Autistic Pride Day Didn’t Need Reinventing. It Needed Infrastructure—and We Built It

Autistic Pride Day already existed. The idea. The community. The intention.

What didn’t exist—especially after the pandemic—was infrastructure. No cohesive platform. No reliable access points. No space for Autistic people to lead with complexity and power on our own terms. The day was there, but too many were locked out of it.

So we didn’t wait to be included. We built what was missing.

We Built Infrastructure, Not Awareness

This wasn’t a hashtag campaign. It wasn’t a feel-good webinar. It was an intentional design response to a structural void.

We developed free toolkits. We launched a global portal. We activated an ecosystem—starting with Autistic Pride Day Symposia in Melbourne and Sydney.

These weren’t symbolic gatherings. They were Autistic-led conferences with rigour, standards, and real-world delivery. And we did it with no government funding, no corporate backing, and no PR machine.

It nearly ruined us financially. We built it anyway.

This Was Built By Community, Not Consultants

Our local initiative was never about optics. It was built by Autistic professionals who understood the stakes and showed up anyway.

Dr Sharon Zivkovic, Dr Judy Tang, Dr Naomi Malone, Roo Harris, Anita Aherne, Rebecca McCash, Christina Chun, Clare Gibellini and so many more rolled up their sleeves and helped.

These are not names on a list. They are collaborators, producers, thinkers, and co-creators of a platform now used by over 500 organisations, councils, government departments, families and individuals globally.

They didn’t ask for credit. They delivered impact.

Backlash Wasn’t a Surprise. It Was an Expectation.

As soon as we used the word Pride, we were told to change it. Too political. Too confusing. Too queer.

Then came the coordinated attacks—accusations from American-style evangelicals claiming we were “promoting sodomy to Autistic people.” Local discomfort dressed up as polite concern. Global pressure to water it down.

We didn’t.

We didn’t fold, rebrand, or apologise. We scaled.

From One Day to a Year-Round System: The Birth of Think Autism

The toolkit and portal were just the beginning. We quickly saw the demand wasn’t just for a single day—it was for a structure. Something that didn’t disappear on June 19.

So we built Think Autism as a year-round platform.

Starting this weekend, we launch our national programming, digital panels, intersectional content, and real-world events that foreground Autistic entrepreneurship, leadership, and cultural work. This isn’t a pop-up. It’s a system designed to last.

This is what Autistic enterprise looks like: strategic, scalable, and unfunded by those who demand compromise.

This Is Not Advocacy. This Is Infrastructure.

We are not just building a campaign. It is a logistics system. It is a communications platform. It is an operational response to years of erasure, gatekeeping, and under-resourcing.

We didn’t create this to “raise awareness.” We created it to correct a systems failure.

And we treat it like the infrastructure it is—with accountability, with strategy, and with ongoing professional delivery.

To Governments Watching: You’ll Fund It Eventually. But You’ll Never Own It.

We will always ensure free access for community and speakers. We will always ensure everyone who contributes gets paid—financially, or through platform, opportunity, or recognition. We do not extract. We do not exploit.

To the governments and institutions watching: You will fund this work eventually—because it works, because the public will demand it, and because your own systems will fall short.

But let’s be clear: you will never be able to claim it.

This wasn’t designed in a boardroom. It wasn’t shaped by consultation fatigue or policy cycles. It wasn’t built to be safe, neutral, or marketable.

It was built by Autistic people who were tired of being spoken for. Tired of being expected to perform gratitude. Tired of funding being contingent on invisibility.

We didn’t repackage Autistic Pride Day. We protected it—and we scaled it.

We thank the City of Sydney for backing us when others wouldn’t. They recognised the value without asking us to compromise it. That’s partnership. That’s what respect looks like.

To the rest: we built it without you.

And we will keep building—without compromise.

PS

For Every Autistic Person Who Was Made to Feel Flawed

This was built for you—because the system was never designed to include you, and too many people were happy to leave it that way. You were never the issue. The barriers were.

First published on LinkedIn, 26 May 2025.