"I’ve spent a lot more time on planes now, where the world you’re moving above is abstract and so distant ... that it’s impossible to conceive of the distances travelled.=..
...
But distances travelled by train are real."

#OtherPeoplesExperiences #Travel #Train #Railway

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/19-02-2023/the-sunday-essay-i-grew-up-riding-trains-across-india

*A rich new lens"

"We reject the medical model of autism, which defines people by so-called deficits.

Instead, we see autistic as simply a description of a particular type of brain, or neurotype."

#autism #OtherPeoplesExperiences

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02-06/autistic-adult-autism-diagnosis-identity-stereotypes-myths/

"We reject the medical model of autism, which defines people by so-called deficits.

Instead, we see autistic as simply a description of a particular type of brain, or neurotype."

#autism #OtherPeoplesExperiences

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02-06/autistic-adult-autism-diagnosis-identity-stereotypes-myths/

"I’ve realised that many of us are cognitively atypical – and maybe it’s something to work with rather than hide or ignore.
...
Our species thinks divergently; we experience different versions of the world not merely at the cultural or social levels but biologically, and this constrains our lives, or at least my life but maybe yours as well. And I wish I’d realised all of this a lot sooner. "

#brains #MentalHealth #diversity #OtherPeoplesExperiences

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/17-12-2022/learning-to-understand-the-strangeness-of-my-brain

"I’ve realised that many of us are cognitively atypical – and maybe it’s something to work with rather than hide or ignore.
...
Our species thinks divergently; we experience different versions of the world not merely at the cultural or social levels but biologically, and this constrains our lives, or at least my life but maybe yours as well. And I wish I’d realised all of this a lot sooner. "

#brains #MentalHealth #diversity #OtherPeoplesExperiences

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/17-12-2022/learning-to-understand-the-strangeness-of-my-brain

"To be a CODA is to be praised for things your parent does while spinning plates. I was praised for being bilingual even though my Maamaa is bilingual as well. I was praised for my communication skills, when my Maamaa’s communication skills were better from a lifetime of talking to people that didn’t speak her language."

#OtherPeoplesExperiences #Deaf #ChildOfDeafAdult

https://thespinoff.co.nz/books/06-11-2022/coda-to-coda-strangers-i-know-and-my-life-as-an-unofficial-interpreter

"Normalising not desiring sex or assuming everybody wants sex promotes a healthy consent culture for everybody – for allosexual people who enjoy sex to have great sex, and for it to be respected if people aren’t into it. Asexuality is a valid and healthy identity."

#otherpeoplesexperiences #ace #asexuality

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/30-10-2022/essay-on-sunday-asexuality-and-the-artist

"I have found that not everybody is honest about — or perhaps, can really articulate — how it feels to have a kid. ...

I know so many women who have agonized, and then agonized over the agony itself.
...
We do not live in a culture where the decision to have a baby is easy."

Content warnings: discussion around childhood trauma (no specifics), losing/aborting a child.

#longread #otherpeoplesexperiences #parenting #amandapalmer

https://amandapalmer.substack.com/p/ask-amanda-5-should-i-have-a-kid

"How can Asians be white? Or, for that matter, Black? It was a statement about perceived hierarchy and alignment, dovetailing neatly with colour, which is what “race” boils down to: a concept that can be used as a “master category” that encompasses ethnicity and hints at superseding it, as structure swallows agency."

#racism #language #ethnicity #otherpeoplesexperiences

https://thespinoff.co.nz/books/25-09-2022/when-are-you-white-and-when-are-you-black

"The logic of most prominent programming languages, such as Python, is based on English vocabulary and syntax — using terms like “while” or “if not” to trigger certain actions — which makes it that much more difficult to learn for non-native speakers. Furthermore, many of the most popular educational resources for learning to code, including Stack Exchange, are also in English."

#barriers #coding #language #otherpeoplesexperiences

https://restofworld.org/2022/tech-workers-latin-america-programming-spanish/

"What would it feel like to be bright and glorious? To allow myself to be seen? I contacted Monique and proposed an experiment. She dresses me – dopamine style – for a week
...
Friday, nearing the end of the experiment, I needed the pink suit again (who am I now?) As soon as I put it on I understood what people mean when they say they dress for battle. I put on lipstick, something I rarely do. I put on my stiletto boots."

#otherpeoplesexperiences #clothesmaketh

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/20-12-2020/after-years-in-black-i-braved-dressing-in-glorious-colour-and-found-myself-again/

#otherpeoplesexperiences

"When whisperings of the word #activist began to drift my way, I froze. It was the kind of word that threatened to pigeonhole me ... I am certainly not indestructible. And I feel uncomfortable with some of the attention I have received through my mere months of “activism”.

Which led me to write this story."

https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/26-10-2020/what-makes-an-activist/

#otherpeoplesexperiences #nzhistory

"I've been here before. The current coronavirus situation with its self-isolation requirement for me and other oldies, brings back clear memories that I thought I'd forgotten.

In the first half of the 20th century, several major polio epidemics raged and there was a lockdown like today."

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/120758613/coronavirus-my-second-lockdown--memories-from-the-1948-polio-pandemic

Content warnings: trials of dealing with the NZ health system, suicide and causes

"...it is hard to avoid the conclusion that our health system is broken. Some will worry at the use of the words. But if something is not co-ordinated and not meeting need, and people are being turned away, then it is broken. Not saying it is broken only makes me complicit in the pretence that all is well when it is not."

#longread #otherpeoplesexperiences #nzpolitics

https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/09-02-2020/mauis-fish-a-view-of-the-nz-health-system-from-the-end-of-a-corridor-in-a-levin-hospital/

"Admitting that I had been wrong was rough. I’d been incredibly lucky – herd immunity had protected my sons – but I had been so afraid of my children suffering that I had willingly put their health and the health of others at risk by cherry picking my way through ‘scientific’ studies and anecdotal reports. Not a fun thing to admit to yourself, let alone others."

#otherpeoplesexperiences #vaccinate

https://thespinoff.co.nz/science/24-04-2019/i-used-to-be-an-anti-vaxxer/

Content warning: Drug use/abuse

"One of the things it does — and this is why I used to use — is that it takes away feeling. I’d use whatever and I wouldn’t feel anything, and that’s what I wanted. You don’t feel anything — either good or bad. I didn’t feel remorse. I didn’t feel guilt. I didn’t feel any of the things that would’ve stopped me hurting people close to me or robbing people. I didn’t feel it."

#otherpeoplesexperiences #nzculture #colonisation

https://e-tangata.co.nz/korero/tuari-potiki-fighting-the-darkness-with-the-light/?utm=presspatron-post-web-04-Oct-19

"Yet the minute I saw the goth bands, I knew that I had found my own look. It would help me express that I was different. Special. That I rejected the dull blandness of everyday life.

That spark in my daughter’s eye when she sees a new Harajuku look? This was the same impulse."

#growingup #fashion #otherpeoplesexperiences

https://longreads.com/2019/09/19/cut-from-the-same-cloth/

#otherpeoplesexperiences #womenshealth

Also for guys who care about what their partner or friend might be going through.

"The focus on weight loss has grown over time, at the expense of any proper conversation about birth injury, ongoing health issues and body changes after pregnancy, she says. The psychological damage to women can be immense.
...
The reality is that weight gain and loss is a small part of most postpartum experiences. "

https://thespinoff.co.nz/partner/womens-health-action/24-09-2019/its-time-to-talk-about-bodies-after-birth-and-not-just-stretch-marks/

Content warnings: partner abuse, violence.
*'If we get it wrong someone dies': A day on the frontline of the Women's Refuge*

#otherpeoplesexperiences #nzculture #nzpolitics #domesticviolence

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/114147477/if-we-get-it-wrong-someone-dies-a-day-on-the-frontline-of-the-womens-refuge

"One bullet ruined restaurateur Ahmed Jahangir’s health, another ended his chef’s career, and together they put six other staff out of work. Six months on from the Christchurch mosque shootings, Ahmed is fighting to reclaim his life and start serving authentic Hyderabadi dum biryani once more."

#christchurchshootings #otherpeoplesexperiences

Content warning: descriptions of gunshot injuries.

http://shorthand.radionz.co.nz/Christchurch-attacks-6-months-on/