“In my wildest dreams, I just expected a bunch of fellow coders to chat about the merits of the mod. I never expected it to ignite a gender-role debate. My kids are awesome. They are too young to understand any of the things people are saying. And after all, it’s the internet. It comes with the territory. It got me thinking about Metroid. If the internet was more prevalent back when thousands of boys discovered that, all along, they were playing as a woman, maybe Nintendo would have gotten just as much hate mail? Having kids is incredible. And having a daughter is something special. I get the opportunity to see the world through her eyes. And if this experience has taught me anything, it’s that the world could be just a bit more accommodating. And that if something as innocuous as having Mario be saved by Pauline brings out the crazy, maybe we aren’t as mature in our view of gender roles as we should be.”
—Why I Hacked Donkey Kong For My Daughter, Mike Mika
“¦remember that just because a PC is not running Windows doesnât mean that itâs broken. Not all the features of atypical human operating systems are bugs. We owe many of the wonders of modern life to innovators who were brilliant in non-neurotypical ways. ”
—From a thought-provoking essay by Steve Silberman in Wired: Neurodiversity Rewires Conventional Thinking About Brains.
Who’s to say that the “predominant” brain wiring is the “best” brain wiring? Evolution, both biological and cultural, has relied on variation in populations to move forward. For instance, just because people live on the autism spectrum, doesn’t mean they should be pushed to the fringes of society. Perhaps we should ask if there are new ways that they can better society?
