Blog #505: Why I Hate Shane Gillis for Mocking “Love on the Spectrum.”

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If you’re going to grow up and be a stand up comedian, there are rules you have to follow. If you are going to mock someone or something, you need to have a sense of respect for the material. Remember that there are elephants in the room that who will view your stand up comedy material as offensive and wrong.

This is the case with Shane Gillis, a stand up comedian who mocked the Australian edition of “Love on the Spectrum,” using derogatory language that we would never use in front of a neurodivergent individual. Now, I get the fact that he was trying to be funny and make the audience laugh to his jokes, but the fact is that if you find something funny, not everyone will feel this in the same way.

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The truth of the matter is that “Love on the Spectrum,” is more than just a show. It’s about overcoming a barrier that many neurodivergent/developmentally different individuals (myself included) struggle with and that is dating. To many, dating is something that you feel like you need to do in life. It isn’t easy and it’s not something to be taken lightly. There have been many attempts for most people to try and fall in love and if we don’t end up finding the right fit, we shouldn’t laugh at the misfortune that comes with it.

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I get also that some people have a tendency to laugh or mock at otherwise inappropriate moments. For comedians like Shane, the more you make people laugh, the more money you will make. Naturally, as I have said before, money is the root of all evils, even evils that are not often viewed as an evil.

There’s even some neurodivergent individuals who find inappropriate moments or topics funny to them, but not to others. In fact, I know some members of the neurodiversity community who have participated on “Love on the Spectrum” and I certainly feel their pain. If you make fun of “Love on the Spectrum” as a whole, you are mocking and putting down the neurodiversity community as a whole. You aren’t getting fame and fortune, you are really getting infamy and shame.

Sadly, this is how most of society has become in this day and age where people have the right to mock a platform that is viewed as safe for others. To those who participate on “Love on the Spectrum,” I applaud you for finding your ultimate romance and for navigating the social waters that come with it.

For those like Shane Gillis, try spending a day in our shoes and see that trying to find romance is never easy for anyone before you joke about it for your own pleasure. If you refuse to do so, then I have no sympathy for you and your own personal goals. Achieving a romantic relationship is a milestone and a milestone that should never be made fun of in any way.

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Catch you all later!!

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Author: Jeff Snyder, Autism and Neurodiversity Self-Advocate