It seems the original author, Autistic Abby, has turned their Tumblr private, but the Internet has ways of copying/stealing/preserving/disseminating information. I’m going to add to that effort because I think this block of text is powerful.
Sometimes people use “respect” to mean “treating someone like a person” and sometimes they use “respect” to mean “treating someone like an authority”
and sometimes people who are used to being treated like an authority say “if you won’t respect me I won’t respect you” and they mean “if you won’t treat me like an authority I won’t treat you like a person”
and they think they’re being fair but they aren’t, and it’s not okay.
Autistic Abby on Tumblr
It’s an important reminder of the nuance of language. It’s also a wake-up call for treating people with decency regardless of any power dynamic. Hopefully, humanity will continue to evolve to be more collective than individualistic. Make a decision today that benefits every single human being on this planet. I know that’s hard to do, but it’s what we should be doing.