Are you forgetting about neurodiversity? — Worthwhile Language Advice

“I know one of your principles is ‘incorporate other perspectives’ but I feel overwhelmed sometimes because there are just so many types of people out there? Maybe you can suggest one perspective I might be forgetting about that I can start with?”

Yes! I’ve got a good one for you. If you’re neurotypical, you might be forgetting about neurodiversity. It’s an incredibly common thing to do.

When people forget that there are different neurotypes, they sometimes make inaccurate judgments about another person’s character or attitude or work ethic or feelings about them.

I’ll illustrate with two examples from the internet series Subway Takes.

(For my neurodivergent readers, I imagine you’re rarely-to-never forgetting about neurotype, but these examples might still be useful when explaining a neurodivergent perspective to others.)

Subway Takes is an internet talk show hosted by comedian Kareen Rahma. The show appears in short form on Instagram and TikTok and as longer videos on YouTube. Each episode begins with Rahma turning to his guest and asking, “So what’s your take?”

The guest then gives their “hot take” and justifies it as Rahma asks follow-up questions and tells us if he 100% agrees or 100% disagrees. Guests are most frequently comedians or actors or content creators, and the tone is almost always light-hearted.

Recent takes include, “Fun socks aren’t fun anymore,” “Any dinner reservation or plan after 8 pm is way too late,” and “The recliner seat has ruined the movie-going experience.”

So let’s look at two times a hot take completely erased neurodiversity.

In Episode 440, actor and popular content creator Delaney Rowe’s take is, “There’s no such thing as being a bad texter, they just don’t want to respond.”

When Rahma 100% disagrees, she reveals that she is guilty of the very behavior she’s about to criticize. But, she says, “it takes a bullshitter to recognize bullshit.”

Rowe goes on: “People go around thinking being a bad texter is like a pathology, but it’s not, it’s a cop out…The convenient self-identification of bad texter is conditional. When a bad texter gets a crush? Best texter in the world…When a bad texter needs something from you? Best texter in the world.”

She ends by calling out what she sees as the two lies people trot out when they revisit a text thread and see they haven’t been responding: 1) “Oh, haha, didn’t see this!” or 2) “Weird, I drafted something and didn’t hit send.”

Rowe’s take isn’t that different from other guests — everyone giving their take is being judgy in some way. In this video, she’s making judgments about character and about the way “bad texters” maintain a relationship with her:

Bad texters are transactional and will ignore you until they need you (or have a crush on you).
Bad texters are liars and will make up bullshit excuses.
Bad texters don’t care that much about you and aren’t that invested in your relationship.

These are all reasonable conclusions if her premise is right, that people aren’t responding to her texts because they just don’t want to.

But the comments tell a different story. Because in addition to glossing over differences in values or the kinds of relationships people have with their phones, Rowe had completely forgotten about people with ADHD.

ADHD creates real challenges for texting. What looks like ghosting or neglect may just be distraction.

Commenters wrote things like:

“I have 100% drafted texts then gotten sidetracked and not sent them
ADHD is a trip 😅”
“(laughs in ADHD and time blindness)”
“I have adhd and am a bad texter and I feel awful about it.”
“some people truly dont have adhd and it shows. we are living completely different experience cause 100% texts are tasks that can be put off and forgotten like any other task”
“Neurodivergent (AuDHD) girl here who is genuinely a bad texter and WANTS to text people back so bad and talk to the people I love but is so overwhelmed with the stimuli of the world and is trying (very hard- and often failing) to keep up with a world created for the neurotypical brain”
“…as a little kid I used to pray that I would be able to stop forgetting important things and that people would believe me. Lol. Things genuinely poof out of my brain constantly… it sucks to be misunderstood in yet another way.”

So, while Rowe’s conclusions might be spot on when it comes to neurotypical people, it turns out they’re not applicable for people with ADHD and AuDHD. The comments from neurodivergent viewers point out that they are living a completely different experience from her and that it makes them unhappy to be misunderstood yet again.

Take 2! In Episode 412, musician Ashley Mayorquin’s take is: “We need to stop villainizing overhead lighting.”

She adds, “Sometimes you don’t want to be sleepy at 2 pm.” When Rahma points out that overhead lighting is unflattering, she responds, “I’m confident no matter what. I could look like shit, but at least I’m awake, I’m alert, I’m aware.”

Reflecting on the trend towards lots of small, lower-light lamps, Mayorquin continues, “Not everything needs to be aesthetic. When I turn on that one big light, you don’t have to act like you’re melting… People who are afraid of the big light, they are afraid of their own potential.”

So in this hot take, Mayorquin is suggesting that people’s responses to lighting are solely based on aesthetics, vanity, or some kind of anxiety or fear.

But Mayorquin forgot that there are neurodivergent people with sensory input issues whose experiences with light and lighting are quite different from hers.

Commenters wrote:

“for us with neuro-divergency, the overhead lighting can be painful. nothing to do with aesthetics, or whinging.”
“no. not afraid of the big light. i have photophobia. it literally hurts my eyes!!”
“the people are not afraid of the big light, they are afraid of migraines”
“The big light is a sensory nightmare. I will not.”
“Not just aesthetic i get headaches from that overhead light. Cant imagine having it all the time”
“Big light = Migraine”
“as someone with extremely sensitive eyes, when a big light is flicked on, I feel like I can’t breathe lol I’m instantly squinting and disoriented”
“My autism is scared of big lights”
“She’s giving neurotypical”

It’s ok to have a fun hot take. I am never trying to stop people from being funny or creating good comedy or just being fun to listen to.

And both of these takes would have been just fine with a tiny caveat up front. Something like, “If you’re neurotypical, then…” and then moving on to the take.

It can be as simple as that. Just noting, “Hey, I recognize that these judgments apply to some people but not to all people.” How seen and taken into consideration those neurodivergent viewers might have felt! Then they could just enjoy the video and not be reminded about how often they are misjudged, misunderstood, and forgotten about.

But! This means that if you’re neurotypical, you have to know from the start that neurodivergent people are having a different experience from you.

That the way neurodivergent people deal with phones and texts and time and memory may be different from the way neurotypical people do it. That the way neurodivergent eyes and brains and ears process light fixtures might be different from the way neurotypical eyes and brain and ears do.

If you’re neurotypical and you don’t have neurodivergent people in your life sharing their perspectives and experiences with you, the only way to learn is by doing research.

For ADHD, you can start with this list compiled by Healthline. And for books on autism, you can start with this list compiled by The Ability Toolbox and this list by The Autism Books by Autistic Authors Project.

Because the best starting point for incorporating other perspectives is to know that those other perspectives even exist.

Worthwhile offers cutting-edge digital training along with “train-the-trainer” options. Scalable, cost-effective, and always science-based, we offer video courses on optimized language for smoother sales, optimized language for customer service, strategic language for managers, inclusive language at work, and more.

Are you forgetting about neurodiversity? — Worthwhile Language Advice

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