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I am writing an academic article at the moment. I have spent several hours today working on the rationale for including those of us with Serious Mental Illness within the Neurodivergent paradigm. In the course of writing this paper I have found other articles looking at who is and isn’t included in the Neurodivergent community (including a discussion on the inclusion of Tourette’s syndrome which can be found in our resources library). The more I wrote the more I realised that this debate on who is and isn’t included needed wider discussion. 

The standpoint of Ocelot Consulting on who is and is not included is relatively simple. Anyone who does not fit the societal idea of Neurotypical is Neurodivergent - end of.

There is rationale behind this, firstly Neurodivergence was always meant to be a broad-church - Nick Walker writes an easy to follow introduction to this in her book Neuroqueer Heresies. Neurodivergence must not become shorthand for Autism and ADHD, any definition of Neurodivergence needs to include Mental Illness, Tourettic people, acquired brain injuries and so the list continues. If we do not include all flavours of Neurodivergence in the paradigm we risk creating a three tier system - Neurotypical, Neurodivergent and those viewed as deviant from the social system. For those arguing that Neurodivergence is first and foremost Autism, ADHD and a handful of ways of being with a tangible diagnosis, there is something to be said about co-opting the means of oppression. 

On the subject of co-opting it is interesting to note that from the grassroots movement around Neurodivergence it has, despite coming primarily from the Autistic community, been open to all ways of being in the world. Language around Neurodivergence and Neurodivergences are being co-opted into the current pathological paradigm. We see reports and articles discussing “Neurodiversity conditions” and “a diagnosis of a Neurodiverse condition” - both of which are poor uses of the language around Neurodiversity and rooted in the pathological paradigm. If we are going to see an actual paradigm shift, as promoted by the Neurodivergent movement, then it is vital that Neurodivergent language remains a voice of freedom rather than a new word for old models.             

The last reason for including a broad-church approach to Neurodiversity is that as soon as we remove people from the all inclusive paradigm we create a house of cards. Each time we remove a group of people from a Neurodiverse society we weaken the strength of the paradigm. If Neurodiversity is a range of ways of being in the world then it should be impossible to remove people from the sum of all people. However if there is a three tier model, where some are more desired than others the very core principles of the paradigm come crashing down. We move from different ways of being to different ways of being only if they are societally beneficial. This isn’t a paradigm shift to a more inclusive and connected world, this is a pathological model of disability and difference that continues to view some humans as more valuable than others. In a time when politically the rights of Disabled people are being stripped away, this co-opting of the Neurodivergent paradigm to make traditional ways of thinking more palatable becomes increasingly dangerous.    

I return to a conclusion I gave at the Critical Neurodiversity Studies: Directions/Intersections/Contradictions conference last year. It is easy to argue theory and philosophy when you are one step removed from the daily lives of those neatly packaged into the divergent and the deviant. With the rise of the Far Right and eugenics becoming once again mainstream politics, I recall the statement - United We Stand, Divided We Fall.

The Neurodivergent paradigm has the chance to cause a shift in thinking and being, but only if the movement includes all ways of being in the world. By removing those Neurodivergences that are viewed as undesirable, you remove a cornerstone. The house may not fall today but it becomes uninhabitable.