From Stigma to Understanding: A Generational Journey of Acceptance

A hundred years ago, my great-grandfather’s younger brother spent his nights gazing at the stars. He wasn’t an astronomer—at least not by title. He was just a curious mind who found wonder in the night sky. But in those times, wonder was often mistaken for madness. His family, unable to comprehend his behavior, performed a ritual they believed would restore his mental faculties—squeezing lemons on his head. It sounds absurd now, even cruel, but such was the lack of understanding. What we now recognize as a love for astronomy was once considered a sign of mental instability.

Fast forward a few decades. My father and grandfather were both left-handed. This, too, was seen as abnormal. They were beaten—forced to write and eat with their right hand, because society had no room for deviation from the norm. Left-handedness was not yet understood as a natural, biologically rooted trait. It took time—generations, in fact—for people to stop “correcting” it and simply accept it for what it is.

We’ve come far in some ways, yet history repeats itself in others.

Today, we’re grappling with the understanding of autism and other developmental disorders. And much like the star-gazer or the left-handed child, individuals on the spectrum are often misunderstood, judged, or even ostracized. They are labeled as different. Parents are told they need institutional help. Classrooms and social systems are often ill-equipped to include them meaningfully. The discomfort society feels around neurodivergence mirrors the confusion and resistance of past generations.

But if history has taught us anything, it’s that societal acceptance evolves slowly. What is labeled as “abnormal” today might be embraced tomorrow. It may take another generation—or two—for society to fully integrate neurodivergent individuals without the stares, raised eyebrows, or misguided pity. For people to stop asking, “What’s wrong with them?” and start asking, “What do they see that we don’t?”

Understanding takes time. But every conversation, every story, every patient effort to include rather than exclude—these are the building blocks of that future.

Let us not wait for another generation to right our present ignorance. Let us be the generation that gets it right.