Empire of Normality Quotes

“The hope was to end neurodivergent oppression everywhere by redesigning the world in ways that would cultivate neurodivergent thriving”
― Robert Chapman, Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism

“In this view, it takes all kinds of minds for society to function, and thus normality should not be assumed to be superior to divergence. Rather, there were many kinds of minds. Each was enabled or disabled in different environments, and no single one was naturally superior to all the others.”
― Robert Chapman, Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism

“Out of this came the idea of Neurodiversity, first documented by a sociology student called Judy Singer. The basic point was that we should reject the very idea of a ‘normal’ brain and the ‘neurotypical’ as an ideal. Instead, it implied viewing mental functioning more in the way we view biodiversity.”
― Robert Chapman, Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism

“In turn, they began to argue that perhaps the problems they all experienced had less to do with their brains being brokem, and more to do with societal failure to accommodate their neurological differences. They thus started to argue for what one 1997 report from the New York Times described as a form of ‘neurological pluralism’. This emphasised the need for the behaviours and processing styles of atypical people to be accepted and supported rather than framed as medical pathologies to be controlled, treated, and cured.”
― Robert Chapman, Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism

“Through the neurodiversity lens I began to wonder, for instance, whether since the very start, I had been disabled by a neuronormative society. This, I came to see, had hindered my learning, my development, and my prospects right from the beginning of life. I also began to understand my trauma and mental illness as stemming from not just relative poverty and parental neglect but also a structurally ableist world.”
― Robert Chapman, Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism

“The dominant medicalised narrative suggested that being autistic made me somehow tragic, broken, and in need of fixing (…) indicating that there was something inherently wrong with me”
― Robert Chapman, Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism