Exclusion can take many forms. It could be social. Maybe you find yourself with out any place to make friends, to socialise, let your hair down and be yourself. It can be exclusion from work, The chance to use your skills to support yourself and play a role in shaping society. It might be exclusion from education, literal exclusion, expulsion or perhaps just a learning environment setting you up to fail. It might be exclusion from the normal human experience of starting a family, some one doesn’t want to let you marry, to have and care for your own children. Maybe you feel excluded from the world. Literally locked away in hospital or prison for the crime of being you, or maybe just denied a voice, denied the chance to speak for yourself, to have your say about about what you want, about how society should treat people like you.
If you’ve been excluded I’m sure some one has told you it’s your fault. That you didn’t follow the rules, written or unwritten. Rules that maybe seemed designed trip you up or lock you up in isolation. Maybe you were told your skills and hard work don’t compensate for not being a people person, for not being a team player. Maybe they said if they didn’t throw you out others wouldn’t want to stay. Maybe they said you’re not capable of the empathy and love a child needs. Maybe they told you being different and hard for them to predict makes you a danger to yourself and others. Perhaps the teacher said you’re unteachable. Dumb, a trouble maker not worth spending time on. That your learning takes more time and flexibility than they can give. Maybe they said you’re too disconnected from the ‘real world’ to have an opinion worth listening to.
We’re here to tell you it’s not your fault. You don’t need to apologise for your autism when it makes you different or inconvenient for the world around you because this world wasn’t made for people like you and that in itself is the real problem.
If you are autistic living in exclusion now (A.L.I.E.N.) We're here to help you. For the most part we're here to help you help yourselves but also to help others. On this website you'll find resources we hope will help you to defend your rights to be included in society. Resources to help you educate those ignorant about autism. But we're also interested in your stories. Because every time some one speaks up about how society has excluded them because of their autism it's one more voice harder to ignore the fact that society doesn't work for autistic people. We hope by collecting your stories together we can paint a picture for the law makers and influential that demonstrates things have to change.