Author: kirkwallhellmouth

A thought on making difference ok

realsocialskills:

One issue with accommodations and modifications in school, is that it can often be hard to avoid stigma. Kids don’t usually like being singled out or doing things conspicuously differently. Also, nondisabled kids often resent it when disabled kids are allowed to do things that they are not allowed to do.

Further, one frequent objection to accommodations is “but if I let one kid do this, then all the other kids will want to.”

Sometimes that’s true — and, often, the best solution to that problem is to just let all the kids do whatever the thing is. Sometimes there’s no good reason to restrict access to something. Sometimes changing the rule works better than making exceptions to it.

One way that something works to correct this problem is to make some of their accommodations available to other kids who would like to try them. The kid who has a documented need for accommodations probably isn’t the only one who would benefit from them.

And even aside from that, it’s good for kids to explore the world and experiment with different ways of doing things. This is a good way to learn that difference is normal, and that doing things differently is a basic fact of life.

For instance, if one kid needs to use manipulatives for math, maybe try making manipulatives available to all the kids.

If one kid needs a large print worksheet, maybe make a few large print copies and let kids try doing it that way.

If one kid needs to chew stuff, maybe make things available for other kids to chew.

If one kid needs to use fidget toys, maybe make them available to all the kids who would like to try it.

If one kid needs to type, and you have the resources to make that available to other kids too, maybe let them try doing assignments that way. And let the kids that works better for continue to do it.

And, beyond that, it helps to get in the habit of providing different ways to do things even when there isn’t a kid who needs them as a specific accommodation.

Not in the sense of “take a walk in the disabled kid’s shoes”, this is not a disability simulation. The point shouldn’t be empathy building, and it should not be presented as being about the disabled kid. The message is “there are a lot of legitimate ways to do things, and it’s ok to experiment and figure out what works for you, even if most people don’t do it the same way as you”.

You can’t always do this, and you can’t always do this for everything. When you can, it helps, a lot.

6 Random Facts about Yourself and tag 10 people

Tagged by sniperct​. Not tagging anyone ‘cause I…just don’t usually tag people.

I am putting this under a read more because a couple of them could kind of use content warnings.

1) In fourth grade, I was the one the other girls in my friend group came to for relationship advice. At the time, I found this very confusing because I was the only one who wasn’t ‘dating’ and had never ‘dated’ (I found the entire concept of fourth grade dating bizarre). Later I realize they probably asked me because they realized I was probably the last person in the world who would ever attempt to “steal” their boyfriends.

2) I once had a moment of such intense anger that I literally “saw red.” I also think it was a good thing that the person who provoked that response was online and several thousand miles away, as if we’d been in the same room I probably would have also found out what it felt to punch someone in the face.

3) Changing medications for my anxiety/depression combo made me realize I’d probably been dealing with at least the anxiety side of things for way longer than I’d even reallized. Probably since around puberty, or at least since my puberty got re-jump-started after I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, started on insulin, and started growning again.

Also, one of the manifestations of my anxiety, starting about…six or seven years ago was compulsive eating. I gained somewhere in the area of 50 to 60 pounds almost entirely from the combination of anxiety-driven compulsive eating and having to give more insulin to cover those carbs. Since getting on new medication, the compulsion to eat has stopped, just like a switch was flipped (it flips back on the week of my period, though, which sucks), and I’ve gone down almost 6 pounds.

4) I don’t like my breasts. I have never liked them. I have never wanted them. After getting on insulin, puberty really kicked in and I went from an A cup and sports bras only to a C cup and underwire minimizers in…a really short amount of time. Now I’m somewhere between a D and DD. They make clothing harder to shop for, the contribute to my back issues, sometimes feel like they are flatting my ribs, and I just…do not like them at all. They are like housemates that I cannot afford to kick out and thus just deal with them. For the moment. I really want to get breast reduction surgery someday.

I am torn between trying to go down to an A cup…or just having them off completely, nipples and all (I’m not really that attached to my nipples, either, and the type of surgery they usually do for people who have diabetes (or smoke) involves a way of doing it where the nipples end up not attached to nerves or anything once it’s done. So they’d basically be there for cosmetic reasons, and I wouldn’t really see the point for me, personally, to keep them). But while I might enjoy having a flat chest, I know I would not enjoy dealing with people’s curiosity over why it is flat. Because many people really wouldn’t be okay with an answer like “I didn’t want them.”

5) I tried starting a novel in 7th grade. I introduced all the major antagonists, including their full names and ages, within the first two pages and then stopped because I realized it sucked. That world, though, continues to grow and evolve–it has changed a lot since I first started poking at it in 7th grade–and even though I haven’t really written anything for it.

6) There are for quotes on my potential tattoos list. Two are from books (Doctor Zhivago and Harry Potter), one is from a comic (a Captain America quote), and one is something my mom said to me as I set out to…take an exam or something shortly after I changed meds and started feeling better.

beranyth:

bythegoddess:

why do people listen to aro/ace ‘criticism’ from people who have made it expressly clear they’re aro/acephobic

like maybe people who outright say they don’t believe it doesn’t exist or have any worth are…people who don’t have any ‘criticism’ of worth to say maybe…justtt maybe

thisssssssssssss

I’m so fucking tired of seeing the opinions of people who pathologize asexuality or aromanticism promoted, or those who say we’re “just straight people who want to be special snowflakes” or “sexually repressed airheads who are too pathetic to be ~liberated” or “gay/lesbian in denial with too much internalized homophobia to admit it” or “can’t get a date so make up an orientation” etc etc etc being treated like they’re the Word of God on us because they can find something to lash out about, or manage to wrap their bullshit up in enough buzzwords for people to swallow it

sometimes the criticism itself is legit but guess what, it’s so fucking easy to keep an ear to the ground for every possible way people from a marginalized group can fuck up and then SHOUT IT FROM THE ROOFTOPS and then get legitimacy for whatever hateful shit you spout the rest of the day

it’s especially heartbreaking when I see ace/aro people–especially kids, which I see a lot–dutifully reblogging it because they’re trying to be responsible and mindful, and inadvertantly give a pedestal to people who don’t care about them at all and want to perpetrate everything that’s harmed them

micdotcom:

Over 87,000 people are calling for Charleston to remove its Confederate flag 

After the massacre in Charleston, South Carolina, left nine black people dead, all the official flags throughout the state flew at half-mast. All but one: the Confederate flag. The symbol of slavery remained full-mast, defiantly flying high at the S.C. State House. Now nearly 100,000 people are fighting back — but sadly, it will take great effort to get it removed.