Eloquence

@@Nari, there's a very personally inspiring person who I'd like to tell you about. Her name is Temple Grandin, she's an expert on animal behavior who has singlehandedly altered and improved the livestock industry through her inventions and innovations. She's won awards and written books, one of which is sitting on my bookshelf right now. She's currently a professor at Colorado State University, and she is an inspiration to anyone who like me is interested in studying and understanding behavior. Temple Grandin has autism. She was diagnosed at the age of four in 1951, a time when autism was so badly understood and undiagnosed that only the most blatant cases were even recognized. She went to college, has a fulfilling career, and could participate in any fan community she wanted to in ways that would undoubtedly enrich said community greatly. There are many people like Temple in this world, and there always have been. Autistic people can be just as capable as you are, they're just capable in different ways. Frankly, it is also very irresponsible for you to be claiming to understand a disorder better than the people who have it or the psychologists that have spent the larger part of their lives working to understand it, as such spreading of misinformation could be damaging to autistic and non-autistic readers alike. I would hope that you keep what you've learned here in mind in the future, and not spread such falsehoods again. There are many autistic people on this forum, whether you choose to acknowledge that fact or not, and I think you would enjoy this forum much better if you did not put yourself in opposition with them. I would like to think that this is a community centered around the goals of understanding and harmony, after all, much like the TV show that brought all of us here.

My Little Pony is a very calming, accepting, and even a kind of therapeutic show, which is why it attracts a lot of neuroatypical viewers. Of all of the pony fans I've met irl, I can't think of one that doesn't have some sort of mental disorder, from depression to anxiety to autism to PTSD. I myself am not autistic, but I have been diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), and will often watch the show to lessen the effects of an anxiety attack. This fandom has a lot of neuroatypical fans in it as compared to other fandoms. It is a big part of why people treat the fandom with hatred and disrespect, but it's also a big part of what makes the fandom so creative and unique, and to me there is nothing more important than making the places I spend time in within this fandom feel accepting to all.