https://t.co/gfXjaJF2tc New study re the views of nonautistic people towards autistic individuals. The aim - to move away from negative stereotypes.
But the 'sample fictional autistic person' is a white male who likes to only talk about fantasy fiction (LOTR).
Er.../

OK, that describes about 1% of autistic people.
And it exactly matches the stereotype myth that all autistic people are like this.
But...if the aim is to improve how people respond to autistic people...how does this fictional character help?/

My concern is that the more we focus on that 1%, the more we a) forget the other 99% exist and b) the more we set people up to fail, on encountering us. I cannot begin to tell you how confused people are that I'm not a young male who can only talk about Sci-Fi & IT, for example/

...and teaching people how to think positive thoughts about a white male fantasy-fiction-fan doesn't get them anywhere when asked to collaborate with a middle aged gay mum. Let alone one who can manage a decent chat on almost any standard topic on earth/

As it happens, I can chat about LOTR, and IT. But probably no more than anyone else on the street.
If we're serious about improving autistic lives, we need to be serious about diversity.