I was growing up, they didn’t test you for any learning disorders. I was labeled a “slow learner,” “dull,” “backward,” and “underachiever.”
Electronics was a godsend… it was so orderly and logical. I got all the way through college, just squeaking by… no one ever questioned why.
I went to grad school for my MSW and one of my professors’ day jobs was to evaluate convicted persons before they got incarcerated. When he handed back my midterm exam, he said, “See me after class!” Yikes… I must have bombed the midterm!
He asked if I had ever been evaluated for a learning disorder.
All it took was for him to see my writing on those 10 questions to see what I had been struggling with all my life.
You know that this blog is about the intersections of trans stuff and politics, so what’s political about this post?
Well, Trump, RFK Jr., and company all are saying learning disorders like ADHD, ADD, and ASD are a new phenomenon. They blame it on chemical food additives, preservatives, ultra-processed foods, and stuff like artificial food dyes.
Well, folks… it is the name that is new. It is the realization that it is a disorder of the brain… not laziness. Not “slow learners,” and not all the other things that they called it. It has always been here; we just called it different names.
Now we have the government and conspiracists pushing all these quack reasons for this epidemic of learning disorders, but they have been here all along, just without the names. Just like us.
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