Library / Watch / Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024
Community voice, Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024
Sharon Zivkovic said autistic expectations had risen and called it a social movement
In short
Opening the closing session of the 2024 Sydney symposium, Dr Sharon Zivkovic said the bar for future autistic lives had been raised in two years. Participants then described what the two days had meant to them.
Read it instead, 5 minutesThe transcript
The story
Dr Sharon Zivkovic opened the closing session of the 2024 Autistic Pride Day Symposium in Sydney with a claim about ambition. Asked what came to mind after two exhausting days in Melbourne and Sydney, she said that the desires and expectations of autistic people about what is possible had increased enormously over the previous two years. “I think we’ve raised the bar of what we think the lives of future generations of autistic people are going to be,” she said. She pointed to the interest of policy makers and of other countries, and said she thought “it’s part of a social movement and I think we’re demanding more”, which she welcomed.
Kyriakos Gold, who hosted the session, had introduced her as the fairy godmother of the symposium, a name he had used for her before. He and Zivkovic had both been speakers at a State Library of Victoria event, and it was a conversation with her there that gave him the idea of creating this community. Two years down the track, Gold asked her how it felt to be part of it.
Sign in to keep reading, listening and watching.
Sign in with your email and everything in the Library is open to you: every story, every talk and every episode. It is free and it always will be. If you can, a donation helps keep it free for everyone.
Sources the story draws on
- Senate Select Committee on Autism Report on services, support and life outcomes for Autistic Australians (opens in a new tab), Autism CRC
- Australian Government response to the Select Committee on Autism report: Services, support and life outcomes for autistic Australians (opens in a new tab), Australian Government (Department of Social Services)
- Release of the National Autism Strategy 2025 to 31 (opens in a new tab), Department of Social Services
- National Autism Strategy 2025 to 2031 (opens in a new tab), Commonwealth of Australia (Department of Social Services)
More from Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024
All 94-
5 minutes 55 seconds, captioned Autistic led does not mean autistic only, an AV panellist told Sydney Kyriakos Gold A founder diagnosed with ADHD three weeks earlier challenged the symposium’s red flag test for programs that are not autistic led. A panellist from Aspergers Victoria replied that the leadership did not have to be one person. - 1 minute 58 seconds, captioned Minds at Play, a contract critique and growth built from special interests Dwayne Fernandes At the Sydney symposium in 2024, Dwayne Fernandes of Minds at Play described an autistic employee whose critique of a contract fixed a problem for the business. A panellist explained using a game to start the conversation.
- 9 minutes 1 second, captioned Sleep, preparation and support workers, the hidden cost of attending an autism event Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024 In the closing session of the 2024 Sydney symposium, a first time attendee asked for more talk about struggle. The replies described how much effort it takes to be in the room at all.
- 2 minutes 48 seconds, captioned Kyriakos Gold on unmasking at 48 and being told he does not look autistic enough Kyriakos Gold In the closing session of the 2024 Sydney symposium, Kyriakos Gold described the daily work of suppressing sensory pain, what unmasking had done to his composure, and the comments that called him a fraud.
- 3 minutes 45 seconds, captioned Tourette’s, a childhood stroke and why one panellist chose to be the bridge Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024 In the closing session of the 2024 Sydney symposium, a panellist from Aspergers Victoria described conditions that complicate each other’s treatment, a childhood without support, and accepting a harder road for others.
- 4 minutes 57 seconds, captioned Especially hard to find if not a Caucasian cisgender boy, an activist said Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024 In the last round of the 2024 Sydney symposium, participants spoke about who gets recognised, from masked adults to late diagnosed sisters, and what a full room changed for them.