Autism and The MU* Community

[mietze]

a coworker refusing to stop putting their hands on another person after that person has told them that the contact is unwelcome and violating seems like a short walk to HR to me. Usually bigger companies don't play with that shit.

[Ganymede]

@thhppbbbt said in Autism and The MU* Community:

It's a really, really common thing, and saying it's just assholes being assholes disappears that NT assholes who mash ND buttons often face no repercussions because the other NT folks can't figure out why ND person is being so insistent, pushy, needy, particular, etc etc etc until the end of time.

Oh sure, I understand. I don't mean to suggest that erasure does not exist; I mean to say that NT assholes should get into trouble for doing shit to NAs (I mean 'neuro-Atypical' for reference) as they should if they do the same to NTs.

[il-volpe]

What @thhppbbbt says.

@Ganymede It's more that HR will fail to see the sameness. Instead of seeing it as me being disregarded after politely asking multiple times for something that's hard on me to change, they will assess the validity of my finding it difficult. They are liable to decide that I ought not to feel as I feel, so my request is invalid. And that I am the bad actor, what with my way of annoying people by repeatedly asking for weird shit that co-workers and HR can't relate to and not taking ignoring me as a "no" or that "no" for an answer. Which brings me back to what Grandma said. Oif.

[Ganymede]

@il-volpe

I hear you.

And HR is wrong.

And if they don’t change, they gonna get fired when I tell a higher up.

Because good lawyers are assholes who protect their clients.

Not people.

[Ominous]

@ganymede

I'm going to second what @ganymede said. Start documenting shit, get a paper trail going, then lawyer up. In some states, you could make the argument that the unwanted touch is assault.

Texas Penal Code Sec. 22.01. ASSAULT. (a) A person commits an offense if the person:

(3) intentionally or knowingly causes physical contact with another when the person knows or should reasonably believe that the other will regard the contact as offensive or provocative.

[Derp]

@ominous

You could make the argument, but assault almost always relies on the contact being rude, angry, or insolent, and I doubt you'd find a jury that things getting someone's attention via touch on the shoulder qualifies, even if it's repeated and unwanted. You might get harassment, but probably not assault.

[Ominous]

@derp

Items 1 and 2 call out rude and angry. Item 3 seems to be written as a catch-all for anything the legislators failed to consider when writing the law. And I wouldn't pursue the criminal charges. I would point out "Hey I was totally assaulted but instead of ruining the assaulter's life by pursuing criminal charges, I'm being lenient and seeking monetary damages like every other red-blooded American would."

[Ganymede]

@ominous @Derp

Those as the laws of Texas, and people in Texas are fucking crazy.

As a corporate counsel -- yes, I advise companies on HR matters -- all that matters is that unwanted touching constitutes civil battery in most jurisdictions and is almost always concerning in cases involving hostile work environments.

As a cat, though, just don't fucking touch people if they tell you not to. It's really fucking simple to me.

[il-volpe]

@ganymede @Ominous

Thing about being marginalized as they say, is that there's this deal where your word doesn't count much. Like many autistic people, I'm grossly underemployed for my education/skill levels, because I can't pass interviews. The state Autism Society people advise that one never disclose until hired, because they'll think up some other reason not to hire you, and there's just nothing one can do except improve your ability to pass for NT. It's illegal to deny people housing for being LGBTQ in my state, but when my landlady figured it out she just started accusing me of doing weird shit, and there wasn't anything I could prove besides 'this happened after she learned...'. Hah, another incident my lawyer informed me that I had had the misfortune to draw the homophobic judge, and that while he had been fair in some situations in the past, in this case I was obviously and by far the bigger queer, and must make every effort to avoid it coming before him. My ex's lawyer told him the same, but with the we-win glees.

Edited to add the no-touch virtual high-five to Gany's kid, who looks to have won the parent lotto in getting great support for this kinda crap.

[Ganymede]

@il-volpe said in Autism and The MU* Community:

It's illegal to deny people housing for being LGBTQ in my state, but when my landlady figured it out she just started accusing me of doing weird shit, and there wasn't anything I could prove besides 'this happened after she learned...'.

In Ohio, you can take your complaint to the Ohio Civil Rights Commission or your local fair housing society. You don't have to wait until an eviction until you bring up this shit.

If you have similar outlets, I'd suggest contacting them once your landlord accuses you of weird shit. Because win-or-lose, if a landlord attempts to file an eviction action after it smells retaliatory.

And frankly, it's stupid. I had a landlord client complain to be me about the lesbians in one of his units. The dialogue went something like this:

Landlord: I have nothing against them, but I just don't want to lease to them.
Me: Is it against your religion?
Landlord: Yes! Yes, it is.
Me: Okay. Are they ever late?
Landlord: With their rent? No.
Me: Do they make a disturbance?
Landlord: No, they usually mind their own.
Me: Parties? Drugs?
Landlord: None.
Me: Would you be willing to give them three months to vacate so I can put them into one of my units? Because they sound like really good tenants, not like those of this other client I had, let me tell you --

And after 5 minutes of telling that landlord about my other client's nightmare, he amazingly became more tolerant.

Anyhow, frankly, I listen to my employees. Always. If someone said "so-and-so keeps touching me and I don't like it" then So-and-So is likely looking for a new job. This is neither harsh nor heroic; this is self-preservation. I won't let my firm go down to some stupid-ass motherfucker who is too hand-sy, and if it is one of my partners I am not afraid to tell them not to fucking do that. Thank goodness I have a couple of women partners who have been in the business a while and have the reputation of not taking shit from no one.

[23quarius]

I am kind of stunned by the idea that someone would tell you to not disclose your status during the hiring process.

Life's not fair and it may very well be that you would rather fly under the radar than make yourself known and immediately cull your prospects for places to apply to.

That said, I have seen someone disclose their diagnosis after being hired and it caused an issue. They said "hey now that I'm a part of the team actually I need to tell you that I'm_____ and I need part time hours."

Our manager gave them such a WTF look and basically said "If you had told us this in the first place, we would have hired you into the part time role you wanted in the first place. We would have accommodated you. We will accommodate you. But you knew this was a full time job. We discussed that you would be hired for a full time position and you didn't say anything about needing part time hours. Now I have to go through the hiring and training process again to find someone to cover the hours that you can't work. Do you understand that this was deceptive and I don't really appreciate being in this position?"

Of course, here we have the dynamic that my ex coworker had a conversation explicitly about the hours and my coworker very well could have just said "I'm not available for full time just part time", and not mentioned any diagnosis things, but where I'm going with this is the decision to withhold information just to get a job, then coming clean, ended up in him starting off with bad will and ultimately quitting anyway. So to read the idea of people encouraging you to NOT disclose, it seems to set you up for getting fucked.

[faraday]

@23quarius said in Autism and The MU* Community:

So to read the idea of people encouraging you to NOT disclose, it seems to set you up for getting fucked.

Obviously applying for a full-time job and then being all: "Oh, no actually I can only work part-time" is a stupid thing to do. You need to be able to fulfill the basic duties of the job.

But there are reasons that employment law limits an employer's ability to ask about disabilities. Prejudice is a very real thing. If you can do the job with reasonable accommodations, why give them a reason to NOT hire you based on some preconceived (and probably incorrect) notion of what <diagnosis> means?

[Macha]

@faraday Because Companies say they will, but they DO NOT want to provide reasonable accommodations.

[il-volpe]

@23quarius Not just "somebody" but organizations with the purpose of helping people with disabilities, invariably (in the experience of myself and everyone I've ever asked) advise you to keep your 'invisible' disability to yourself until hired. Once hired, you can ask for accommodations and the law is on your side about getting them. Disclose before you're hired, you won't get hired because you are "not the best fit for our organization" and there's fuck all you can do.

This was not some rando giving me bad advice. Stunning or not, this is reality.

Yeah, somebody applying for a full-time position and then demanding part-time as an accommodation is probably being crap.

[faraday]

@macha Sure, and if you'd rather take the risk of them NOT hiring you because of a disability (which is illegal but can also be the result of unconscious biases) over the risk of them hiring you but then failing to provide reasonable accommodations for a disability (which is also illegal), that's your prerogative. Doesn't mean I would advise someone to do that in an interview though.

@il-volpe said in Autism and The MU* Community:

Yeah, somebody applying for a full-time position and then demanding part-time as an accommodation is probably being crap.

Yeah, I don't know all the details obviously but that doesn't exactly scream "reasonable accommodation".

[Too Old For This]

Speaking as someone who was just let go from a company two days after being hired in, the day after my employer found out I have CFS, they will find ANY excuse they can for letting you go. In this case, I live in an 'at will' state, so they aren't required to give ANY reason for letting me go. And unless I can prove that there was some sort of discrimination, I have no recourse.

Labor laws protect the corporations, not the workers.

[Macha]

@faraday Oh no, I always disclose on the check box thing that I have a disability. If they ask before I'm hired, I tell them I'm a diabetic. I am, and it's part of the ADA. They don't think it's a big thing.

I tell them AFTER about the other ones.

[Ganymede]

@il-volpe

You’re right. The advice is very sound.

I don’t like it. I would rather we live in a different day and age. But fucking with a person’s living is akin to killing them.

But you’re right. An employer should not ask. If they ask, they are asking for trouble.

[Derp]

@il-volpe

Honestly, this isn't just disability. There's a lot of stuff you should leave off of the resume if you can carefully disguise it. Age discrimination is also a very real thing, in both directions, so never include anything like date of birth if you can avoid it. Include degrees and where they were conferred from, not necessarily when they were conferred. Etc.

Also, despite what people tell you to do, don't include a picture. It only gets attention if you're photogenic by the standards that society considers acceptable.

There's a lot of bullshit they tell you to do in resumes that really only works toward a select privileged few.

[il-volpe]

@derp Very true.

@Ganymede Yeah, it'll probably kill me. I like to think that the Glorious Autistic Uprising Autism epidemic will make people more knowledgeable and less crappy. Then I remember how like, every law librarian I've ever met is either a retired lawyer on a second mini-career, or a woman who got her law degree and then learned that wanting or having kids gets you blacklisted. Stuff like Derp mentioned.