end of season two, so the creator had to scramble to make a couple final episodes, so thanks Disney.
Limes: That’s how I felt about the Netflix show Q Force. The plot of the show is, they’re all secret agents, and they’re all gay, and they got relegated to this dumb assignment in West Hollywood where they’re doing meaningless work and not allowed to be in the field because they’re all gay. And it was really good, really funny. It’s very campy. But it also got canceled after like one season. I was so sad about it because it’s very funny. And I love the show so much.
Amanda Antell: That’s awesome.
The Impact of Negative Stereotypes and Poor Representation
Amanda Antell: On the flip side, I do have to ask a more negative question. Now, what are your least favorite autistic and ADHD characters? And why do you feel like they don’t represent autism or ADHD very well?
Limes: I would definitely go with I don’t even know the character’s name, but the one from The Good Doctor that’s been going into memes and stuff. I’m not a big fan of that. I was not a big fan of, I don’t know if Sheldon Cooper is supposed to be, but I wasn’t a fan of how he was played. Those two just feel like, a non-autistic person’s idea of what an autistic person is. And then turned up 50 percent for TV. There’s more to it than like, missing social cues, and meltdowns, and stuff like that, I wasn’t a big fan of those two.
Silver: I also can’t stand Sheldon, and I also hate that show. I don’t like Bart Simpson as a person, but I think he’s a really good representation of a young boy who’s got ADHD. And this is an American family. Of course he’s going to be a little s**t.
Amanda Antell: Yeah, I definitely agree with the Sheldon Cooper thing. I honestly cannot stand his character. To me, he was funny in the earlier seasons when Big Bang itself was actually funny. The problem was they just made him more and more dislikable, and I think what happened was when autism just became more and more of a trend and got attention from the wider media. They capitalized on the autistic traits and just made him more and more autistic without actually saying he was. And with the Young Sheldon show, they made the autistic traits even worse. They basically made him a caricature of autism, which pissed me the f**k off. Just stop. If you’re going to make him autistic, then say he’s autistic, but do your actual f**king research. Do not just look up Autism Speaks and pick out the traits that they say are the best autistic traits. Yes, he’s intelligent. Yes, he is socially awkward. Yes, he is selfish, yes, he has routines, but autistic people are more than that. We’re actually capable of evolving and growing because we have to be. If we were like Sheldon Cooper, we would not be able to function in the real world, and that’s really what makes me angry about character. For the good doctor, the reason why I hate the good doctor in particular, though, is because it just doesn’t make any sense for me, because he’s high functioning enough to have this really demanding career as a surgeon. But He also is , so low functioning,, he’s not particularly verbal, and he is prone to meltdowns, but the meltdowns themselves don’t really make a lot of sense, because to me, they almost seem random in the show, whereas meltdowns, the way they actually work with autistic people, it’s a slow buildup of stress, and it just eventually, I always describe it like a volcano, we have to eventually just let it out. And there’s no stopping it at that point. Whereas Sean, it just feels like a temper tantrum rather than a meltdown. And I don’t know, Limes, I don’t know if you’d agree with me about that interpretation of it, but that’s how I feel about the good doctor. I really freaking hate the good doctor. I’m sorry. It was like a toxic representation of what autistic people could be,, again, it’s that savant character of the highly gifted autistic person, but because autistic people are supposedly nonfunctional in a way as well, they made him have crippling social anxiety and crippling verbal communication issues. So, it’s just a complete flip flop and they don’t even keep it consistent about what his accommodation needs even are in the show. I don’t even know if, the writers even know what accommodation needs are with autistic people. I would doubt it. And there is actually another good character representation that is non canon I thought of, and I don’t know how either of you feel about this, but if you, either of you have watched House MD, House’s character is almost perfect autistic representation, almost perfect. And I can go into why, but I’ll let you both respond to my comments first.
Silver: I can see what you’re talking about, and I totally agree with that.
Limes: Yeah. Wow. I haven’t thought about House in years.
Amanda Antell: So, I thought about House recently because, YouTube’s algorithm gave me clips of it for some reason. So, thanks, YouTube, I guess. But the thing about House that makes him really good autism representation,, even if the show flat out said he wasn’t, it never said he was autistic, but he definitely was very different.
Naia Holte: You’re listening to Let’s Talk, Portland Community College’s disability awareness podcast.
Amanda Antell: And a couple of writers have said he had Asperger’s or something, at least that’s what I heard. I But what makes House a really good representation of autism is the fact that they kept his accommodations consistent, not just with the cane, but just the fact that he needed to be alone a lot of times, the fact that he had also had an office that faced all of his workers or interns or whatever they were, the fact that he was in a close proximity to Wilson and Cuddy until Cuddy left the show. It’s the fact that he just did not give two craps about social rules and faux pas, and it just allowed him to be as brutal as possible with patients, which did end up saving their lives. He wasn’t a likable character, and he would have been a pain in the a*s to work with, but that’s precisely why he was such a good representation of autism. It’s because you get the good and you get the bad, and yes, they are capable of change, but it’s really hard for them. And the thing about House I find really fascinating is the fact that it was so successful that I think a lot of shows have tried to imitate it. Like Good Doctor, for example, The Resident I saw a few episodes of. I’ve seen a couple of more medical shows that to me tried to do what House did, where you have this borderline autistic character with, who’s basically a genius in medicine. Although that really wasn’t The Resident, The Resident was just kind of a Gary Stew situation. But. You just have the Savant character basically just perfect at one particular thing, but they just make the autism quirk, the entire character whereas house was a character with autism who lived with autism, and this is how he functioned. And it also showed the ups and downs of how he handled it too there were times he did lose it, there were times he handled it well, and there were times life did get too much for him. And I just, really appreciated the fact that they showed all dimensions of that with house. So, I know we went into this already, but.
Characteristics of Authentic Autism and ADHD Representation in Media
Amanda Antell: With these two questions in mind what makes a good autistic or ADHD character in media? What characteristics, habits, speech patterns, or other character attributes do you look for when a show either explicitly touts an autistic or ADHD character or just heavily implies it?
Silver: I think the sensitivities to physical stuff like light and sound and touch, as long as it’s not represented in a way that’s to bully or make fun of them being sensitive to stuff like opal being really sensitive to clutter in the space in Steven universe. She’s got to have everything. OCD set up perfect., or Catra needing to not be touched unless it’s very specific. She liked it when her ear fur was petted that one time, but then she was betrayed again or like how, really is into the tiny foods, so she’s really specific with that thing.
Limes: I do like to see characters who get really into special interests. I do like seeing that because, I know how I am with stuff like I’m a walking car encyclopedia. I like seeing stuff like that. I’d like to see more characters who don’t, talk autistic, Abed’s guilty of that, Sheldon is definitely guilty of that. It’s not to say that I don’t, start talking higher pitch and excitedly about Things, but that isn’t the whole thing. Autistic people can talk differently in different situations. I do like to see sensitivity to things Especially if it’s not done as overblown and super dramatic like I you know I have partners who can’t stand the feeling of microfiber towels like they just don’t touch them and it’s not like God get that away from me it’s just yeah no I don’t like that that sort of thing I’d like to see , I generally just look at an overall thing of getting the traits right, but not overblowing them and not like making them the whole thing. But like just putting them as yeah, that’s just how it be, this one can’t stand the feeling of microfiber towels. This one can’t stand the feeling of velvet, which that’s me. Don’t touch me with velvet. It’s gross. Especially against the grain. Getting the traits right, but not lighting them up with a neon sign that just says like autism., that’s I think what I look for.
Silver: Entrapta has the special interest thing also she’s really into tech and building stuff, and she really understands robotics and is also a walking encyclopedia. And She Ra, they showed masking really well, and in also an empathetic way, like when Entrapta would get super excited about Oh, somebody’s going to talk to me about this tech. Oh, this is so exciting. And then someone would shut her down and she would bring her welding helmet down over her face and get quiet and leave. Cause Oh, this is not cool. And then Cantra would like, oh, my cat’s traits are getting me in trouble constantly. I’m just going to cut off my hair and. Hide my kitty stripes and pretend that I’m this kind of person. And it was in both cases, really draining for these characters. And, they eventually have to , take that off later. And, they show it in a way that’s also, it’s not like you’re a failure for not being able to mask. It’s of course, you’re struggling with this. And it’s not fair that these other characters aren’t just like trying to understand you and forcing you to try to understand them. And also, she Ra specifically, they had that thing where regular characters and Entrapta, both, were shown to try to understand rather than just forcing Entrapta to understand. I guess that’s not necessarily a characteristic of, autism and ADHD, it’s more treating them with respect rather than throwing them under the bus. They struggle to communicate, but not because it’s a fault of theirs. It’s because this is the way that I communicate, and this is the way that my brain works and other people are not trying to get it. They’re expecting them to act as if they were neurotypical. Entrapta’s way of showing she has empathy is by diving hard into her tech and robotics work to help her team. And then her team goes, why don’t you care about us? And she’s like, well, I thought I, this is, I do care about you and this is why I’m doing this. It’s not, oh, you just don’t have empathy. It’s. You do have empathy, and this is how we’re showing it.
Amanda Antell: Yeah, the empathy and the masking, I definitely agree. I don’t know, I think that part of why I think I listed those characters that I liked is because they didn’t mask, and I relate a lot more heavily to that. , like Luz in particular I don’t think she bothered masking either, because I don’t, know if it was because she was like me and the fact that she saw nothing wrong with what she was doing and didn’t bother or just found it too mentally exhausting. Because if I recall correctly, her mom did try to make her do that, but Luz just never really followed through, which good for Luz. again, what I liked about Owl House is it wasn’t just about Luz’s autism. It was also just about how the family reacts to it. Which is, to me, a huge piece of it. There’s just so much stigma there., it’s the fact that these characters I liked weren’t masking that I think that’s why I like them so much and why I identify with them. But Silver’s also right where a lot of autistic people do need to mask, especially women and people raised as women. And I feel bad I’ve never watched the She Ra show because that actually sounds really cool.
Silver: There are a lot of queer relationships in She Ra also,
Amanda Antell: and in terms of what I look for in shows that actually have good autism again, I want them to be human. I don’t want them to be caricatures like Sheldon Cooper and The Good Doctor. And now The Good Lawyer, which is a spinoff of The Good Doctor,, which features a female autistic character that’s basically a female version of Sean, but in law. And I’m like, nope, not going to watch this. I’m just going to rage too much. Just nope. Don’t need to piss myself off even more. So what I like to see is just habits like House where, the autism traits are just embedded in life. It’s like his coping mechanisms again, going out to be alone or bugging patients or bugging Wilson. That was how he coped and how he escaped. Again, he was a jerk to everyone, definitely, no question, but that was also just part of who he was, and he, and they never really tried to hide that with him, and with Luz’s character, it’s just the special interest, like Limes said, where she was just so into Talesman, she’s into reptiles, she’s into drawing, And she just sees nothing wrong with that, and she is so passionate about it, and she just finds this group of people in Owl House where they’re basically cut from the same cloth, and the fact that they’re all different in some way, and they all have their own demons, and they all have their own issues. To me, that’s a really beautiful message, but with Moss and IT Crowd, I’m trying to think of the best way to articulate this, again, because it was made in mid 2000, I do think it was really ahead of its time in terms of Moss, because he is male, but he’s also black, or at least half black. I don’t know the race, of the actor who plays him, but I know he’s not white Which, again, I find, cool, because people of color often find it really difficult to get diagnosed. But Moss is, just the way Moss talks to people, just this whole, he thinks he’s going along with the conversation, but he completely misunderstands it. That opening scene I talked about, where Roy is, talking to a customer about turning on a computer by pushing a button, and he’s Moss is really accommodating to this customer that’s on his line, but he goes way into programming I don’t remember the exact line, but he said that you don’t want to be in the middle of invalid memory and you’ll end up wiping everything out or something like that. And the customer gets so freaked out. They hang up. I don’t know if you know what invalid memory is, but I don’t either. I thought it was just such an autism thing that you think you’re being helpful. You’re really trying to help, or you’re really happy to help someone with something, you know, but it just ends up backfiring spectacularly. Another example with Moss was he was at a party with Roy and the female character on the show, Jen. And Roy to tell a story about something that happened in the Netherlands, and Moss gets it wrong completely, and talks about a story about a prostitute, whereas Roy was talking about falling into the canal. So just stuff like that, just missing social cues and just why that wasn’t appropriate to say.
Limes: Oh my god, yeah I really need to watch the IT crowd I also googled it, the actor is half Norwegian, half Nigerian but yeah, over explaining things when it’s something you know a lot about, like I always have to tell myself to tone it down when I’m explaining to people who don’t know s**t about cars, like how to fix their car, cause like I don’t want them to get like overwhelmed with yeah, you can check this, this and this, and this also works with that. And this works with that. And this might be an issue, but maybe it’s that. And I’m like, just tell them to go to O’Reilly’s and get their check engine light scanned and then tell me what it says. Don’t try to diagnose it because they’re just going to get freaked out, I was gonna say another fantastic thing about Q Force is the character Stat who was never outwardly said to be autistic, but really heavily implied. Stack gets really excited when a special interest is brought up and seeing that personality shift of them going from being, a little standoffish, dry and sarcastic to like, just genuinely excited and smiling and happy, I like seeing that sort of flip because I totally understand that. Someone asked me about cars, I’ll talk their ear off and it really excitedly too because people don’t always ask me and I know I’m not supposed to just info dump on people, but if I get the opportunity, I’m so stoked. And I really love just seeing that portrayed accurately.
Amanda Antell: The special interest thing also really just hits home for me too because I’m like that with animals. I want to be a veterinarian, that’s why I’m getting an animal science degree, so I can apply to be more eligible to apply to vet school next year. But I will talk someone’s ear off about animals. You do not want to get me started. I like to think I don’t scare people, but I think I do, definitely do overwhelm people with animal care tips, like if they get a new puppy or a new kitten and I try not to overstep because sometimes I don’t know what they know, so I end up saying really basic stuff sometimes , but other times I can get yelled at for not mentioning something I consider very basic, like , you generally don’t want to feed your dog too many fruits, if any, at all. Please don’t do that. And, I just am like, okay, what did your veterinarian tell you versus what my opinion is? I don’t want to say anything against what your veterinarian said, because they’re an actual medical professional.
Silver: Entrapta’s special interest thing really is awesome too, if it comes up, then we’re talking about this, or someone asks her about , something that she’s working on, she’s like, Oh my God, somebody’s talking to me about this, let me just tell you it’s cool how, her thing with tech is also vitally important to the plot, it’s not like a funny side piece that you can just make fun of this character for having, It’s like, Oh, if it weren’t for her and her projects, half of the story wouldn’t have happened. Also, the other characters, some of them are like, I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I love that you love this. And that we’re friends and, oh, you need first ones tech. Okay. Let’s go get some for you. He, he, this is fun adventure friendship. But you know, like in real life, when some asshole comes along and shuts her up and then makes her sad and she puts her mask on her face and walks away with her hair, it’s like, oh yeah, that’s also relatable and unfortunate. And why can’t people just not suck?
Amanda Antell: Yeah, definitely.
Challenging Stereotypes: What Media Often Gets Wrong. Media Misconceptions and the Impact on Public Perception
Amanda Antell: So, what does the media often get wrong about autism and ADHD? What tropes do you see the most often, and do they worsen the general public’s perception of us?
Silver: Making every autistic ADHD character a f**king villain, as if they’re doing it on purpose and as if they’ve never tried to or don’t have any capability of caring for people that’s s**tty. Everybody has the capacity to be a good character, quote, or a bad character, quote, and it’s never just oh, you’re autistic. Therefore, you are a bad guy. And yeah, because then you like meet someone in real life and it’s like, Oh, you’re like that. Oh, are you a villain? Like I’ve seen in movies no, but if you keep talking to me like that, maybe I f**king will be.
Limes: The worst thing is the super one dimensional socially awkward, genius. And I definitely think it does worsen, people with autism to the general public’s perception, because I like to describe myself as pure of heart but dumb of a*s, I’ve had a bunch of people get to know me, and then I do the autism reveal, and they’re like, wait, you are? They’re so surprised that a person like me who, has the energy and intelligence of a golden retriever. I’m very sociable, but I can be pretty dumb about stuff. They’re surprised that that can be someone who’s on the spectrum. My favorite one was one of my coworkers, an old job I had, I told her and her, now husband, then boyfriend. She gave the stereotypical Oh my God, you’re autistic. And her husband was also on the spectrum. And he was like, you didn’t notice all of these small cues. And you didn’t notice that Limes hasn’t made eye contact with either of us this whole time, except for like really tiny glances. And she was like, oh no, I guess I haven’t. I’m like, thank you. Random man, whose name I forgot. I think the super one dimensional thing,, it just reinforced this rigid stereotype that I don’t really fit. And, I want more three dimensional characters because I don’t want the instant reaction to be oh, you’re autistic, but you’re, so social, you’re so this and that, I’m like, I can be, we can be, it doesn’t always have to be young Sheldon or the good doctor, it doesn’t have to be those, one dimensional it is just, I think the biggest thing I really don’t like to see and same with ADHD people with ADHD might be hyperactive, but it’s not literally Oh, squirrel it’s never, it’s not literally that, I just want more three dimensionalism.
Silver: The idea that an autistic person can’t have friends because they don’t know how to socialize is really f**king awful.
Exploring Entrapta’s Compassion and Humanity
Silver: And one of the great things about Entrapta specifically she sees, It’s the humanity and everything and is so compassionate for everything. And in a way that like, oh this robot is unique and has a personality and it’s my friend and this clone is unique and has a personality and is also my friend and I have empathy for all of these things and all of you guys and I want to have friends and Some of you guys are just really mean to me, and I don’t understand why you’re so mean to me.
Amanda Antell: Yeah, I definitely agree with all those points.
Navigating Social Landmines: The Autistic Experience
Amanda Antell: The caricatures and, again, the example you keep bringing up Silver, is a really good one, because it sounds like a really three dimensional approach to autism, and just how women and people, racist women, have to contend with all the social stigma of that, and just, again, all the, I call them social landmines, where it’s Even when we grow up watching different people around us there’s still like a bunch of unsaid social rules, and we just end up unintentionally setting a social landmine off, and suddenly we’re in trouble. I always hated that about social interactions growing up. It’s like, I am following all the rules. What the s**t is happening?
Silver: And then they don’t tell you that you’ve worked for them.
Navigating Social Dynamics and Misunderstandings
Amanda Antell: Yeah, exactly.
Naia Holte: You’re listening to Let’s Talk, Portland Community College’s disability awareness podcast.
Silver: They’re just like, now I’m mad at you and I’m acting cold and distant and we’re like, why are you suddenly acting cold and distant? What happened? You should know what you did. How would I know if you don’t f**king tell me?
Amanda Antell: Exactly. We’re not mind readers. Seriously, I would always get yelled at.
The Challenges of Masking and Social Acceptance
Amanda Antell: Especially if we don’t even like people to begin with. if I’m asked, it’s very minimal. I don’t even know if I do or not, to be honest. But if I don’t like someone masking, basically, it’s not existed with me. I just won’t interact with them at all.
Personal Stories of Struggle and Misunderstanding
Amanda Antell: I don’t know if I’ve told the story in the podcast or not, but when I was in kindergarten close to every day I was sent to the principal’s office because the kindergarten teacher and I did not get along at all., quite frankly, this woman was insane and should not have been working with kids, but , I hated her and she hated me and it was mutually understood in the class. Suffice to say, the principal got to know me very well. And it was borderline entertaining for my mom sometimes, it was so bad, I was so miserable in that classroom that after I was dropped off, I would just go to the library and just hang out with the animals and the librarian. So, it wasn’t like I ever left the building and I’m pretty sure the principal knew where I was at after the first week, but they would just let me hang out there as long as possible because they knew how abusive this woman was. They did not want to send me back there. My mom did try to have me switch classes, but they didn’t make an exception for me. Because again, I wasn’t diagnosed, and they couldn’t make an exception for me because then they would have to make an exception for everyone. And that’s yeah, public school in a nutshell.. Although I can’t really imagine it’d be better at private school anyways.
Media Representation of Autism: The Good, The Bad, and The Misleading.
Amanda Antell: Anyways, going back to the actual topic of conversation., I would definitely agree that the tropes you mentioned definitely make it worse. , Sheldon Cooper, young Sheldon, definitely skew the public’s perception of what autism is and looks like. And another issue with Sheldon and young Sheldon specifically is the fact that, despite how. Socially inept, they are it makes it look like we can function without any other accommodations. These are selfish characters. They’re really insanely smart characters, but as long as 1 or 2 needs are met. They can function in every other way I think young Sheldon, he was living alone in Germany for a while, I think they’ve just gotten to the point where he’s in Germany now or something, but he was going to college, and his own dorm room, and , if he can’t even function without his mom at home, he would not be able to function in a freaking dorm room hours away, that’s just not realistic. So that’s what pisses me off about that too, it’s just how, again, the accommodation aspect of autism and just how meltdowns happen, I have never seen an accurate portrayal of autistic meltdowns in media, I don’t believe. There might have been one in Owl House, and I might have missed the episode, but I’ve never seen an accurate portrayal of how meltdowns actually happen. I’ve always just seen them just happen really suddenly, where, they don’t show this buildup of stress, how it just explodes out eventually.
Silver: I think Catra in She Ra gets accurate meltdowns because they do show how somebody does this to her and somebody else does that to her. And there’s this chain and, you can just see like her ears and then her tail and then she explodes. And some people are like, I can’t believe you just did that. But the viewers are like, of course she just did that. I relate to that a lot because I’m also like the feral cat you’re poking me, you’re touching me you’re saying things to me, you’re forcing me to wear these clothes and you’re forcing me to eat this food and forcing me to hug strangers or family or something. And my ears are going back and my eyes are getting like, you can see the whites over here and I stiffen up and then I bite someone and it’s like, how dare you silver?, that happens really clearly with Catra. Until you brought up the Accurate portrayals of meltdown thing, I hadn’t seen it either, anywhere except with Catra.
The Impact of Accurate vs. Inaccurate Portrayals of Autism
Amanda Antell: In the times you have seen media portray autism or ADHD accurately, what would you say that it does improve the public perception of us?
Limes: I think it can improve public perception. I always worry that there’s a generally well-meaning part of the population, but well meaning too much, that they’ll see, a positive character and then still end up infantilizing people. And stuff like that or want to talk to me about it in a way that I don’t like oh, all of this this character is autistic. Do you do this? I know we’re all different people. But I think Matilda’s a good example of portraying things positively and showing that she’s a more well rounded person they show her warts and all and, I think that can help improve public perception especially with the more well rounded characters with autism come out.
Silver: Yeah, getting to be whole people with good sides and bad sides makes Autistic and ADHD characters so much more relatable. Like Oh, look at how they’re not just a villain. They’re in need of being coddled. That’s also bad. But like a whole person with interests and dislikes and good sides and bad sides, a neurotypical could go, Oh, well, this person reminds me of so and so in my family.
Amanda Antell: No, I definitely agree with all of that. I like the fact that we do have actual examples of good Autism representation.
The Impact of Negative Stereotypes on Autistic Individuals
Amanda Antell: Like, all of us have examples, but what I don’t like is the fact that the good examples are just not as well known as the bad examples. We keep bringing up Sheldon Cooper in Good Doctor where it’s like, , Moss Catra, I like the fact that we all have those, and I’m hoping that your shows are more popular the ones I’ve brought up, but again, everyone knows about Good Doctor, everyone knows about Sheldon Cooper, and I’m not sure it’s because they’re just on mainstream platforms, or if that’s just what the general public accepts that autism is now, but I really hope that good examples can overtake the bad examples eventually, But the only way that’s going to happen is if the general public actually watches shows with good representation and actually think to talk to us, because I think that’s the thing I don’t like about autism being coming more and more mainstream, honestly, one idea is presented, one image is presented, it’s not just what autism looks like, it’s about how to interact with us. There’s like specific rules and in terms of how to interact with us. And it’s more than the liberal mindset. There’s just this approach that people , just get unconsciously trained to do. Going back to the House thing, the thing I really liked about House was also the fact that other characters tried to fix him. Cameron, I hated Cameron. With a burning passion, I hated her. And I never knew why until , just saw the scene where she was on a date with House, and House is like, you don’t want to love me, you want to fix me., oh my god, this is why I hate Cameron, she’s such a self righteous b***h. Oh my god, you think you can make House a better person because you don’t think he has empathy? B***h, you’re the one who has no empathy, you’re the one who’s, you’re honestly one of the most selfish, self righteous characters on the show. , I hated Cameron, as you guys can probably tell. But, there were a couple of characters that just tried to fix him. And it just didn’t work. And when other characters weren’t trying to fix him, , it just showed a really accurate portrayal of relationships he had. Whereas other shows, like Good Doctor, that is pure infantilization. That is pure everyone is taking care of Sean, , And everyone takes care of Sheldon, but again, a contradiction of that is somehow they’re both of these characters are able to live on their own and have relationships and not that that’s bad. It’s good that they can have relationships. But if you’re going to say that they need to have their needs taken care of by literally everything. You can’t just turn around and say they’re independent enough to live their own life. That’s just a complete contradiction. And that just sends a lot of mixed signals to people.
Silver: The last one that reminded me of, elizabeth Salazar from Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, because she was considered a ward of the state and getting checks from the government for living expenses because she was determined to be an invalid. She’s a book representation of a girl with autism and ADHD, but she was also really good at computers and hacking, and that’s a stereotype as normal. She wanted to prove that she didn’t need to be considered a ward of the state anymore. But then her friend was like, you’re going to need to do adult responsibilities you’re going to have to do taxes and come to your court hearings if you don’t want to be considered a dependent. But she’s like anti social and would just not pick up her phone sometimes. And they would give her a pass for a while. And she was considered incapable of taking care of herself. everyone just treated her as if she was stupid, they treated her as if she didn’t care about people and because of her history of being abused, she didn’t want to speak up for herself because people didn’t listen to her anyway, and then, society would go, oh, well, if you’re not going to speak, then we’re going to assume that you didn’t understand us and that you can’t, and so you don’t deserve to have any rights. It was a long three book series.
Amanda Antell: I actually read that series and I agree with everything you said, but I just want to say, when she finally fought Camilla, it pissed me off because it was a buildup for five books, and it ended up being the most pointless fight. interaction ever. Well, okay, I wouldn’t say pointless, but the way Camilla died, I just was like, are you effing kidding me? This was a buildup for literally five books, and their interaction ends in two pages? Are you f**king kidding me? You tortured me with the entire third book, which was basically Lizbeth essentially slamming the court system for their failures, which is well deserved. I was just looking forward to final fight with Camilla and Lisbeth, I guess it’s a different author, so I shouldn’t be too angry. After the third book the original author died. So, someone else actually took over writing the books, because the manuscripts were actually complete, but the reason why they took so long to come out is because there was this huge legal battle between the author’s wife and I think his brother, if I remember correctly? . And I like the writing style a lot better, but holy crap, the quality of the story went down on. And it wasn’t a high quality story to begin with, but you don’t have enough to work with for the final confrontation of Camilla versus Lisbeth, the least you could do is like just Do something better! . Suffice to say, the last three books were a s**tshow.
Silver: I’m gonna pretend that they ended at the first three, then.
Amanda Antell: I think it is with that third book. I don’t think it was very satisfactory. I did think the death with the nail gun was awesome, don’t get me wrong, I love that. That was actually one of the best death scenes I’ve ever read in a book. But I wanted that confrontation, there’s just no way Camilla wasn’t dead. I wanted to see that final fight so bad, especially because Camilla is like the ultimate sociopath. she’s the opposite of Lisbeth. She can control people because she’s so good at social cues. She’s so good at Relationship. So you have the ultimate autistic versus the ultimate sociopath. , I honestly love that and I was looking forward to that so much. ’cause to me, sociopathy and autism are sometimes linked together, like you said in that villain sense .
Silver: She’s like a medium, good, medium, bad representation of an autistic character, because Elizabeth has a little bit too many of the ,
Amanda Antell: well, to be fair, she has major PTSD.
Silver: That’s, yeah where does autism trait end and trauma side effects begin?
Amanda Antell: I’ll be honest, one thing I liked about Elizabeth is that she lived out my fantasies of taking out revenge on people that pissed me off.
The Importance of Authentic Representation and Community Voices
Amanda Antell: going back to the questions even in cases where autism and ADHD Is represented in a negative or inaccurate life, would you still say it’s necessary to include these characters for the sake of representation? Like the good doctor and the Sheldon Cooper characters, even though they’re bad representation of us, would you say it’s still good to include them in the media for just the sake of representing our community?
Limes: I think I would say like inaccurate. No, I wouldn’t want that, I wouldn’t want to veer away from an autistic character who is a negative character I always feel like the ultimate form of representation of any group of people is to show that they’re not all good. They’re not all bad. I, a person with autism can be a giant d**k. That can just be a thing, and, I think negative would be important just for well roundedness, but inaccurate, definitely no. If you’re going to show like group people, you should be accurate with how you show them. Especially if it’s being a media , for other people to consume who might’ve never had interactions with, that group of people inaccurate. Get that out of here. But allow us to be bad people as well as good people or , bad, but for complex reasons, that’s what people are. People can be a lot of different things.
Silver: I agree with negative yes, inaccurate no. If you’re gonna show an autistic or an ADHD person as the absolute worst stereotype ever, that just makes it worse for all of us. But , a villain who’s doing things for an obvious and understandable reason, and also has good qualities, is a whole a*s person okay, yeah You can’t just assume oh, you’re a marginalized person, therefore you can do no wrong. That’s just not real. Everyone can do wrong, right? Depending on what your societal morals are. , I think there’s one benefit of having inaccurate portrayals because then you get everyone coming out of the woodwork saying this is wrong and here’s why, and this is how to make it better, which, that’s good, right? Because if there were no portrayals at all, then there wouldn’t be anything like that. No one would be able to come out and say, well, this is right because, and this is wrong because it’s just, well, it’s missing. So what do we do? Nothing, I guess. when people come out and say, This is wrong and here’s why that probably doesn’t get as much traction as the inaccurate portrayal does in the first place.
Amanda Antell: I have a lot of mixed feelings on this because I’m with silver where it’s even with inaccurate portrayals, you do get people coming out of the woodwork and criticizing, like you said the Sia movie I don’t want to open up a can of worms by mentioning that, but let’s be honest, that’s one of the worst representations of autism out there, if not the worst. I haven’t seen it either and don’t torture yourself. I’m not suggesting you torture yourself. It’s not worth it. But one thing I will say about that though is, so many autistic people and autistic actors came out to criticize Sia about just how bad that was and just this is what autism actually looks like. So that was like a huge media firestorm from the autism community. So I will say that was nice in that level, but what sucks is the fact that that movie freaking exist. But seriously, this movie was so bad, Autism Speaks didn’t claim credit for it. Sia she used Autism Speaks as a source, and Autism Speaks, point blank, said they had nothing to do with the movie. It was that bad. That’s actually impressive in the worst way possible. What I would say is, to me, accurate representation, as much as I prefer that, I do like the negative aspects of autism represented as well I know you keep mentioning like, villains as autistic, but I honestly can’t think of any villains , or maybe there are villains, or characters I’ve seen that are meant to be villains, and I completely miss that they’re villains, but even if they are shown, I guess it’s good that we’re getting conversation about autism, but it’s a slippery slope in my opinion, because I also don’t want autism to be a checkbox, essentially, like the LGBTQIA plus community is I don’t know if you guys have seen Deadpool 2, but the Relationship, I think it was Yu Gi Oh and Megasonic Teenage Warhead, I think were the characters, it was like those two characters, where , oh hey, it’s a lesbian couple , and those characters have, they’re awesome characters with great powers, and they have literally , like five minutes of dialogue if that, I think actually even less than that, maybe two, they had to have like ten lines for the whole movie. That’s not inclusion. That’s not representation. That’s just you checking a box. Don’t pretend you’re doing any communities any favors by doing that. I guess the short answer is. If autism or ADHD is presented at a negative or inaccurate light, at least explain why this is a negative or inaccurate. Let’s start a conversation and not just use these characters like circus animals.
Naia Holte: You’re listening to Let’s Talk, Portland Community College’s disability awareness podcast.
Reflecting on Personal Experiences and the Power of Representation
Silver: So, I think Cruella de Vil is probably autistic and she’s definitely a villain. She’s really specific about her Dalmatian stuff and it has to be this way. Catra is. Very much a villain character. Eventually she’s got her redemption arc, which is cool. But she does so many things that make people just hate her because how can you be like this? But obviously she’s doing this as a response to what she’s f**king been through. That’s why I like Catra as a villain. Because, this is why she’s doing these things that she’s doing. Rather than like Cruella who just is portrayed to be some evil b***h who just wants to kill a and there’s, I’m talking about the original cartoon for that one. And then there’s evil stepmom type characters who are like narcissistic or particular, like those they may be a negative portrayal of autism, but I can’t like think of any besides my literal mom who is the villain of my life and not a character in a story who seems to be narcissistic and has done a lot of terrible things, but that’s because of unaccommodated needs and a response to the world that she grew up in.
Limes: I think there’s the episode of Community, where Abed is hanging out with Shirley, Annie, and Britta, and they get him to be mean to other girls because he over describes and all that. Thinking more on it like, it is gross to show weaponizing autism against people. But I did like showing, an autistic character, falling prey to manipulation for the grounds of friendship, because that’s something I’ve definitely done. Definitely allowed myself to do stuff I wouldn’t normally for the grounds of oh, these people are going to pay attention to me and hang out with me. And that’s definitely like a negative portrayal of autism of Abed just having all of these cruel things that he notices immediately. I like seeing just that vulnerability of wanting friendships, especially if you’ve, had social difficulties, especially we’re all in our 30s. I don’t think there was as much good autistic representation. We were all kids and being socially weird wasn’t accepted the way it is now thanks to meme culture and a lot of well at least like internet culture has made it and seeing a character do negative things just to fit in just really hit home to me even though I don’t think it was necessarily right to show weaponizing someone’s autism as a thing.
Silver: Entrapta was also manipulated like that. She was part of the bad guys because Catra said, oh, where are the princesses? They abandoned you. They left you here. They claim leave no princess behind. Well, they left you behind. And We’re not going to leave you behind. Guess what? Also, Adora left me. See? See? She claims that she’s so good, but she left me. And now she left you. And Entrapta’s like, oh. And then Captra starts using her for her tech stuff, but then there’s another character, Scorpia, who’s like, we’re friends. And Entrapta’s like, oh my God, I finally have a friend. And you care about my stuff. And I’m going to make this stuff. And it’s so great. And then Scorpia is like a real friend, but like Catra’s mean and the big bad evil guy is also at first terrible and using her for stuff. But yeah, the princesses, they were, Oh, you’re weird. And you don’t understand this, and we can use you for your tech. But then she got abandoned and they thought she was dead, but Catra convinced her that she was abandoned. And yeah, the being manipulated for friendship.
Amanda Antell: Yeah, that’s a trigger point for me, honestly, because I don’t think I’ve ever been used like that, like Abed and Catra have, but I definitely have been in social situations where I was, okay, maybe I have, because I thought everyone was happy with me, I was going along with what I was supposed to do, and suddenly I’m out and I’m being yelled at. I had no idea why. The most touching scene I can think with Abed in particular was after this group study Annie was doing with this one Insane Professor where they just had a bunch of subjects like just sitting in this classroom for like 12 hours or something like that. It was like this ridiculous amount of time, and it was like the experiment to see who would give up fastest, and Abed stayed the entire time until Annie told him to go home, and I think, correct me if I’m wrong, Limes, but there was like a scene where she asked him why he stayed so long, and if he was miserable, and if he’s like, yeah, I was miserable, it was awful, and she’s like, then why did you stay, and he’s like, because you needed me, you’re like, you’re my friend. That very human wanting to please social aspect of autism is just, to me, such a sensitive thing, where we’re trying so hard for the people around us, and we’re just not given any credit, and the bad part about that scene is, unless if Annie had asked, Abed never would have said that, because it never would have occurred to him, because to him, that’s just the natural thing you do. And I’m like that too. You suffer for your friends because, I guess for lack of a better way of saying we don’t have many or don’t have any because we just don’t… we aren’t… at least I’m not good at building a relationship or keeping them I guess. I shouldn’t, I don’t want to group you guys in with me in case you’re actually good at that.
Silver: I’m also bad at making friends and stuff, being social.
Limes: Yeah, I just, let them come to me and it’s worked, but yeah, as I’ve gotten older and more confident with myself, I’ve stopped doing the whole I’m going to pretend to be neurotypical thing. And part of that is what I like to call pretty privilege. I’m, I get called cute enough that my awkwardness is endearing or it’s written off -able as endearing. But also, I just, I don’t care if someone thinks I’m weird. I know I’m weird. Whatever. I don’t have to be friends with someone who needs me to not be weird.
Silver: Yeah, and Trapp just sat there, hidden in the ducts, waiting for, her team to rescue her so they could all go back. And she was like, I’m just going to wait for them to come get me. And then they never did. And she’s like, they’re going to come get me. And yeah, Catra was like, they left you here. Don’t you think they would have picked you up by now? Oh yeah, they would have for any other member of the team. But it was easier for the princesses to be sad about her dying than for them to, like, think, oh, she’s not here, let’s go get her. So that’s, how it was so easy for Catra to tell her that they actually didn’t care about her, but we care about you.
Autism in the Church: Structure, Rules, and Belonging
Amanda Antell: I wonder if that’s why autistic people feel comfortable in church. Like, I’ve heard that, where it’s like, Because of the social rules, like, are more explicitly stated, there’s, like, comfort in that, but sorry, that was off topic. That’s reminded me of how church does trick people into joining them.
Silver: That makes a lot of sense with the structure and the rules and the, like you said, clear spoken expectations.
Amanda Antell: But there’s also those invisible rules where it’s like, if you don’t do enough volunteer hours, you’re suddenly the devil. Or, like, you’re not, kissing the preacher’s a*s or something. I have a lot of bitterness towards church.
Advice for Writers on Portraying Autism and ADHD
Amanda Antell: So, the final question, what do you want to say to writers of any medium about using autism or ADHD in their characters?
Silver: Nothing about us without us. Don’t just write as if you know without consulting anyone who is.
Limes: To go off that, don’t just talk to one of us. Talk to a bunch. Get a real well-rounded thing. And also, like, don’t be shy about showing, the downsides of the more negative things,, because they definitely do exist. It wouldn’t be, like, autism wouldn’t be its own thing if there wasn’t, like, good and bad stuff. Just definitely, like, talk to us. Try to get autistic people to play your characters. I get that there’s not always going to be, someone who is on the spectrum who’s available for this, specific fictional character. But like, if you can always try to actually get an autistic person to play an autistic person. Definitely talk to us and talk to a lot of us and just really get a well-rounded thing. And I wouldn’t say like no jokes about being autistic because, I make jokes about being autistic myself all the time. It’s one of my favorite things to do about myself. That and like, my mom passed away. That’s really funny to me, to make other people uncomfortable sometimes if I don’t like them., don’t shy away from the negative and don’t think you can’t make jokes, but like, make jokes that are good and actually would make an autistic person laugh. Not just, make people laugh at an autistic person.
Silver: And even better than talking to and referencing Autistic and ADHD people hire them into the writer’s room, like oh, I’ll give you a commission for doing this interview with me. No, how about you hire them with a wage to be part of the creative process?
Amanda Antell: Right on to everything both of you just said. For me Yeah, just talking to actual autistic people, and talk to people on different parts of the spectrum. Like, talk to low functioning, talk to nonverbal, talk to verbal, talk to high functioning verbal, I don’t really care how you categorize autistic people in your head, just talk to multiple people who have different needs, different accommodations, and just, and different coping. seriously, talk to people who have different coping mechanisms, because no matter how different we are, we can just recognize an autistic coping mechanism when we see it. Maybe I’m just speaking for myself here, but I feel like that’s how I can identify other neurodivergent people pretty easily. I just recognize what they’re doing. And it’s like, there’s no explanation needed. There’s no justification needed. I know what they’re doing. They know what I’m doing. It’s just a comfortable understanding there. And to me, if you incorporate that in your characters, you represent autism in a really good way. Because the more human you make your characters, the more people will treat us as humans.
Closing Thoughts on Autism Representation and Community Engagement
Amanda Antell: Do you have any, closing thoughts or statements you would like to add?
Silver: Rebecca sugar, I think that’s what their name is, the one who wrote Steven Universe, explicitly said that none of the gems are neurotypical. Like outright. So that’s cool. And I just, I haven’t seen Steven universe in a couple of years, and I wasn’t able to watch any before this, but, I just talked a lot about Catra and entrapped cause I have been watching that lately and I just want to be like, but also don’t forget about Steven universe.
Limes: I want to say like, it’s okay to ask me about the autistic experience. Even outside of this, podcast, if any, one of my friends or,, people I know want to ask me about it. , I’m very fine to talk about it, but also like, don’t assume that my answers are indicative of everyone. And then, try to watch better representations. Try to watch more than young Sheldon and the good doctor, because, I just want to be treated as a person and I want it to be more understood that if I don’t understand a social norm, or if I come off as rude, I’m not meaning to usually and that I can be talked to about it and asked about it and I will happily explain myself and explain how I got there but like, actually listen to me and not just assume you’re right and I’m making excuses. Just treat us better treat us nicer and understand that we’re a little different that’s fine. Everyone’s different. Everyone’s weird.
Silver: Yeah, like the basic respect and treating us better thing goes right into if you expect us to make all sorts of efforts to understand you on your level, how about you show us the same, if you want us to do that, then please also put in the effort to try and understand where we’re coming from.
Amanda Antell: Yeah, definitely. so, to echo that, I would just say if you’re going to watch Good Doctor or Young Sheldon or Big Bang Theory, Those are caricatures of autistic people. Actually ask us how accurate that is, so if you’re not going to watch any accurate portrayals, ask us, if these aren’t accurate, and we will go on and explain why they’re not. That, that’s all you have to do. Just very simple awareness that these are caricatures of autistic people. They’re not really accurate or real representations at all. Cause we actually appreciate having conversation with people, at least I do personally, cause if I have conversations about my autism, they don’t make assumptions about me. Or, at the very least, the assumptions are minimized. And I can talk more and more about what living with autism is actually like, and I can tell you every time I’ve done that, it’s been a very good experience, and people walk away with a better understanding of at least my autism, and I hope a better sense of empathy for people who think differently than them. So, thank you, Silver and Limes, for joining me today. It was an awesome conversation, and I hope you join me for another talk.
Silver: Thanks for having us, Amanda.
Limes: Yeah, definitely. Thank you. This was great.
Amanda Antell: Thank you for listening to today’s episode of Let’s Talk Autism. I hope you enjoyed the comparisons of different characters, especially in what makes for good and bad representation. The good characters I would like to highlight are Catra from She Ra, Abed from Community, and Luz from Owl House. Silver’s Choice highlights the many aspects autistic women and people raised as women face while living with autism, such as masking, being expected to meet social criteria, and sensory issues. Lime’s choice in Abed is a great example of autistic people learning behavior through external sources like media, along with having a lack of filter in social situations. My Choice in Luz is a very emotional one because not only did she unlock her true power when the show said she was neurodivergent, but also explored the family dynamics autistic children often experience. The universal negative stereotypes brought up were Sheldon Cooper from Big Bang Theory and Sean from The Good Doctor. As stated before, these are caricatures of autism and not actual representation. The main take home message that I want the audience to have been to pay attention to how neurodivergent characters are presented. If they lean towards one or two traits in an extreme way, they are most likely not accurate portrayals. Otherwise, I would Ask the audience to just talk to autistic community members directly about particular characters and what makes good representation. Thank you for listening. And I hope you tune in for the next episode.
Naia Holte: Thank you for listening to Let’s Talk, Portland Community College’s broadcast about disability culture. Find more information and resources concerning this episode and others at pcc. edu forward slash DCA. This episode was produced by the Let’s Talk Podcast Collective as a collaborative effort between students, the Accessible Education and Disability Resources Department, and the PCC Multimedia Department.
We air new episodes biweekly on our home website, our Spotify channel, and on X Ray, 91. 1 FM and 107. 1 FM.
Carrie Cantrell: Eugene Holden is our webmaster. Carrie Cantrell is the Show runner and lead producer, with Miri Newman as Production Assistant. Amanda Antell is the host and producer of Let’s Talk! Autism. Kylo Montez was the audio editor for this episode.