I have asperger's. I know it sounds scary but I'm honestly not that different to you. Seriously. Asperger's is part of a vast spectrum of Autism, and can also be called an ASD/C (autism spectrum disorder/condition - it only becomes a disorder if it affects your life to the point of losing function). Every single person that has an ASC has different ways it affects them, so I'm not going to go into detail, but I will link some resources for you to find out more here and here.

This post is my way of getting out all the frustration I feel towards NT people that pity, look down upon and patronise people with autism and aspergers. I know you mean well when you share that video on facebook, or that post from buzzfeed, but all it does is say to me that you view ASC's as other. What I mean by that is, when you share a video with an autistic child doing something 'normal' and 'praising' them for it, you're automatically assuming that that child's 'normal' is different to your 'normal' and that your 'normal' is better than their 'normal'. This frame of mind is very damaging to people with an ASD and makes me personally feel less than you, which is 100% not the case. 

A large misconception about people with autism/asperger's is that we don't have emotion. Not true. Sometimes it's difficult to communicate the emotion, but it's still there, and if anything, we feel more emotion that NT people as we don't really have emotional 'filters'. We just feel everything, and then it can sometimes get jumbled and not make sense. 

This idea of people with aspergers allows NT's to treat us as if we need protecting, or that we're incapable of living a 'normal' life. It makes me so angry when people are comfortable with helping severely disabled people, that are recognisably disabled, but then seem to have only two options when dealing with people with an ASD: treat us as incompetent children who can't function properly that desperately need to be helped, or flat out refuse to believe that we have a different way of thinking in some situations and therefore dismiss any problems we might face. There is a middle ground. It is possible to treat a person with an ASD as you would any other NT, but make certain adjustments when necessary - without making the person with autism/asperger's feel stupid, less than you, or in the worst case less human.

You may think that I'm overreacting - and I may be for some - but my experience with NT's treating people with aspergers as charity cases makes me feeling like I'm less than them, which in all honesty sucks.

I don't want pity or sympathy, I want empathy and understanding. But please, do not pity me.

The new year has always brought a sense of refreshment to me, a feeling that I can start over and create a new me. This year felt different, too say the least. 

As the new year rolled in I was lying on my living room floor, surrounded by three of my closest friends, covered in blankets and half heartedly counting down to midnight. Although I had a great day/night, I just felt off and rather 'blugh'. It was strange, and to be quite honest, at midnight, I felt like crying. 

I feel as if I'm having to grow up now. I have to work hard at my AS/A Levels, I have to plan UCAS applications, prepare for Uni. And, I have realised that it's not that I just don't want to grow up, it's that I don't want to grow up this way. I don't want to grow up with the majority of my time spent stressing and worrying about essays and assessments and exams and the future. I used to love learning, love debating and thinking about the topics I was being taught; now I just feel like it's a drag until the next thing kicks in. 

I keep saying to myself, "Just hold on to the weekend, you can sleep for as long as you want then" or "Just think about the half term, you can work on your music then". To me, this doesn't sound like the life I want to live, but I can't see anyway to change it. It's unlikely I'll ever make it into the industry I want, because as much as I say "I want to be a musician" no one actually believes it'll happened, and thats beginning to feel like the inevitable. 

I hope that after college starts again I begin to feel a little more positive about how my life is at the moment, I mean, I do have a lot to be grateful for, but that seems overshadowed by the stress.

Anyway, I hope you have a slightly better outlook on the year, and feel like this is a chance to start over. 

Gothaard x

Many people, including me, are upset at the new Rolling Stone interview featuring the pop punk band Five Seconds of Summer.  While part of me is upset because of writing of the article its self (focusing on personal lives and partying instead of music, which y'know, is kind of important considering they're a band), the majority of my upset is because  of the way the band have addressed the 'problems' of becoming a 'real' band.

 Although Michael has addressed the article on twitter, saying "i hate when people include everything in an article EXCEPT the reason we're a band; the fans", he didn't touch on the fact that what the article did include were comments that could be badly interpreted at best.

 They say how they've tried to shed their 'boyband' persona, which is clearly a top priority to the band as they spend "Seventy-five percent" of their lives trying to brush it off. Although there is nothing wrong with wanting to be punk, or rock, or a 'proper' band, attempting to do this by projecting a dated idea of a rock star life, doesn't seem like the best way to do it. Although this could be managements doing, or a plan to make their image more 'edgy', it still doesn't sit right.

When talking about their parties at their Bel Air house, Luke states that the "ratio was huge". Although the definition of what the 'ratio' was of wasn't specified, in context of the article, it seems like he was talking about the ratio of women to men, which as The Tab so eloquently put, reduces girls to "a commodity at a party". Not the best thing to be quoted saying when the majority of your fan base is girls. 

After saying how good they've got at proving that they're a 'real band', Ashton goes on to say "We don't want to just be, like, for girls", which at first glance seems fine, they just want to expand their fan base. They want to reach a bigger audience, be more respected, and that's great. What isn't so great is the fact that it seems to have overtones suggesting that having a majority female fan base is somehow less of an achievement than having a majority male fan base. 

It's common in pop culture for artists that have a majority female base to be looked down upon; One Direction, Justin Bieber, Fifth Harmony, Taylor Swift and a large number of other singers/bands also aren't given credibility due to their music reaching a mainly female/young audience. Although there are other factors that determine the lack of credibility given to them - such as Taylor Swift being branded as only writing songs about breakups (which deserves its own post on how ridiculous this is) the fact remains that if young women like something, according to mainstream media, it's not quite as good as when young men like it. I could be interpreting this wrong, but looking at others reactions to the article, I'm not the only one who is uncomfortable with their attitude.

(Also side note, Ashton talks about how the Beatles did it ((i.e. were a 'real' band)) and therefore so can they - has he never heard of Beatlemania? The reason why the Beatles were SO huge to begin with was because of their dedicated and huge female fan base).

Going back to the 'rock star' life they seem to want, the article goes on to discuss the boys adventures when first going on tour. Luke says "When you put four young dudes on a tour bus, playing theaters, then arenas, you're going to have sex with a lot of girls, I guess", which, okay they're teenage boys, they're are going to try a have a must sex as possible. It's nothing to get upset about, as long as it's all consensual, it shouldn't be a problem. However, it turns into a problem when they are happy to take all the bonuses of having a large female fan base -i.e. hundreds of girls screaming their name and eager to be at their beck and call when they want some hanky panky- but not the unfortunate negatives that come with the industry they in.

It is undeniable to say that groups with mainly female fans struggle to be recognised as 'real' artists in the pop industry, but as the article shows, they have the credibility of many accomplished and respected artists they look up to, so why are they so keen to change the opinion of unimportant people that can't take 10 minutes to listen to a few songs and decide for themselves their opinion on the band without preconceived ideas of the band based solely on the majority of the fan base? All Time Low, Twenty One Pilots, Goldfinger, The Veronicas, Sum 41, Good Charlotte all seem to have a high respect for the band as they are either personal friends or have written with them. 

If this is a media stunt to change the bands image, or just a poorly written and conducted interview, it still stands that the band said what they said, and that needs to be addressed.

For my birthday this year, my dad's taking me on a road trip around a few countries in Europe. Since I was going to be away from my friends for my sixteenth, they decided to throw me a surprise party, which absolutely succeeded. Me and my closest friends had planned to go out for a meal to celebrate finishing GCSE's, and when I arrived at my friends house I rounded the corner and saw two tents, which immediately surprised me, but because I'm slightly slow, I didn't click on until everyone jumped out and said happy birthday. I started crying and just felt so loved, it was wonderful. It also crossed of number 33 on my Summer Bucket List: Camping! 

Although the tent ended up very soggy, Jamie even ended up waking up in a puddle poor lad, it was an amazing night and there was so much laughter it's something I definitely will not forget it in a hurry.

Alexa.