hey there hexbear nd gang! it’s that time of year for the first time ever!

here we are once again approaching the end of the year according to the roman imperial calendar that we all have to use for some reason. it’s the winter holiday season in the global north, a time of great symbolic significance to many people.

and so, i want to solicit your thoughts about this community, what it means to you, how you’d like to see it evolve, changes in moderation policy, suggestions for thumbnail and banner images, or anything else related to the comm or neurodiversity in general.

or just come hang out!

i also want to invite applications for new moderators for this comm. what would you like to do as a moderator for c/neurodiversity?

personally i’ve largely been a placeholder, but i do love this community and i want to see it grow as a shared and safe space for our neurodivergent comrades to talk about ourselves and with each other. i also want to do better and want your input about what that means.

c/nd has a well behaved user base so we don’t need extra mod help for enforcement or anything like that. what i’m mainly looking for is fresh perspectives on community engagement and growth.

there is absolutely no requirement to disclose any personal information about yourself, just to make that clear. but if you’re interested in moderating this community, please contact @CARCOSA@hexbear.net, myself, and/or the other nd mods with an application.

if deadlines help motivate you, you have 3 days from the time you read this.

if deadlines harm your motivation, don’t worry about it. if an application comes in a month or two from now of course we’ll still consider it. this isn’t a job, i’m just asking for volunteers to help moderate a small internet message board.

Application

What is your Hexbear username?

Do you have any preferred pronouns?

What are your thoughts on capitalism?

What are your thoughts on imperialism?

What are your thoughts on trans rights?

What are your thoughts on racial justice?

What are your thoughts on neurodiversity?

What do think about current and previous protests around the world?

What are your thoughts on Veganism and Animal Liberation?

Do you have any experience with other leftist online communities? What did those experiences teach you?

What is your approach to moderation, and how do you work with teams?

How do you deal with online drama and people who try to start things for the sake of it?

Do you have any ideas for c/neurodiveristy community engagement?

What is your general time availability? (amounts, common browsing times, etc)

Element information

Element is a messaging app that lets you talk to people over the Matrix protocol.

To get started, check out this link, where you can choose to either download Element for your platform or, if on a computer, open it in a browser (“Launch Element Web”).

The instructions that follow are for the desktop application and the web application, but the process is similar on all apps:

  • Press “Create Account”
  • We host our own Matrix server, so if you want you can change matrix.org to chapo.chat. This is completely optional; users who sign up with a matrix.org username can still talk to people with chapo.chat username. (Note: It is chapo.chat, not hexbear.net. Also, registrations aren’t always open on chapo.chat; if they’re not, just create an account on matrix.org)
  • Fill in a username and password
  • Hit register, and you’re done!
  • CannotSleep420
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    11 months ago

    How do I know if I’m masking? I think I’ve lost myself in the mask.

    • bubbalu [they/them]@hexbear.net
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      11 months ago

      I am by no means an expert. What cued me were feelings of guilt around certain stimming activities and the fact that I have very different voices in different spheres of my life. That indicated to me that my performance was just that. That realization coupled with my partner who has a much higher degree of autism consciousness led me to critically reflect on my behaviors. For instance, my most natural voice sounds a lot like many offensive caricatures of autistic people in media so I learned early on to mask it.

      If you feel lost or repressed, I would consider reflecting or meditating on why you feel that way instead of looking at the framework of masking prescriptively. All of these concepts only really work when they resonate or feel descriptive. Whatever you find will aid you in self-understanding.

    • ReadFanon [any, any]@hexbear.net
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      11 months ago

      If you’re late diagnosed/late self-identifying then it’s really common to feel this way.

      I experienced a lot of childhood trauma and a metaphor of unearthing has always resonated a lot more with me than anything else, and this applies to unmasking as well - rather than it being a distinct “real me” behind a facade, I feel like my adult life has been like an archaeological dig site where I gradually removed the dirt to uncover what has always existed below the surface (i.e. the trauma and the masking) and the more I uncover, the more I can put the pieces together and the more coherent or integrated it all becomes over time.

      An example here is that I might be extremely people-pleasing due to the circumstances I grew up in but beneath that is a strong sense of justice and an ability to assert myself in situations where there is injustice. Learning what that sense of justice is, what drives it, how it speaks to me etc. and separating that out from under the layers of people-pleasing (re)connects me to my “true self” (hate that term but for shorthand it’ll have to do rn) and strengthens my sense of self and guides how I interact with the world, especially other people.

      I guess in short, if it feels like there’s nothing behind the mask, then it might be better to think about it in terms of discovery/rediscovery of the self.