Before submitting the articles, please read the guidelines carefully:
Themes
We welcome any submissions on any topics in mental health, human rights, disability or any neurodiversity, especially from your lived experience. We also publish the perspective of caregivers, respected professionals, educators and researchers. We accept:
1) Article/Essay (informational or personal story)
- Must include an introduction that states the key points of the post
- Only one submission at a time (pdf, docx)
- Links and references must be included (if any)
- Length: 400 to 1200 words
- English or Bahasa Melayu
2) Visual art (traditional/digital)
- High-quality image, photograph or scanned artwork (PNG or JPEG file)
- Each artwork must include a short description in English or Bahasa Melayu
- Maximum three artworks per submission.
3) Poem
- Any length
- If you intend to submit more than one poem, try to send several poems as opposed to a single piece (no more than three in one submission)
- English or Bahasa Melayu
Language
To ensure the blog is accessible to many people, we encourage submissions to use easily understandable language. Complex subjects are welcomed, but please ensure that terms and concepts specific to the subject are explained. Poems, however, need not strictly adhere to this recommendation.
When discussing disability, mental health, human rights and neurodiversity issues, it's important to avoid making generalisations or stereotypes.
Sensitivity & Triggers
Generally, we allow all kinds of entries; however, we take note of all entries that can be triggering, distressing and dangerous to some people. If these details are mentioned, they will be deleted in the editing process. Please find the breakdowns as follows:
1) Suicide methods: It's OK to talk about suicide, but leave out details about specific suicide methods. If you have a suicide method as part of a narrative, be as vague as possible. We encourage you to go through https://reportingonsuicide.org before submitting the entry.
2) Self-harm: Similarly, it's OK to talk about self-harm but leave out detailed descriptions of methods and imagery.
3) Harassment and Violence: It is important to talk about the traumatic experience from all forms of harassment and violence, but please avoid extremely graphic details and imagery unless it is crucial to the story.
4) Inappropriate details: If you're a parent or caregiver, write about your experience without disclosing intimate, graphic or potentially embarrassing details about your children, partner or someone you care for.
5) Stigmatised words: Words that have historically demeaned people with lived experience and persons with disabilities: This includes words like idiot, stupid, retard, psycho, cacat and others. If you're writing a piece about how we shouldn't use these words, go for it!
6) Outdated language: This includes: handicapped, wheel-chair bound and crippled but excludes those who've reclaimed it in a meaningful way to self-identify.
7) "Inspiration Porn": Don't call disabled people "inspirational" for doing everyday activities. Don't treat abled people as heroes for simply being kind to a disabled person.
Adaptation from The Mighty
updated on 1/1/2023