Like many people, I am fascinated with Greta Thunberg’s meteoric rise. For me, her appeal is not to do with her environmental campaign: it’s because she is a well-known figure on the autistic spectrum. Like Greta, I have Asperger Syndrome. I was diagnosed when I was a young teenager in 2002, before Greta was born.
While I admit that I have mixed feelings about Greta Thunberg, I find the hatred she engenders disturbing. Some of Thunberg’s detractors on social media say she is ‘mentally unstable’, ‘used by others’ and ‘fragile’. This taps into the dangerous stereotype that people with her condition are incapable of being autonomous individuals who can make their own decisions. Everyone on the autistic spectrum is different and many people with autism live with mental-health challenges. Greta is not that extraordinary if you know people on the spectrum.
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