Not So Different?
A strategy that some people want to take when they try to increase acceptance is to emphasize the similarities between a minority individual and the "norm"; to try to explain to people that, "He's a lot like you. There's no need to reject him for being different because he's not really that different." It works pretty well with racial minorities, and to a degree with minority sexual orientations; and to some extent, it's even true of people with physical disabilities, because with these categories, the primary difference is one of culture and lifestyle, one which most people can understand. But "he's not so different" is a rather misguided approach when you try to use it to encourage acceptance of people with psychological and neurological disabilities.
The fact is that despite having more things in common than not with the average person--after all, we all share the fundamental experience of being human--people with mental disabilities have significant differences from the norm. A person with a mental difference--for example, bipolar disorder--is not just a typical person who also has bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder, or any other cognitive or psychological difference, touches the person's experience of the world; the way he thinks; the way his personality is expressed. In any sense but the metaphysical, a person is his brain, and when the brain is different, the person is different.
If you try to get people to accept a person with this sort of disability, by emphasizing the parts of his life that are very much like most everyone else's, you may end up getting acceptance only of the person who would theoretically exist without the cognitive difference. That's bad enough when it happens with a physical disability (for example, people who treat Deaf folks as though they are just like hearing people, only without one particular sort of sensory input; ignoring the different experience of the world that they have, not to mention their different culture and language). It's even worse when the difference between the disabled fellow and Joe Average is something that touches the way you think, feel, and see the world.
If, for example, you gain acceptance for people with schizophrenia at the cost of getting people to accept schizophrenia itself, all you've done is gotten acceptance for their parallel-universe non-schizophrenic twins; and the best they can hope for is being treated as though they were those twins, with their differences uncomfortably ignored because they're still thought of as foreign and somewhat frightening. When people are judged acceptable because they're "not really so different", the polite thing becomes to ignore the differences. The differet-ness of these individuals become the elephant in the room, stunting relationships and forcing people to try to put on a show, acting as though these very important parts of their own lives and minds didn't exist.
When the cognitive or psychological difference becomes big enough, this sort of "acceptance" totally blocks communication, because the individual with a big enough cognitive difference sees things from such a different angle that he simply can't be understood under the presumption of sameness. Eventually, the charade that "we're all the same, deep down, really," breaks down; and with nothing to replace it, only the glaring differences remain, forcing rejection by people who don't know of any other possible reaction to unreconcilable difference.
It's probably going to be rather difficult to get people to accept these undeniably weird folks, instead of just assuming the differences must be insignificant. Neurotypicals, especially, but also some neurodiverse, are built to try to connect with people; and they do this by relating their own experiences of the world with the experiences of other people. That trick works fine when those differences are subtle; but it breaks down when they're significant. At that point, the predictable becomes the frightening unknown, and all too commonly,the result is rejection, marginalization, and sometimes even outright violence.
The fact is that despite having more things in common than not with the average person--after all, we all share the fundamental experience of being human--people with mental disabilities have significant differences from the norm. A person with a mental difference--for example, bipolar disorder--is not just a typical person who also has bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder, or any other cognitive or psychological difference, touches the person's experience of the world; the way he thinks; the way his personality is expressed. In any sense but the metaphysical, a person is his brain, and when the brain is different, the person is different.
If you try to get people to accept a person with this sort of disability, by emphasizing the parts of his life that are very much like most everyone else's, you may end up getting acceptance only of the person who would theoretically exist without the cognitive difference. That's bad enough when it happens with a physical disability (for example, people who treat Deaf folks as though they are just like hearing people, only without one particular sort of sensory input; ignoring the different experience of the world that they have, not to mention their different culture and language). It's even worse when the difference between the disabled fellow and Joe Average is something that touches the way you think, feel, and see the world.
If, for example, you gain acceptance for people with schizophrenia at the cost of getting people to accept schizophrenia itself, all you've done is gotten acceptance for their parallel-universe non-schizophrenic twins; and the best they can hope for is being treated as though they were those twins, with their differences uncomfortably ignored because they're still thought of as foreign and somewhat frightening. When people are judged acceptable because they're "not really so different", the polite thing becomes to ignore the differences. The differet-ness of these individuals become the elephant in the room, stunting relationships and forcing people to try to put on a show, acting as though these very important parts of their own lives and minds didn't exist.
When the cognitive or psychological difference becomes big enough, this sort of "acceptance" totally blocks communication, because the individual with a big enough cognitive difference sees things from such a different angle that he simply can't be understood under the presumption of sameness. Eventually, the charade that "we're all the same, deep down, really," breaks down; and with nothing to replace it, only the glaring differences remain, forcing rejection by people who don't know of any other possible reaction to unreconcilable difference.
It's probably going to be rather difficult to get people to accept these undeniably weird folks, instead of just assuming the differences must be insignificant. Neurotypicals, especially, but also some neurodiverse, are built to try to connect with people; and they do this by relating their own experiences of the world with the experiences of other people. That trick works fine when those differences are subtle; but it breaks down when they're significant. At that point, the predictable becomes the frightening unknown, and all too commonly,the result is rejection, marginalization, and sometimes even outright violence.