autistics | Henny Kupferstein

More of drhennyk [on TikTok] [on Instagram] [FB link for sharing her page] [Follow on Twitter] [on LinkedIn]

The Doogri Institute services and supports are publicly available online to students everywhere. Students of all abilities are welcome to participate in online school lessons, communication support, AACs for communication, and 10-finger keyboard typing. New York families with self-direction eligibility may use their budget to pay for the tuition and fees.

If performance artist Sia is autistic, she too has a right to tell her story. If a thousand volatile people want to project their feelings of job inequity, then go ahead, don’t watch the damn movie.
👉Sia has Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, and #EDS is tenfold in the #autistic population, including myself.
👉Nearly 100% of autistic people have #perfectpitch (97%, read my study). Sia’s clarity in her vocal range is very impressive to my trained ear.
👉Hiding the face with extreme costumery is a brilliant stunt to create social distance between fan chitchat, eye contact demands, and any interaction outside of the live performance.
I offer this clip where you can decide if you can spot an autistic on Ellen DeGeneres. Can you see the 🕶️ masking, the forced speech, the hand fidgets, the tight ankle cross, the scripting from lyrics, and the use of stress laughter to make conversation? How would you act if you are #autistic and are on the Ellen Show? The costume deterred Ellen from hugging and petting, which we all know is a part of live TV. Score!
The outrage by #autistics begging for “authentic representation” by way of #actuallyautistic talent is an old cry. It stems from lack of #inclusion in training programs, which I advocate for on an hourly basis.
When I was studying music therapy, I was regarded as an imposter and hacker, someone who had to be defeated. My art has been misunderstood, my talent 🎹 has been blamed on scammery, and my inclusion was blocked through denial of #accommodations. I pulled through 🎓 because I paid more attention to my goals than they gave to destroying my soul.
The arts requires stellar 🎩 representation to a storyline. Any media attention is positive attention (so go ahead and + hate me too +).
I would much rather have 25 more Rain Man movies come out this year, than none at all.
Thank you Sia for selecting seasoned and talented actress to portray the gifts and capacities, the use of #AAC typed communication (which is the law), and above all, the story of ❤️❤️❤️INCLUSION IN THE ARTS.
Signed,
An #actuallyautistic artist who is delighted that you choose to tell your story in your unique and artful way.

Elissa Milne

Wow. Lots of people calling Henny “sweetie”.

Lots of big feelings.

Feeling outraged is a choice we’re all quite good at these days.

It takes a bit more work to actually engage with ideas, and it’s perfectly understandable that a lot of people in late November 2020 are a bit too emotionally wrung out for that kind of engagement.

This whole question is about what representation is in the performing arts.

Does the stage musical of the Lion King require a lion in the lead role? Is it wrong for the story of a lion to be told with a human in the role?

Is it wrong to perform Shakespeare in a historically accurate manner, with men playing all the parts?

Would it be wrong for a woman to play Richard III?

Is it wrong for an Asian opera singer to play the part of Violetta in La Traviata? And is it appropriate for any singer to take that part unless they have already died of tuberculosis?

Henny Kupferstein, Ph.D.

Here I am sitting on my fainting couch, laughing way too loudly. It’s about time we see a lion on stage!!

Elissa Milne

WE COULD GO FURTHER.

Is it wrong to depict assault on stage, if the actor is not actually assaulted?

Is it wrong to use stage craft to communicate plot points THAT ARE NOT ACTUALLY HAPPENING TO THE ACTORS?

etc etc

Representation in the community is a completely different kind of representation to what we talk about when we refer to “representation” in the performing and recorded arts.

Vocalists have all kinds of effects added to their tracks – their voices are a part of the finished “representation” that is a song on Spotify, but we’re not literally hearing that person’s voice and that alone – it’s all adjusted, treated, transformed, compressed, amplified, all kinds of things.

The product you consume in the arts is made up. It’s not a naturally occurring thing. Duh.

Henny Kupferstein, Ph.D.

The only naturally occurring thing in this post is natural selection.

Elissa Milne wins the internet. Maybe covid20 will be all the #autistics searching for tuberculosis to be authentically represented in the arts. Natural selection is naturally self evident.

Elissa Milne

Is it wrong for an Asian opera singer to play the part of Violetta in La Traviata? I don’t think so.

Is it wrong for a woman to play Richard III? I don’t think so.

There is so much missing from an understanding of the performing arts in any take that says that the character must be portrayed by an actor with the same characteristics, it’s really hard to see a place to start with helping develop a more informed perspective.

Look at the work of Caryl Churchill (link below) for an example of creating work where distancing (in a Brechtian kind of way) is accomplished by casting characters into unexpected bodies, and where the impact is a subversion of power and a highlighting of abuses of power.

Consider theatrical traditions where roles are cast very deliberately against physical types.

The profundity of human theatrical expression that relies on the performer not being the thing being performed is immense.

Henny Kupferstein, Ph.D.

Elissa Milne Even the Jews had to wear a penis prosthetic to fill the role of perfect human form for athleticism during the olympic games, because their circumcision represented mutilation or lameness.

Elissa Milne

Gosh – I’m not quite sure what to do with that information!

But now you have mentioned penises…

Hugh Sheridan musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch cancelled after outrage from transgender activists

Henny Kupferstein, Ph.D.

Elissa MilneOf course we must mention penises. A star’s show gets ‘cancelled’ (the show biz kind, not the online kind) because he is the wrong rainbow on the flag? Well, as we’ve learned from Orange is the New Black, not every Laverne has a Cox to play her pre- and post-.