Putting the term 'Asperger's' and functioning labels in the bin

This week's topic is something which is a bit controversial in the autistic community, given that not all autistic people agree on the subject. For this reason, I'd like to emphasise that this post is just my view on the situation and what I believe to be the most compassionate way of handling it. 

When I was diagnosed, the psychiatrist that I saw used the term 'Asperger's syndrome' which is supposed to refer to someone who is on the autism spectrum, but considered to be 'high-functioning'. However, shortly after receiving my diagnosis I realised that a lot of autistic people don't like to use the term 'Asperger's' or high-functioning/low-functioning labels and this confused me, until I researched the origin. 

Asperger's syndrome is named after Hans Asperger (see photo) who was an Austrian doctor during the Second World War and he was one of the first people to investigate autism and what it means. However, Hans Asperger worked closely with the Nazis and after clinical records that were previously thought to have been destroyed were uncovered in recent years, it was revealed that he was actually responsible for the deaths of many autistic children. The term 'Asperger's syndrome' stems from his classification of a highly functioning autistic person, who could be considered as potentially useful for work and for this reason they would often avoid being killed, whilst autistic people that were considered low functioning and therefore served no purpose for them would be executed. Basically, Asperger wasn't a very nice guy. 

For this reason, the majority of doctors nowadays will only use the term 'Autism Spectrum Disorder' or ASD when they are giving a diagnosis, however some still do, perhaps out of habit and in my case, the psychiatrist who gave my diagnosis wasn't from the UK which might offer a possible explanation as to why he used this term when diagnosing me if the regulations in his home country differ from those used here. 

The other issue is that many autistic people are attached to the term Asperger's and functioning labels and they don't want to stop using these, as that may be what they were offered in their diagnosis and they adopted that as part of their identity. From my perspective, this is valid if they are using these terms to talk about themselves, but what we should be mindful of is avoiding pushing this onto other people. Even if you yourself are autistic, it's not okay to say to other autistic people that they should use these terms, particularly when you take into account the dark and painful history associated with them.  Another point to consider is that forcing the use of the term 'Asperger's' or functioning labels can be especially triggering for Jewish autistic people who may feel excluded by these terms which were used as justification to murder those who came before them. 

Moving onto functioning labels (high-functioning or low-functioning), these are obviously also associated with Asperger and eugenics, but there is another reason why they're not so great for autistic people. Autism is not a scale with low-functioning at one end and high-functioning at the other. It is a broad spectrum of traits and areas that range from social skills to sensory needs and every autistic person is on a completely random point of this spectrum. For example, many people may consider me high-functioning, but I struggle a lot with sensory processing and as a result it's quite common for me to have meltdowns or burnout, whereas someone you may consider more low-functioning than me may struggle less in this specific area. 

In addition, this means that because of functioning labels, autistic people often miss out on getting the correct level of support. People assume that those who they perceive to be high-functioning have no issues and so they don't need any support, which I know firsthand is absolutely not the case. Likewise, they may assume that those who seem low-functioning aren't capable of doing anything and don't have thoughts or feelings or any concept of what is going on around them, but they do. 

To summarise, the term Asperger's syndrome and functioning labels are a bit outdated and the reason that so many autistic people are urging others to avoid them is because of the painful history that comes with them and the divide that they cause within our community. Whilst it may be a personal choice for some to use these to talk about themselves, it seems to be a good idea if we can all start to move past these labels and just accept all autistic people.

Thank you so much for reading, 

Ashleigh x