When the election happened not long ago, I warned that Donald Trump aspired to be a dictator—that our rights were in jeopardy, that he would damage this country in ways we couldn’t yet comprehend. But no one wanted to listen.
Now, recent events seem to confirm those fears. Trump has systematically dismantled the very fabric of the America we once knew. He’s sent U.S. Marines—an institution meant to embody honor and discipline—into Los Angeles to serve as his personal enforcers. He has repeatedly disregarded the Constitution, and perhaps most dangerously, he’s emboldened and legitimized some of the most racist and bigoted elements in our society.
I see the fallout every day on Facebook: people openly celebrating the arrest and deportation of innocent immigrants, often because of nothing more than the color of their skin or the country they come from. They deny their racism, but it doesn’t take a genius to recognize the hate just beneath the surface. Tragically, many of these same individuals voted to give Trump a second term.
Supporting Trump has become more than a political preference—it’s become a personality trait. And I couldn’t, in good conscience, remain friends with people who stand by him. To support Trump requires a dangerous cocktail of willful ignorance, racial prejudice, and a chilling lack of empathy. It means turning a blind eye to lies, embracing policies rooted in cruelty, and calling for the expulsion of families who came here in search of a better life.
In the age of Trump, we’ve lost our moral compass. We’re governed by the unqualified, and too many live in fear of those in power. This isn’t what America was meant to be. Our nation was founded on the idea of a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Trump has taken a sledgehammer to that ideal.
How we fell this far is something I’m still trying to understand.
I don’t know how we got here, and why people are unaware but the land that I once knew is barren and so bare.
There’s a shadow on the horizon and chaos brewing soon. I sit at my table drinking tea at noon.
I once knew a land of prosperity a land meant for the stars. Where people were treated honorably and no one was tossed aside.
I once knew a nation where law was heeded made to abide. Where we did not have to hide.
I once knew a government that was not very corrupt. Where a mad man can’t gain power, and our leader was so just.
But here we are in this new world where craziness erupts. Where chaos brews, and people fear and no one really trusts.
But hope remains and the sun will rise as it always does. We will band together, and survive the storm coming thus.
I once knew a people who were generous and kind, A people bent for unity no matter the type of mind.
I once knew the song of the wind, peaceful and divine. The movement of the rivers flowing mighty fine. The voice of the mountain thunderous and loud. A environmental so great it would make the gods proud.
I once knew the truth, That people were mostly kind. What happened to this pretty world that we left behind.
In 1943, Autism was first identified by Leo Kanner, and a year later, Hans Asperger described a similar condition. At the time, both were viewed as distinct disorders, almost like diseases, and it was decided they should be documented and diagnosed as such. Since then, individuals on the autism spectrum have faced stigma and marginalization from a society that often fails to understand these conditions. In this article, I aim to offer a glimpse into what it’s truly like to live with neurodivergence. I believe that through understanding, we can create a world where people like us are not marginalized, but embraced for who we are.
I was diagnosed with Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS) at age three, which led to many early challenges that required intervention. At 13, I was sent to a boarding school that provided me with the tools to navigate the world and overcome the limitations often associated with my diagnosis. By the time I graduated high school, I had become high-functioning enough that my original diagnosis no longer seemed to fit. PDD-NOS was considered the highest-functioning form of autism, but in my case, it was becoming clear that I could function in ways that went beyond what people typically expect from someone with autism.
This brings me to a crucial point: there are many different forms of autism. Unfortunately, in 2013, the medical community made a significant mistake by combining all of these forms under the single diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). While their intention may have been to simplify the classification, this decision has created significant challenges for people like me.
When potential employers learn that I’m on the spectrum, I am often passed over for jobs, presumed to be incapable of functioning in a work environment. The same happens in dating. People assume that because I am on the spectrum, I must have major deficits, despite the fact that I may have only minor challenges, or none at all. This assumption extends to all of us—whether we are “high-functioning” or not. The label “autism” is so often associated with severe impairments that many people simply don’t see beyond it.
If my original diagnosis, PDD-NOS, still existed today, I believe I would face less discrimination. Those with similar profiles were once diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, but this, too, was absorbed into the umbrella diagnosis of ASD. Interestingly, Asperger was a Nazi collaborator, which led to the eventual reclassification of the disorder, perhaps unintentionally blurring the lines between different forms of autism. Had the conditions been kept separate, people with mild autism, like me, might not face the same levels of misunderstanding and stigma.
Media portrayals haven’t helped. Take Netflix’s Love on the Spectrum, for example. While it offers a glimpse into the lives of people on the autism spectrum, it largely focuses on individuals with moderate to severe autism, leaving out those of us who might be more “high-functioning.” As a result, the public perception of autism often revolves around a narrow, distorted view, leaving people like me and my friends invisible.
Academically, people on the spectrum are frequently overlooked. Educational systems are often not equipped to teach us in ways that we can learn, perpetuating the false belief that we lack intelligence. In higher education, the likelihood of being denied scholarships is higher due to the stigma surrounding autism. Socially, we often find ourselves isolated because we don’t adhere to typical social norms. We are seen as “other” rather than simply different.
The harsh reality is that society often treats people who are different as inferior. There is a fear of what people don’t understand. Instead of embracing neurodivergence as just another variation of the human experience, we are often treated as though we have a disease to be separated from the rest of society.
I envision a world where such misconceptions no longer exist—a world where all people, regardless of neurotype, are treated equally and without discrimination. In this world, we wouldn’t have to hide our abilities or potential. But that remains a distant, optimistic dream—far from the painful, distorted reality we face today.
Those of us on the spectrum often have a deep understanding of what is right, just, and fair. Yet, we are constantly treated unfairly. In a world that is unjust, we remain steadfast in our sense of fairness, but we are too often the ones left behind.
Ever since I was young I wanted to enter the film industry. I didn’t know it at the time but the creative fervor of the 90s independent film boom spawned such classics as Pulp Fiction, Dazed and Confused, and Clerks had breathing room to live alongside studio masterpieces such as Jurassic Park, Titanic, and the Matrix. This isn’t even to mention the Disney Animation resurgence with films such as the Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Beauty and the beast, and Aladdin. These were all films that you could be proud were part of your childhood each one was a work of art that had such creative power! These were Films that anyone of any age could go back and watch again and again, the creative spark behind each frame bringing a smile or tear to anyone of any age, in a manner of speaking they transcended generations. But more importantly, and central to our cultural consciousness of how art evolves, you were confident that these totems to a time and place would remain the same (george lucas notwithstanding), being eternal time capsules to the myriad creative voices of a time and place; which have become foreign today.
In recent years I have lost that foundational faith.
Authorial internet is not just under attack, it is being erased and retconned. Whether it is children’s books by Roald Dahl being rewritten to not offend the youth of today or Huckleberry Finn removing it’s most offensive language to be suitable to today’s standards, we are not just reinterpreting authors words, which is and always has been fair game. We are changing the author’s words. That is something I find not only deplorable but terrifying for the future of art. Censorship is one thing. It has always existed. But to go back and change a dead author’s actual verbiage, the actual words and ideas communicated through them in essence their vision. degrades and mutates a healthy product. It’s giving chemo to a patient without cancer or insulin to a person who isn’t diabetic. The job of education, or Art, is to challenge, to push boundaries, and more prosaically to show how the world existed in the time and place of when it was written. We read Mark Twain not only for his prose and wit, but for the world he creates, a world we never got to experience. We get to experience the horrors of racism through Twain’s wit. We experience the controversial and twisted mind of Roald Dahl through his words and stories. And it is the job of teachers and readers and elders and precocious readers to discern all this for themselves. Not for political idealists who want to push their ideology on us.
Therefore, in our current era where cultural forces from across the extremes of political and ideological spectrums want to change and alter past creations, we must be vigilant in our watch. When a story comes from a time and place, it should reflect the author’s vision of that specific vision. To change it at will might seem harmless. Some say does it matter that Ariel from the Little Mermaid is black? Does it matter that Cleopatra or Anne Boelyn are being played by black actors? It is easy to say this doesn’t matter, I believe the reasoning they use is that these were fictional characters. But in an age where identity matters, and the mindset that says “to understand a culture you must be part of the culture” reigns supreme, I detect a sinister double standard. The Little Mermaid comes from a Danish folk tale. I happen to be partly Danish. My culture is Scandinavian. In an era where I can’t even wear my own culture’s insignias on a t shirt without being called racist, simply because some idiots have appropriated Scandinavian culture for white supremecist imagery, it is more important than ever that culture be respected and not changed to fit current political trends. The Little Mermaid is a Danish Folktale. It should reflect the world in which it was written. Cleopatra was a descendent of the Greek nobility which ruled over egypt. Her being white is central to her existence as coming to grips with being part of the ruling family that ruled over their colonial possession. That’s not even addressing the fact that “white” as a concept did not exist back then. Making Anne Boelyn black completely erases her English ancestry which was central to her identity. A movie about Montezuma would not cast a white man to play the last of the Aztec leaders, nor would a movie about MLK Jr cast a white actor to play a black historical figure. And for good reason. Their identities were l central to their being.
The political headwinds that are forcing creators to change past works, change the identities of the characters from past works, and the inevitable self censorship that comes with creating new pieces of art has made me despondent over the future of creativity. I’m not saying you can’t change expectations. Hermoine was recently cast as black in the Broadway Harry Potter musical. But since J.K. Rowling never specified her race and was writing in the 1990s, a time when London was a multicultural melting pot, there is freedom to interpret her character. That’s fine. But to change the past won’t fix the present. Our current issues won’t be fixed by making cleopatra or Anne boleyn or peter pan black or asian or mestizo. They only can be fixed if we can read past works and adapt them the way they were made and have a conversation about them as they are. As they were meant to be.
I am nervous all the time living in a society which thinks so little of freedom of speech; where we are surrounded by thought police and where people try to cancel us for having opinions they don’t agree with. I believe that this has hindered my progress as a writer because I can be verbally attacked for writing things people may perceive as offensive even though it’s not.
In our society we have to walk on egg shells out of fear of angering others. Our society has become so emotional and weak mindedthat we feel we have to cancel anyone with a differing opinion. This is why I am nervous with people.
I start each morning with a 20 minute session of transcendental Meditation followed by reading a couple chapters out of my favorite book. I believe that writing in a journal at some point in the morning is a godsend for the anxious mind; it is important. At 12:00 pm or 1:00 pm a small healthy meal is had, this is the basis of a healthy start to the day.
What are your morning rituals? What does the first hour of your day look like?
SimonB writes 