@@KateyOneMoreTimeIf you have any tips, I'd love to hear them. I can't get a diagnosis-- it costs thousands of dollars here, and there's literally no one in town who can even perform the assessment for me :/
Yes thank goodness. Not that autism isn’t every bit as serious but honestly bipolar is rather a bit “scarier,” in many ways so, it feels like it would be quite a relief. (Struggling to make sure I’m not being ablist or anything offensive but I’ve lived with a few people who were bipolar and known a lot more people with bipolar and it’s a really big overwhelming disorder)
@@soniasulaimanthe advice I was given to start was to focus on stopping masking when I’m able - unsurprisingly I scored ridiculously high in masking behaviours! - and to stim and engage with special interests as much as possible. I was lucky enough to have an autistic psych actually diagnose me and he explained that working on those things are most important for regulating. ❤️
@@ultravioletpisces3666I kinda get what you mean but I suppose at the end of the day my experience hasn’t changed. I’m still someone who has experienced extreme depression, anxiety and has attempted suicide. Being autistic in an ableist world has been really hard and there’s no medication to make it easier. However, you’re right, there has been some relief, but for me it’s more relief that I have a label that is already proving so much more useful. For a long time I’ve felt like a ‘bad bipolar’ who wasn’t trying hard enough or something because I could never get on top of my symptoms, if that makes sense.
Hm, makes me think about my friends who have been very upset with Klein's stance on Palestine (which they take as trying to protect her legacy after diving into conspiracies and propaganda about us early on). They don't trust her, in other words.
Ah interesting. I confess I don’t know much about Klein outside of reading this book. There was a chapter in it about Palestine and Israel that I felt was a very mixed bag. She used the doppelgänger imagery in reference to the victims of the Holocaust becoming the victimisers of the Nakba, for example, which I thought was reasonably well done. But while she says she is anti-zionist, she’s also sympathetic to Zionist Jews. Like much of the book, there were strong elements, but others felt a bit wishy washy at best.
@@KateyOneMoreTime - I am from Canada. I am a bit more familiar with Naomi Klein's husband's family than I am with hers. Her husband's great grandfather Moishe Losz (Lewis) was a leader of a bund and menshevik who came to Canada after being interrogated for days by the Soviets. His son, David Lewis, who coined the phrase "corporate welfare bums" was the second leader of the Federal NDP, after Keifer Sutherland's grandfather Tommy Douglas. I have a book passed down from my grandparents written by David Lewis called Make This Your Canada. David Lewis represented the anti-communist left. David's son, Stephen Lewis, was the leader of the Ontario NDP before going on to try to eradicate HIV in Africa. His wife, Michele Landsburg was a journalist whom Naomi Klein once worked with. I have been a fan of Naomi Klein's husband, Avi Lewis, since his Counterspin days. Avi's sister is a lesbian who used to be married to the lead singer of the Parachute Club. Naomi Klein has a brother Seth Klein who used to work for the BC Branch of the CCPA. He wrote a book comparing fighting climate change to war. Their father is a doctor and mother is a documentary maker. Do not watch her Not A Love Story. They came to Canada from the USA during the Vietnam era. Naomi Klein's grandfather was a cartoonist who was blackballed by Disney for going on strike. In this book, Naomi Klein was trying to understand the other side, which is likely why she came off as wishy-washy. The best take away is how pain and fear can be turned into hate - that it is the manipulation of emotions that leads to genocide. Naomi is a longtime supporter of Palestinian rights. Naomi Klein's big book is Shock Doctrine. When she and Shoshana Zuboff (author of Surveillance Capitalism) started appearing on stage together, they each went away with both books melding together in their minds. I personally think that this is where Doppleganger really started. Surveillance in an Era of Pandemic and Protest - Intercept - youtube - features both of them together - there was a couple times before that. I know nothing about Naomi Wolf - except what I have heard from others. Presumably, she made an error in one of her books and was factchecked live on TV - it was a rise and fall story. Then she started hanging around with Bannon.
It kind of seems like the structure of Doppelganger mirrors deradicalization methods in some ways. It makes me wonder if that is a goal of this book, and that maybe the target audience was actually current Naomi Wolf fans rather than established feminists/leftists/etc. Because I really agree with what you were saying around @17:30, that this book could have been more interesting had it spent time discussing how followers of White Feminism can so easily flip over to the "mirror world", but I wonder if I think that because I consider myself to be an "established" (but ALWAYS learning) leftist and feminist. Idk if any of that makes sense but I'm going to leave it lol I really enjoyed this video a lot, thank you for your hard work!
I literally just clicked on this cuz I hadn’t seen a Katie flowers video in so long and wasn’t sure what it was or if you had a doppelgänger or what but I’m so glad I clicked! Lol
I found that the first year or two after being diagnosed autistic (as an adult) put me in a really fragile place emotionally. Particularly when it came to engaging with media or situations that shine a light on the ways autistic people are mistreated. Soon after my diagnosis, I saw an event advertised called ‘dealing with anxiety and autism’ so I went along. Everyone else there was a parent of an autistic child and some of them had brought their children with them. They spent a long time complaining about things they didn’t like about their children. One mother snarkily talked about how annoying it was that her son recites train timetables. And he was right there with her! At the end, I went up to the organiser of the event and asked who was this event meant to be for, and I expressed how upset I was hearing people just lambast their autistic family members. I couldn’t keep my composure and started crying. But she didn’t seem to see the problem and said that people need to let out their frustrations sometimes. Anyway, just to say that if you’re experiencing something similar, go easy on yourself. It gets a little easier the more you ease into this newly understood aspect of your being.
I'm sorry, that sounds truly awful. Sure parents need to vent sometimes but do so in therapy, or at parent groups but not at a public event or in front of their children! So thoughtless.
Wow what I horrid thing to experience - I’m so sorry that happened to you. It’s just heartbreaking to hear how some parents really don’t know how to just love their kids. Our world is so ableist and children so dehumanised that some parents think they’re ‘owed’ a particular kind of child. I have no words, but thank you for sharing and for validating how sensitive I feel right now. ❤️
This was such an interesting discussion. I have such a hard time understanding conspiracy theories and alt right extremists. Also as someone diagnosed as autistic (and with other mental illnesses) as an adult, I sympathise-it’s a heck of an emotional journey.
Thank you, Katey. I enjoy you so much. Your frank presentation and authenticity are refreshing...and yes, I made it to the end. Lol. Hug Ollie for me. ☮️💟🐾
A lot of people, myself included, mourn for a childhood lost to not having an autism diagnosis, but honestly there's such a good chance my family would have gone down the ABA path. My great aunt said autism is caused by vaccines back in 2008, long before we had any idea about me being autistic.
What you said about autism sounds a bit like the conversion therapy they used to do on LGBTQ2 people to try to "straighten" them out. Speaking of intersection, there is a lot of pressure on women to be a certain way, so being a woman with autism, you got pressure both ways. As women, we are encouraged to beat ourselves up if we are not perfect. It may not be as literal as punching one's self in the face so one does better next time. Trying too hard be perfect makes one abusive. Trying too hard to be seen as a good parent can make one an abusive parent. Kids should be loved as they are unconditionally. Parents should not get upset at the kid because they felt the kid made them look or feel incompetent. Sorry you went through that. Some people find it easier to believe a discredited study linking autism to vaccines than to admit that they may not be a perfect parent. There is no such thing as a perfect parent or a perfect kid. My parents were not perfect. Neither was their tree-climbing daughter with the hairy birthmark that covered 1/8th of her face. Naomi Klein has been a feminist since the Montreal Massacre, but she doesn't really write very much about feminism directly. She tends to focus more on capitalism in her books. Shock Doctrine is what she is best known for. Doppelganger is a huge departure in both topic and writing style. Don't know much about Wolf, but your take on her makes her sound an awful lot like Sheryl Sandberg. My favourite critique of Sandberg (which is of the white neoliberal feminism you speak of) is "Lean In: A fairy-tale in a fantasy land" by Monia Mazigh - July 11, 2014. "Sheryl Sandberg is talking to a small, restricted “girls’ club.” And I admit, it is a fine discussion. In theory, I agree with most of it. But it forgets all the other women who are in another world. Not the world of Silicon Valley or Capitol Hill or fancy lawyer’s Manhattan towers. They are the women who work in the fields, in the factories, in the offices, in hospitals, in schools. They are the women who do not have nannies to feed and clean their kids, or wealthy husbands to pay their bills. Sheryl Sandberg’s book is excellent - but only for women who are like her! It gives them a moral boost. It motivates them to climb the corporate ladder from being a manager to becoming a CEO. However, her book, for many other women, me included, means nothing. It is another fairy-tale to add to the list."
