I’ve seen this exact quote attributed to various anonymous people over the years, so I doubt it was written by a fifteen-year-old autistic girl experiencing ABA therapy. That said, ABA is trash.

Thought I’d post here as well, it blew up over there.

“And sin, young man, is when you treat people as things. Including yourself. That’s what sin is.”

“It’s a lot more complicated than that—”

“No. It ain’t. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they’re getting worried that they won’t like the truth. People as things, that’s where it starts.”

“Oh, I’m sure there are worse crimes—”

“But they starts with thinking about people as things…”

― Terry Pratchett, Carpe Jugulum

All too often, people who identify as an authority do so because they think of people as owned things. An ugly situation somewhat ameliorated by Celine’s Second Law “Effective communication is only possible among equals.”

And I didn’t say it there, but here I say, while coping mechanisms should be carefully cultivated, and acting is useful and effective, ABA sounds like an excuse for abuse. You’re likely better off doing improv unless you have a truly great therapist who for some reason isn’t using better methods.