A friend of mine with an autistic son linked to this article.  I liked it, so I thought I'd share.

http://www.mmonjejr.com/2012/12/person-first-language-doesnt-put-people.html

I like this post from the Wellcome Trust's blog on WordPress. I'd like to tell the author that I like what she's written, and that I've posted the link to this comm on LiveJournal. But this week I'm using a slow Internet connection which doesn't cope well with WordPress. So if you use WP, perhaps you'd like to tell this author that argylesock (my ( Read more... )

Do you think it's helpful to call some people 'proto-Aspergians'? Apparently that word is used to describe people who have some autistic traits but who don't meet the critera to be diagnosed with Asperger's ( Read more... )

Back in April I wrote a post here in this community about using what they call "person-first language." That means saying things like "person with a disability" instead of saying "disabled person." My local disability centre had a whole list of them: "person with a visual impairment" instead of "blind person," because you have to put the "person" ( Read more... )

Some disabilities are at least partly visible. Not always the most important parts, but enough to get useful improvements in people's behaviour. This is one of the reasons I love my wheelchair. Nearly everybody, on seeing me using my wheelchair, responds with kindness and politeness. There's a lot that isn't visible but I get plenty of help with ( Read more... )

I was asked to post a link to this here. This is my autism blog, which I update on a very irregular basis. The latest post is about "person-first" or "person-with" language. I'm sure we've all been told that it's important to say things like, "a person with diabetes" instead of "a diabetic"; "a person with epilepsy" instead of "an epileptic"; "a ( Read more... )

A friend of mine told me that using the terms "blind" and "deaf" is offensive. She said that I should say, "visually impaired" and "hearing impaired ( Read more... )

I'm grateful to the person who taught me the sentence, 'My brain and my limbs do not talk to each other.' For me that's literally true, and it can be difficult to state it clearly when so many of the symptoms look comical. Saying, 'I have peripheral neuropathy,' tends to cause more misunderstanding than it solves.

What is a gimp? To me it's something to do with the 'gimp masks' that some kinky people like to wear but since I've been on LJ I've noticed some people using the word 'gimp' to mean (I think) a disabled person. Well I suppose that those masks are quite disabling but not all disabilities resemble a mask like that.

rainbow_goddess made an interesting new comment on this thread.