Capacity Is Not Accessibility

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The Difference Between Capacity and Accessibility

I need you to understand something.

Capacity is not the same as accessibility.

For those of us with autism, or different ways of learning, or a different perception of the world, we know what it takes. We know how we have to dig deep and do something that is extremely difficult. We know how we go out into the world and mask, bending and shaping ourselves just to try and fit in.

But here is the question that haunts me. What actually happens after all that effort?
We still do not feel accepted. We still do not fit in.

And it is not just a feeling. It is the reality of walking into workplaces dominated by a culture that calls itself normal. Normal shop talk. Normal work culture. That is what they name it. But what I hear, what many of us hear, is the constant grinding hum of talk about Indigenous people, about Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ people, about new Canadians. Outright homophobia. Transphobia. Racism. Hateful, hurtful nicknames for anyone who is different.

It does not stop.

And what happens when you experience it, when you observe it systemically at every single turn?
You start asking for accountability. And that is when the doors close.
WCB says UNDRIP and the TRC Calls to Action are federal issues, not theirs. Ministers say organizations are at arm’s length. The Alberta Human Rights Commission will not accommodate. The Ombudsman will not accommodate. Elected leaders who publicly proclaim support for diversity and equity witness what is happening and do nothing.

I see it clearly because I have to. Autistic pattern recognition is not a superpower. It is survival. It is systems analysis because the system keeps trying to erase me.
And what I see is obvious. This is a systemic problem.

Employers are allowed to operate this way while standing at podiums and proclaiming how important health and safety are.

The hypocrisy is the point. The exclusion is the design.

So I am writing this here, on my own space, because I have to put it somewhere.

This is my story. This is what I see. This is what I live.

If you recognize yourself in these words, I see you too.

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