As if an entanglement with Shia LaBeouf wasn’t a questionable enough choice for this decade, Sia made a contentious movie in 2021 called Music, for which she received super heavy backlash for casting Maddie Ziegler— who’s neurotypical–in the role of a non-verbal autistic girl, for the way the film portrayed autism in general, and for lacking research and input from members of the neurodivergent community. After Sia piss-poorly responded to the backlash in several tweets, the pushback was apparently so taxing on her that she ended up breaking her sobriety and headed to rehab. And now, two years after the whole Music ordeal, Sia just shared that she herself is on the autism spectrum.
Page Six reports that Survivor super-fan Sia was on past contestant Rob Cesternino’s podcast to give $100,000 to her favorite finalist this season, Carolyn Wiger, and got candid about her recovery from addiction and revealed she’s on the autism spectrum while she was explaining why she chose Carolyn.
“I’m on the spectrum, and I’m in recovery and whatever — there’s a lot of things,” the “Chandelier” singer said Thursday during a candid conversation with “Survivor” Season 44 finalist Carolyn Wiger on “Rob Has a Podcast,” noting that she is also sober.
Sia, 47, did not disclose when she was diagnosed with the developmental disability, which the CDC says can be “detected at 18 months of age or younger,” though she suggested it was recently.
Sia’s diagnosis is presumably recent since she’s 47 and said she hadn’t felt comfortable or fully accepted herself for 45 years.
“For 45 years, I was like … ‘I’ve got to go put my human suit on,’” she explained. “And only in the last two years have I become fully, fully myself.”
“Nobody can ever know and love you when you’re filled with secrets and … living in shame,” she said, “and when we finally sit in a room full of strangers and tell them our deepest, darkest, most shameful secrets, and everybody laughs along with us, and we don’t feel like pieces of trash for the first time in our lives, and we feel seen for the first time in our lives for who we actually are, and then we can start going out into the world and just operating as humans and human beings with hearts and not pretending to be anything.”
Here’s the video:
However, some are skeptical of Sia’s news in light of Music and her way-less-than-ideal response to the criticism when it came out:
I hope that Sia doesn’t plan to use her Autism diagnosis to sidestep or “invalidate” the criticism she received for ‘Music’. Regardless of her neurology, she created a harmful movie, was so rude to the autistic community – her community – and an apology from her is long overdue.
— Callum Stephen (He/Him) (@AutisticCallum_) May 31, 2023
#Sia. Girl please.
For anyone in the back, #autism is not an excuse for atrocious, ableist, harmful-to-an-entire-community behaviour, especially when you have power, money, and a platform. Happy for everyone who learns who they are but ya… #NothingAboutUsWithoutUs
— Diane @Autastic.com (@WeAreAutastic) May 31, 2023
But a few were more forgiving:
Hot take – (I am willing to be dragged for this) but I'm hoping that there is some forgiveness for Sia on the autism front. It's clear she's got a lot of internalised abelism and sees autism as a part of her that's shameful. The only way that can change is with acceptance.
— Ness (@NessieAvery) May 31, 2023
Sia going public with her autism diagnosis is a) not a surprise I totally clocked her lol and b) not ammunition for us to use as criticism of “Music.” Maybe she has a lot of internalized ableism/stereotyping that she needs to work through.
Maybe let’s leave her be?
— scaredy cath
(@scaredycath) May 31, 2023
(@scaredycath) That revelation had to take a load of weight off of Sia’s shoulders since she had been conforming to live in a neurotypically-dominated world, which had to be extremely exhausting. And hopefully, she’s also had the revelation that she’d be better off sticking to making her stacks of Survivor fun money by never making a movie again and just sticking with actual music.
Pic: ACE/INFphoto.com