“Daily, I get messages that invalidate me as a human because I'm autistic, with people asking me why I would ever be proud of something like that. Daily, I see, hear and experience people try to diminish my identity, and refuse to acknowledge the identity of their children, their patients, their students. When I look at the world around me, I'm reminded by the media, by politicians, by the very essence of our culture that my mind is wrong, that I'm not needed, that neurodivergence as a whole is indisputably delinquent, and that our identities are not considered important or whole.”