You may know I was diagnosed with autism 10yrs ago. You may not know I was also diagnosed with schizophrenia at the same time. Today is World Schizophrenia
Awareness Day (1). Here in so-called Australia, schizophrenia affects between 150,000-200,000 humans (2).
You might know autism and ADHD/ADD are forms of neurodivergence, but did you
know that schizophrenia social anxiety/anxiety disorders and depression are as well?
Neurodivergence means having a different brain to what is historically, clinically and socially classified as “normal”. (shudder)
Fortunately for the neurospicy like me, the Social Model of Disability is seeing medical definitions rewritten with a healthier focus, changing outdated societal ideologies and expectations.
My form of schizophrenia is visceral (3). When I’m tired, stressed, or anxious, my
symptoms can arise despite daily medications. I see, hear, and feel bugs. Flying, buzzing, crawling insects. Bugs creeping on my scalp and into my skin. It’s usually a speck of dust. Sometimes, it’s actually an insect. An offset of my schizophrenia is a cognitive disability (4) (confused thinking, loss of words, disjointed understanding, and
forgetfulness).
There is too much misinformation on how schizophrenia manifests. Science has not discovered irrefutably what causes it; however, mine was likely brought on by excessive stress and poor health maintenance.
When the word “crazy” is so easily used as a gross negative, it paints schizophrenics as bad people with uncontrollable brains leading to dangerous behaviour. We see this stereotype in the media when individuals enact incomprehensible harm (5). More often, the individual is just a massive angry douche. To be clear: people with schizophrenia are rarely violent, and when they are it is usually self-harm (6).
I’m not prone to hyperbole, but every time I hear someone use the term “crazy”
derogatorily, it HURTS me. It means you consider ME suboptimal.
I know language is difficult to change. Hell, I’m almost 50 & struggle with using “crazy”, particularly directed at myself. We stopped using other harmful words in my lifetime, so we can stop using this one too.
The Art Newspaper leads off with a deep dive into the vibrancy of the Palestinian art scene in Gaza - “people in the community really responded to what these artists were doing in places like Shababeek & Eltiqa, which unfortunately have now been destroyed.”
#bandshirtfriday
This is Dana wearing the new Fogdriver T-Shirt. But wait a minute - did you notice the similarity?
Yes, you´re right. She is indeed the "dancing shadow" in the fogdriver-video, on our CD-cover and the centre point of our new Shirt design!
Thank you so much, Dana, for being part of all this!!
I just released a new video piece. I called it INK because there's a lot of ink in the video and "Ink" looks so small. Sounds composed with Csound using a python script I wrote to analyze the individual frames of the video. I hope you like it! https://vimeo.com/932750036
From Bandare Laft we took the ferry to Iran mainland. Our plan was to pedale along the coast northwards, to stay a bit longer in the warmth. The weatherforcast for the inland regions (Shiraz, Yazd etc. ) is still a bit chilly, espeacially at night...
'Badgir', the so called Windcatcher are very impressive.
Badgir are built like the traditional houses, from clay and straw. From all directions the wind get catched and brought down into the rooms, essentially a natural air conditioning system.
In the little traditional village 'Laft' a lot of these Badgir are still visible. From a rocky little hill in middle of the village we enjoy the fantastic view over the old part of the coastal village.