Quotes About Diversity

Every person with autism is unique, with a different profile of strengths and challenges.

different way of thinking and learning. People with autism are people first.

We'd discuss one unwritten rule and a hundred exceptions would instantaneously appear.

There is often too much emphasis in the world of autism on the deficits of these children and not enough emphasis on developing the special talents that many of them possess.

By cultivating the autistic mind on a brain-by-brain, strength-by-strength basis, we can reconceive autistic teens and adults in jobs and internships not as charity cases but as valuable, even essential, contributors to society.

Geeks, nerds, and eccentrics have always been in the world; what has changed is the world itself and our expectations of others within it.

Do not allow a child or an adult to become defined by a DSM label.

Parents and teachers should look at the child, not the child's label, and remember that the same genes that produce his Asperger's may have given the child the capacity to become one of the truly great minds of his generation.

I feel that my local bias frees me from the global bias that gets in the way of top-down thinkers.

we generally focus more on what they can't do, and tend to overlook the positive traits many of these individuals possess.

So it's not that autistics don't respond to eye contact, it's that their response is the opposite of neurotypicals'.

author Donna Williams, who is autistic

America has only three cities: New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans. Everywhere else is Cleveland.

Why, man alive, Laura! Just look about you a little. What do you see? A world full of common people! All of 'em born and all of em' going to die! Which of them has one-tenth of your good points! Or mine! Or anyone else's, as far as that goes - gosh! Everybody excels in some one thing. Some in many!

The different people are not like other people, but being different is nothing to be ashamed of. Because other people are not such wonderful people. They're one hundred times one thousand. You're one times one! They walk all over the earth. You just stay here.

But in all seriousness," Hyacinth continued, "what is he good at? Simon's better at numbers, and Anthony knows more of history. Colin's funnier, of course, and—" "Art," Sophie interrupted in a sharp voice, a little irritated that Benedict's own family didn't see his individuality and strengths.

They say I can open movies, and that's nice in that it puts into people's minds that women can do it. It's not just Kevin Costner, not just Arnold Schwarzenegger. Not just the guys.

So much for the famous 'Hoosier hospitality.' When we moved to our new house, no one stopped by with strawberry rhubarb pie or warm wishes. Our neighbors must have taken one look at David and Jerome and locked their doors - and minds - against us

All that you ever need to know about genitals is that they are made up of flesh, blood, and millions of tiny, restless nerve endings - anything else that you read into them is mere hallucination, a product of your own overactive imagination.

But true equality won't come until boys learn to embrace girl stuff as well.

We make assumptions every day about other people's genders without ever seeing their birth certificates, their chromosomes, their genitals, their reproductive systems, their childhood socialization, or their legal sex. There is no such thing as a "real" gender - there is only the gender we experience ourselves as and the gender we perceive other to be.

So long as we refuse to accept that "woman" is a holistic concept, one that includes all people who experience themselves as women, our concept of womanhood will remain a mere reflection of our own personal experiences and biases rather than something based in the truly diverse world that surrounds us.

Whenever I hear someone who has not had a transsexual experience say that gender is just a construct or merely a performance, it always reminds me of that Stephen Colbert gag where he insists that he doesn't see race. It's easy to fictionalize an issue when you're not aware of the many ways in which you are privileged by it.

People often squabble over what defines a person as a woman or a man—whether it should be based on their chromosomes, assigned sex, genitals, or other factors—but such reductionist views deny our indisputably holistic gendered realities. For all of us, gender is first and foremost an individual experience, an amalgamation of our own unique combinations of gender inclinations, social interactions, body feelings, and lived experiences.