Escaping Tumblr

“I was also on Tumblr with an agenda. Over the past ten months, I had stumbled deeper and deeper into the neurodiversity movement, which frames autism as an identity as well as a disability and blames society for ‘oppressing’ autistics.”

Before it policed the limits of my imagination, Tumblr expanded them. I created an account in May of this year, energized by my first foray into autism advocacy and eager to explore “disability culture.” In many ways, Tumblr is perfect for teenagers on the spectrum. It erases the anxiety and pressure associated with oral communication, offering a straightforward framework for social reciprocity. I quickly found a place within the #ActuallyAutistic community, where I bonded with other users over shared struggles. We swapped practical tips: lists of websites that sold high-quality earplugs, strategies for coping with loud environments, suggestions for navigating the college accommodation process, collections of novels and movies with disabled protagonists. The aesthetics, too, were enchanting. I filled my feed with mesmerizing gifs: sky-colored soap sliced into paper-thin, luminous shards, rain falling rhythmically onto glistening pavement, a hydraulic press crushing candles and hot wax spilling out. “Come for what you love, stay for what you discover,” read the pop-up that prompted me to make an account. And so far, I loved what I had discovered.

I was also on Tumblr with an agenda. Over the past ten months, I had stumbled deeper and deeper into the neurodiversity movement, which frames autism as an identity as well as a disability and blames society for “oppressing” autistics. The #ActuallyAutistic crowd endorsed neurodiversity with forceful, even zealous enthusiasm. I latched onto the notion that everything about autism ought to be celebrated and that I should resist any attempt to overcome my impairments, as doing so would culminate in the dilution of my “true” self. Thanks to Tumblr’s algorithms, I could find plenty of accounts that endorsed these beliefs, and I could block the ones that did not. I received abundant positive reinforcement for posting about autistic pride and culture. It was fertile ground for indoctrination.

To reinforce the concepts of autistic identity and solidarity, I joined other users in #ActuallyAutistic Tumblr’s favorite pastime: identifying ableism in all its insidious forms. We were not picky about where we directed our anger, combining forces with physically disabled and chronically ill users to broaden our repertoire of outrage. Everything from bad parking jobs to fictional doctors on television to appreciating empathy to “inaccessible” graphic design could trigger tidal waves of righteous fury. At the time of writing, Tumblr’s most popular posts tagged #ableism include a declaration that “every single person who doesn’t support a universal healthcare system thinks that some people who get sick and can’t pay deserve to die;” a complaint about a news story describing a child who bought his friend a wheelchair (“I hate ableds and their [expletive] inpiration [sic] porn”); and a rant about France winning the World Cup, deemed problematic because “French autistic children are being forcefully removed from their parents and shoved into freezers.”