i am autistic and i am on the ‘extremely vulnerable high risk’ list, my bubble includes an autistic type 1 diabetic and her autistic child. 1/3 of all people who have died from the virus are diabetic. obviously autistic people will be disproportionately dying from it as well. we are terrified over the virus and the new strain. everyone is scared so, we should probably help each other.
i usually write in my own colloquial style which includes little to no caps, crap grammar, casual high-frequency swearing and provocative joking. humour is one of the things that gets you through, everyone knows laughing is good for you – when youre going through the shit, sometimes it gets so bad you gotta laugh and take whatever mirth you can from wherever it comes, in my case i have dark humour as you know if youve ever seen me ranting before. i am not laughing about this hate crime.
unfortunately this now has to be written like a police report, because it is one. this is annoying because i want to write it from an autistic point of view as this website is my way of contributing to the thought in the community and i have my own style which is usually quite free, now i have to make it more robotic and i cant swear so much either. boring.
the process of reporting the crime has become so involved and is such a barrier to communications that it clearly shows institutional ableism – hence i have to create another fucking article just to show how shite this all is and what a bullshit pretence the laws are.
my statement
- how you were attacked
i was sworn at by several people, screamed at by another person and the management of the shop i was in joined in. the shop knew i was autistic and continued to push that i was firstly too abrupt (literally a description of autists), then something else, then something else then it became i ‘verbally attacked’ people. a familiar trope of ableists. i believe i was singled-out on the basis of a vendetta from alan, a hatred of me communicating with possible tones of anxiety in my voice
- if you know it, the identity of the attacker and where s/he lives or, alternatively, what the attacker looked like and/or what they were wearing
alan (last name unknown) has a history of singling me out for lies and abuse. trina (last name unknown) the manager who instead of apologising – verbally attacked me on the phone including slamming the phone down and then pretending she dropped it. this was recorded.
- what, if anything, was said by the attacker, particularly anything insulting about you
the attackers said ‘fucking bullshit’, ‘youre moaning too much fuckoff’ and that i made ‘two girls cry’ and i ‘verbally attacked’ people amongst other things.
- why else you regard the attack as having been prejudiced against you
previous incident involving two girls where alan the manager made up lies about me.
- if you have been attacked before, when and by whom
alan made a false and malicious claim about me quite a few months ago and then used the unproven allegation as a reason to join in with a customer screaming fuckoff at an austist.
- when the attack was made (date and time of day or night)
afternoon of the 15th or 16th i think
- the nature of any injuries sustained. It might be helpful to obtain medical evidence
stopped work, extreme stress and anxiety, feel attacked, cant visit the shop for my friend which puts her more at risk – that worries me even more. cant charge the electric key. depression – more ableism and people trying to belittle the crime when i try and report it. the co-op itself blocking my story on the internet. extreme distress.
- the names and addresses of any witnesses.
the only witness who was not part of the hate crime is on the CCTV and shes a cashier there.
Ive got a hernia so i dont like going out of the caravan, but the electric key needed charging and we needed food. Because my friend is diabetic type 1 i said i would go to the local co-op again, being extremely wary of ignorant ahem people who want to breathe on me.
the conon co-op is usually full of ignorant people walking towards you as though 100,000 people are not dead but today it was particularly rammed. as i had just read the stricter rules for supermarkets arriving in the paper the previous night i proceeded to act as instructed by our holy media and government, maintaining a 2m distance. everyone else in the shop did not do the same which confused me and i started getting anxious about people coming towards me.
as i first walked in i started to look at my shopping list to see what i needed. another guy walked in, casually ignoring the 1 in 1 out policy sign that is right outside the door. he started walking towards me and was about to walk calmly into my 2m area. i lifted my arm up and said ‘can you keep a 2m distance please mate’.
he looked at me for a full 5 seconds like was the most alien thing he had ever encountered and i was a total asshole. he may have been having a mini-fit or something cos he was stuck for a bit there. he looked at though i had just insulted his mother.
odd i thought but there are quite a few kind of well, er weirdos up here and carried on shopping, he was hanging around so i thought oh he might need to go past so i said ‘do you want to go through and ill move over here mate’ and he said ‘no youre alright’ – i noted he seemed to have got over the initial shock that theres been a virus here for about a year thats killed 100k people and seemed reasonable enough. i felt more relaxed that he wasnt going to cause a problem. good.
more and more people came in, nobody noticing or just maybe ignoring the sign outside that says 1 in 1 out and the fact the guidelines are getting stricter, the virus just hit its second highest point and they may be law in a few days. (edit: in the few days since then we have reached emergency peak levels and a 30% more deadly strain has arrived)
as each one tried to invade my space i asked them to maintain a 2m distance, i had my motorbike helmet on, so i may have talked slightly louder than i do normally to be heard through the mask and helmet, but in no way was i aggressive or anything to anyone, i was consciously really trying to get through this not very nice experience as quickly as i possibly could and get the hell out of there! i *was in a fairly decent mood on my way in the shop and mentally prepared my mask of jovial shopper trying to maintain a distance.
as far as i was aware i as polite as possible while thinking this store is horrendously mismanaged and these people just dont care at all about the guidelines. i started to internally freak out more and more at people coming near me and i dont think they wanted to help allay my fears, i think they wanted to make it worse which was a really horrible feeling actually. its so odd the attitude ive seen before as well, as though they want to come near you. i dont get it. anyway…
several other people invaded my space all of whom i asked to maintain distance and i was getting more disturbed. i got round to the queue. one of the people who seemed annoyed about the 2m thing noticed i was uncomfortable with them being close to me in the queue as i moved to the side to get further away from them.
she immediately moved herself and her child that had no reason to be in the shop closer to me to the next mark on the floor that i was just standing on! i said ‘ you realise i moved here to get further away from you right? cos im still in the queue i was just getting a little more distance’ – she said ‘ im standing on a blue mark therefore im 2m away’.
she was standing on the blue mark that i was just standing on and moved further to the left! she showed no attempt to make me feel more comfortable or acknowledge my place in the queue, to the contrary. it was her right to infect me and my feelings did not matter. hoooookay.
i needed to get away from these people ASAP! the woman moving closer on purpose really shocked and upset me, i made up my mind to complain to the manager who was on the next till. i found that people dont like you getting upset and suggesting stuff cos thats totally out of order and you should fuckoff. it came as a bit of a shock tbh.
as i started to complain about people not maintaining a 2m distance from me and that the signs were ignored, there being too may people in the shop, the one way system ignored etc a rough looking unshaven old bloke walked past into my 2m area and i think he muttered ‘fucking bullshit’ to me. he said ‘ fucking *something*’ and im pretty sure he intended to abuse me. i looked at the cashier shocked once more. i said ‘wow, did you just hear that!? he abused me!’ she was wide eyed and nodded.
at this point nearing panic i looked over to the manager on the next till. i said look this is ridiculous, theres too many people in this shop, this guys just abused me and nobody is adhering to the guidelines, what are you doing!? a fat woman carrying a really fat unmasked baby that was mostly head joined in. i had not noticed her before this point. i guess she just wanted to get stuck in while she carried her unmasked baby round the shop with its massive fat head that looked a bit like the head off total recall. not only did she find it offensive i dont want to die from the virus, it was her right to infect me and her fat baby as well while screaming fuckoff in front of it.
sorry. it was fat though, really weird looking head. like when you get a fat adult head on a tiny baby, you know it looks totally weird. anyway.
so this unknown shopper shouted at me:
‘youve been moaning round the whole shop’ and shouted ‘FUCKOFF!’ she pointed at me as she said fuckoff. hoookay. wow. what a nice fat lady.
i looked up moaning in the dictionary and shes right – moaning means politely asking people to keep a 2m distance. at this point i started to think. is this an english / scottish thing or just plain ableism or both. i felt attacked at this point and really worried about further escalation. i wanted to get out ASAP! i looked to the manager thinking, wow hes going to have real stern words with the woman knowing im autistic n everything, did he notice that last guy just swear at me? i know a bunch of the people there and i always make a point to say hello and ask how they are, i get on with one particularly well who i suspect is ND.
instead…. the manager joined in! i was totally gobsmacked. he didnt say anything to the woman, or indicate he thought he screaming fuckoff at me was inappropriate in any way. he was defending the people shouting at people with noise sensitivity while trying to infect me and then he said something else, that
- broke privacy laws
- alleged an abusive act of which he has no proof because it didn’t happen
- was a total lie
- shows he wasnt doing his job anyway
i guess this was alans shot at bolstering his argument when i was saying he wasnt managing the shop properly. he personally attacked and defamed me in front of other shoppers over a bullshit incident which didnt happen.
you made those two girls cry in here before
Alan at @coopconon
alan thought an appropriate resposnse to several shoppers ganging up on me screaming fuckoff because they dont want to follow guidelines is to bring up a lie he made up 3 months ago. what, not this again. this is some old bullshit alan made up, read the link if you really want to know about it but bringing this up after the fuckoff in front of a bunch of other shoppers was breaching other laws, i felt completely attacked from all sides. the story is basically TL;DR about two girls who happily walked right up to me in the same shop without masks on to breathe on me and i told them to get away from me – alans fantasies about this incident he did not witness went into overdrive – show us the CCTV you liar. as always its the combination and order of the autists words that is the problem and the actual crimes committed against us are usually ignored. covidiots putting my life at risk were left to wander the shop (two friends without masks) and alan starts having a go at me – current guidelines and basic common sense say go shopping on your own. the child in my bubble will never go inside the shop unlike the rest of the children in the town, which the shop happily allows in maskless with their parents.
the resulting distress as my autistic friends will know echoes down through the traumas causing meltdown. its very hard to describe this, thats my best effort. two days later and i am a wreck and i cant and wont visit my local shop till these ableists are removed. at the same time i have other people telling me i am not disabled from all sides. one week later, no crime number and its stressing me out even more.
as i left i tried to flail to defend my statement, ‘theres lots of people dying…..’ whatever i said wasnt going to get in this persons head, she was shouting at me like a drunk person, i just had to get out. she shouted more stuff, i became dizzy with the encounter and i was really scared it was going to escalate, i dunno i was thinking her massive guy comes round the corner and touches me and infects or beats me to a pulp or both or she hits me over the head with her baby god knows, i was at the top of the anxiety scale at this point close to meltdown. she doesnt mind shouting fuckoff right next to its head so i guess she doesnt care so much about it.
I managed a decidedly unconvincing fuckoff back to the woman as i was legging it. i was genuinely shitting myself this woman was scary. im a biker and im 6ft 1 as well. this woman was twice my size (in weight) and her first sentence to me included the word fuckoff at screaming level. i just wanted to get the shopping list and get back ASAP with going near anyone.
i think the shop has known im autistic for quite a while. i know the employees and get on with everyone except alan and trina, altho i say hello to alan, i havent had a conversation with him since he lied about me before. i dont know who trina is i couldnt put name to face. one of the staff commented on being stressed about the way they are managing the place and the customers behaviour and respect. the store needs new management and to get tougher on the idiots going in.
after i posted that i would blog this the account of the shop @coopconon blocked me immediately. stop blocking me and own what you did! i phoned up. the woman who answered was called trina. she proceeded to crap all over the equality act 2010, sounding confrontational and angry she slammed the phone down on me, i was expecting some kind of de-escalation or apology, so again we go up the anxiety scale another notch. then when i called back she pretended she dropped the phone ( she was saying she wouldnt talk to me on the phone just before she slammed it down- like er huh?)
trina refused to talk too much on the phone about it and said i should come to the shop. i was really upset, she sounded extremely agitated and angry from the beginning and already knew about the incident and had passed judgement. she then said if i did come to the shop she would call the police (eh? so dont come to the shop and talk to you then). i recorded this conversation as i do all my phone calls. i started doing this after receiving ableist abuse from various companies much like this. i told her so and she got very upset realising that she was pretty mean to me on the phone and seemed personally offended by the whole affair when its literally her job to sort these things out.
she then started saying i ‘verbally attacked’ people by politely asking them to maintain guideline distance but she wasnt even there! she started off the call in a defensive manner, with no apology for my experience. first of all she said i didnt talk right. she said my manner was abrupt, literally a description of autism. when i said oh its abrupt is it, she then increased the level a bit more and a bit more until she arrived at the description of ‘verbally attacking’ (this is recorded).
what :/ this continues the familiar ableist trope ‘its autistics fault because of the way they say words’ thing. how can i verbally attack someone asking them to go 2m away, im clearly wanting to be 2m or more away from them, its obvious im scared of the virus, for me to ‘attack’ someone with my words is not logical. actually touching them would be hard because my arms are not > 2m and its the very last thing on earth i want to do , which one would assume obvious seeing as though im saying it over and over.
a satisfactory resolution would be an apology and the sacking of trina and alan, perhaps some disability training for the new staff. once something like that has happened you cant visit that thing again, like i say – echoes. cumulative trauma is a thing. perhaps autistic shopping times or some other solution could be appropriate but really the best option would be if people would stop being ableist, help each other and just follow the guidelines that are supposed to keep us safe. an attitude of do you feel safe should prevail amongst us while shopping, not fuck you get out of my way.
after i left the shop i experienced days of anxiety and withdrew from making my music. it caused me immense distress as i was terrified of going in there anyway. having misophonia and the shouting dont go too well and i feel attacked and like i have been specifically singled-out, abused and then barred because im autistic and english. there is an element to this that was definitely – this weird English guy cant come in here asking us Scottish to maintain the rules printed in literally every media outlet everywhere and on every social media site.
what a terrible failure of a time and i think all autistics can identify with going in with the right intentions and just being more and more confused and upset by the injustice or misunderstandings. it escalating to an actual hate crime is unbelievable.