Autistic vs Has Autism

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I prefer autistic. To me, "has autism" suggests disease. It's also a bit too close to this person-first thing, and I've never liked that. I accept that language is important, but I don't like to see it being policed too vigorously, which I think was being done by the lady in the story in the original post. I sometimes wonder how it is that some people think they get to decide what folks are allowed to say and what they're not.

One of the aspects of allism is that people think person first language makes a difference. For only dollars a day, won't you help end the cycle? Everyday more and more people grow up thinking that reversing the modifiers matter. Won't somebody please think of the children?

For myself, I have no preference either way; in general, I will use either depending on the environment I'm in.

i.e. I work in disability services, where "person first language" is very much the desired terminology, so I generally use "has autism / person with autism / on the spectrum."

When talking to fellow autistic people, especially in online spaces, I tend to use "autistic."

I prefer 'autistic' because saying that I 'have autism' makes it sound like you could separate me from my autism but you can't - autism is part of what makes me me, you take that away and I'll be a completely different person.

I prefer to say I'm autistic rather than I have autism, mainly because it's less clunky. I like to be economical in my communication. And it seems more appropriate, since autism is not a disease.

I'm studying for a grad certificate in autism studies, and the current preferred term seems to be "individual on the autism spectrum".

We're supposed to put a statement in our assignments saying what language we will be using, with a citation referencing a study to explain our choice, which bugs me as it really isn't something I care about and I don't get why it's such a big deal, honestly.