# Semantic Battleground: The War of Neurodiversity **Covers**:: **Source**:: [Semantic Battleground: The War of Neurodiversity](https://threetrackmind.wordpress.com/2021/03/04/semantic-battleground-the-war-of-neurodiversity/) **Creator**:: [[threetrackmind.wordpress.com]] # Highlights ##### ^217948693 ###### ^217948693q The notion of neurodiversity is very compatible with the civil rights plea for minorities to be accorded dignity and acceptance, and not to be pathologized. And while the neurodiversity movement acknowledges that parents or autistic people may choose to try different interventions for specific symptoms that may be causing suffering, it challenges the default assumption that autism itself is a disease or disorder that needs to be eradicated, prevented, treated or cured. ^217948693 ##### ^217948694 highlight_tags:: [[Autism]], [[ADHD]], [[neurodiversity]] The phrase standardized measure of functioning strikes me as a important part of this debate. Any standardization cannot encapsulate the experiences of everybody it effects. There is a difference between trying to standardize Autism and ADHD and trying to cure it ###### ^217948694q Disability – When an individual is below average on a standardized measure of functioning and when this causes suffering in a particular environment ^217948694 ##### ^217948695 ###### ^217948695q if we dip into the wide range of features that are seen in autism, we will find differences and disabilities (both compatible with the neurodiversity framework), and we will find examples of disorders and even diseases, which are more compatible with a medical than a neurodiversity model. ^217948695 ##### ^217948696 ###### ^217948696q What is attractive about the neurodiversity model is that it doesn’t pathologize and focus disproportionately on what the person struggles with, and instead takes a more balanced view, to give equal attention to what the person can do. In addition it recognizes that genetic or other kinds of biological variation are intrinsic to people’s identity, their sense of self and personhood, which should be given equal respect alongside any other form of diversity, such as gender. But to encompass the breadth of the autism spectrum, we need to make space for the medical model too. ^217948696