girlsdontcry's Diaryland Diary

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I had a dream.

I once had a dream, a long time ago, and in my dream I had arranged for my younger brother, the autistic one, to be murdered. I'd paid someone to beat him to death, and they had. And when I woke up, I felt really guilty because I'd had him beaten to death, and not killed in some more humane way. I mean, I felt really guilty about that, it felt so real, I felt like I'd really done it and I couldn't stop thinking about what a horrible way it must be to die.

I hate so much when people say that disabled people can "be happy too". What the fuck does that mean? As an argument against, for example, aborting a foetus that you know is Down's Syndrome. "They can be happy too." Yeah. Or, they can be dependent on other people for the rest of their lives, never fit in and be taken advantage of by any sick fuck who chooses to do so.

I think my brother would be better off if he'd never been born. It's hard not to think, selfishly, that I would have been better off without him. Sure, I'd probably be one of those stupid people who goes around thinking that disabled people can be happy too, but that's an illusion I'd be happy to carry.

I think my brother's life is tragic. Much effort went into painstakingly teaching him to speak -- rewarding him for making a grunt, a syllable, a word, a sentence -- so that he could turn around and tell us: "I know I'm not normal."

Not normal.

Now, I know that no one thinks they are normal. But with him it's like this. You might be single, lonely, bored and unhappy with your life. You might be looking for someone, you might have a hundred stories about the terrible dates you've been on, the bad relationships you've been in.

My brother knows that no "normal" girl will ever be interested in him. He knows that it's not because of his haircut, his clothes, his job or his financial status. It's because of him.

When we were growing up in the 1970s, the buzzword was "early intervention". If you get to these autistic children (and by the way, I'm talking about someone severely affected, not someone who has trouble making fucking eye contact) early enough, you can educate them and integrate them in to "normal" society.

What my brother has achieved is indeed a triumph. But to what end? That he can articulate what no one can bear to hear. I mean, who can say -- would he have been able to have such thoughts if he'd not had words?

I want to say more, but later sometime.

11:54 a.m. - 2002-09-26

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