I would also add, don't use false inclusion. And by that, I mean, don't invite an autistic person to do something that you know damn well that they have no interest in. Okay, they might think it was nice that you asked, but it can come across as insincere. To give an example, when I was in Year Eight at school, a teacher asked if anyone was interested in playing in a football match. One kid in my class decided to be a smart ass and put my name on the list. Now, fortunately, the teacher knew it wasn't in my handwriting and crossed my name out. Another time, a nice kid asked me if I wanted to play football, and while it was nice that he asked, he knew me well enough to know I didn't like it. If there had been something related to Japan and he'd said, "Oh, I'm not interested in that, but Peter might be, so I can give him my ticket," that's true inclusion.

I remember getting the last laugh against the smart-ass kid in Year Nine, because my father had worked for a confectionary wholesaler, that was bought out by what is now British-American Tobacco, and he brought home some samples of candies that came in what were like milk cartons. The smart-ass kid was eating some one morning, and a girl in my class gushed over it and said how cute it was, so he offered her a few candies and then he looked at me and said, "Have none." I told him I didn't want any, but what I didn't tell him was that I had tried them, because my father worked for a company that distributed them.

I would also say, "Don't use autistic people for your own advantage." Many autistic people are very loyal to our family and friends. If I could give an example from my own past, I went to university with a woman, and when I first met her, I wasn't sure if I really liked her. She wanted to sit beside me one day, and that became more frequent, and I thought I had a friend, or at least someone who liked me. Sometimes, she would look through my folder to find something, and I thought that because I thought she liked me, it was okay. But she wasn't my friend. She was just buttering me up to use me. If she didn't attend lectures, she'd ask if she could borrow my notes! At first, I didn't mind, but when I saw what she really was, I felt used and abused.

I would also add, DON'T, and I cannot stress this enough, ever use it against them or disclose it to someone else without their permission. If an autistic person tells you that they're autistic, they might be telling you because they want you to know, OR they might be telling you because they trust you. Okay, I regularly go to a bottle shop, and I mentioned to a staff member that I'm autistic and he mentioned to another staff member, with an autistic son, that there is an autistic customer she'd absolutely love, and he was talking about me. That's fine. But if you are ever angry with an autistic person, DON'T throw it back in their face. And if they tell you, in confidence, respect that confidence.