What's with these guys?

Why do some people still want to pretend that conditions like dyslexia and ADHD do not exist?

Seriously.

Why?

What are they getting out of it?

It bewilders me. Side note – isn't 'bewilder' a brilliant word? I looked up its etymology, and apparently, it comes from 'lead astray' or, more literally ', taken into the wilds', which is probably why I like it so much because when I say 'bewilder', I probably actually mean it drives me wild.

Anyway. Back to the original question:

Which was this:

 WHY do people get so exercised about dyslexia and ADHD? After years of evidence that

 a) these are highly inheritable neurological conditions that exist

b) they are lifelong

c) you can't 'get rid of them' – but you CAN manage their effects

d) a significant minority of the human population (anywhere between 10 and 20% depending on who you ask/how you measure) experience dyslexia and/or ADHD

Why are there still people out there who appear to think that all the scientists are wrong? That all the millions of people with lived experience of these neurological differences are wrong?

That these are just labels handily given out to (mostly middle-class) people who just want to get an unfair advantage over other pupils, or a made-up syndrome populated by TikTok, or laziness and poor teaching, or something that you should 'just get over'?

Like, what is your deal?

I was reading a post recently on LinkedIn. A lovely, inclusive, thoughtful post explaining a little about dyslexia and asking for people to share their strategies and thoughts.

Ooh, a nice, uncontroversial post, I thought. As I'm always interested in any new strategies that might support my own students, I read the comments. There were lots of great strategies, comments, tips, and encouragement.

And there was one person who seemed to be driven to troll almost all of the comments. Their responses suggested that students with dyslexia just needed to 'work harder', that they would have to wean themselves off accommodations when in the 'real world' where people won't pander to them, and that the idea that dyslexia did not mean you could not be successful was dismissed as irrelevant.

That's just one angry guy – you might object. Ignore him.

Well, yes, I can do just that. But here's the thing. It's not just one angry guy.

It's the English teacher who insists her dyslexic students 'copy from the board' because they'll have to do it in the real world (to be fair - so much board copying in the real world!).

It's the GP who dismisses a worried parent that her daughter might have ADHD because, 'they're all saying that, it's just a TikTok thing'.

It's the employer who won't send questions ahead of an interview because 'our client won't give you a set of questions before meetings'.

It's the friend who says, 'but isn't everyone a bit disorganised sometimes?'

It's symptomatic of a society that seems still exceptionally ill-educated about neuro-divergence, what it is, how it manifests and how it affects people.

And that really bothers me.

I'm not sure what to do about it, but it really bewilds me.

If you've got any solutions, let me know.

Confused puppy