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[title]Award-winning Australian actor and advocate Chloé Hayden is no stranger to speaking up and standing out. She is best known for her role as Quinni Gallagher-Jones on the 2022 Netflix reboot of Heartbreak High. However, her contributions extend far beyond the entertainment industry. She is also a disability rights activist, author, and a prominent social media personality.
Recently, Hayden sparked a national conversation around accessibility in public spaces – she made headlines for calling out Melbourne's Marvel Stadium after being denied entry to the stadium’s sensory room at the Harry Styles concert because she didn’t appear “Autistic enough”. She has also given testimony at the Disability Royal Commission, and has recently released her debut novel Different, Not Less: A Neurodivergent’s Guide to Embracing Your True Self and Finding Your Happily Ever After.
Question what you're not seeing. Question what you don't naturally believe to be the truth.
At the 2023 All About Women Festival (Mar 10-13) at the Sydney Opera House, Hayden is a panellist on Actually Autistic: Women and Non-Binary People on the Spectrum, a talk that also features Grace Tame, Dr Jac Den Houting and Dr Amy Thunig.
We caught up with Hayden ahead of the festival to talk about representation, sensory spaces, TikTok and her love of sharks.
Chloé, you give so much of your time and energy to answering other people's questions about Autism accessibility and equity. What questions do you wish other people would ask themselves or the people in their lives about their conceptions of autism?
A big one for people to ask themselves is, ‘Is my viewing of this person based on them, or a depiction of what I have made up about believing their disability to be?’
When you see someone like me, who doesn't visibly appear disabled, or you see a kid in a supermarket screaming and panicking, instead of immediately going, ‘Oh, that's shit parenting’, hang on. Maybe this is a kid that is Autistic or has sensory processing issues and is in a traumatic situation. Similarly, you see someone that's like me, and you see them out and about, or you see them in a concert, or you see them, you know, living their life, and then they freak out about something, or they have a meltdown, or they get quiet, or they go non-verbal. Instead of going, ‘Oh, that's really weird’. Go OK, well, ‘Like, what am I not seeing?’
Question what you're not seeing. Question what you don't naturally believe to be the truth.
Historically, women haven't been adequately represented within the Autism spectrum. And there are so many ways in which gender intersects with the Autistic experience. What are some of the challenges faced by Autistic women that you want to start a conversation on?
I mean, the biggest challenge is the fact that our actual diagnostic criteria doesn’t put Autistic women into the mix. Our experiences haven't been factored into the diagnostic criteria. The research that they did on Autism was based on a very, very, very tiny group of Autistic men.
The number of trained medical professionals, doctors and psychologists that have told me, ‘Oh, you’re not Autistic simply because you're a woman’. It happens all the time. The number of women that are misdiagnosed or just not diagnosed, period, for no other reason than because they're a woman, is ridiculous. Like, I think it really has to start at the bottom.
You explore these issues in your book Different, Not Less. It provides such a great accessible guide for Autistic people to embrace themselves. But I also felt that the book isn't just for them. It's an incredible resource for families, educators and health practitioners to better understand the Autistic experience. Can you tell me your intention behind the book and what you hope people will get from reading it, whether they're Autistic or not?
You've pretty much nailed it. Like, my book is for Autistic people, but it's also for those that know autistic people. I don't remember the exact statistics, but it's something like 83 per cent of Australians know, interact with or are aware that they have at least one Autistic person in their lives. This book is for everyone because it's a group effort to create a world where we can all fit in and create an inclusive world. It's the book I wish I had been handed when I got my Autism diagnosis, and the book that I wish my mum had been handed because maybe she wouldn't have cried. I wish my doctors had had this book, and I wish my psychologists who diagnosed me had read this.
Photograph: Supplied/Chloe Hayden
Speaking of representation, you played Quinni on Heartbreak High, a rare instance of an Autistic person playing an Autistic character. You were able to use your lived experience of meltdowns, sensory processing, going nonverbal, and also the challenges of navigating relationships to the role. What does it mean for you to be able to give the representation that you lacked growing up?
Oh, it means everything, because my whole mission was to ensure that young people don't have to go through the same thing that I went through growing up, and representation is a massive aspect of that. A lot of people are privileged enough to have been represented their entire lives in media because, simply, they are what people expect, and they fit into this tiny box of ‘normal’.
Many people don't recognise the importance of representation or understand the impact of not seeing myself in characters growing up, and having to relate to Disney characters because that's the closest thing I had. It means you grow up going, ‘Why can't I see myself? Why can I not see people like me?’
You start thinking, 'Well if I can't see anyone that looks like me, am I even supposed to be here? Am I a mistake? Am I a glitch?'
Seeing Autistic people represented in any aspect, but especially a brilliant, bold, bubbly, neurodivergent character where her Autism is the least important thing about her is so important, and it's going to change the lives of so many young people because I know that would have changed mine.
You're so right that Quinni being Autistic is a kind of subtext, it doesn't define her. How did you play a role in making sure that Quinni wasn't some kind of caricature of what an Autistic person might look like based on misconceptions?
I think when they hired me, they knew I wouldn’t let that happen. I only discovered after getting the role and finishing the series that they actually scouted me on TikTok, and I don't hold back on there. I am very loud and very vocal, particularly about the entertainment industry and about media, so I think they knew from the get-go this wasn't going to be a ‘yes man’ sort of deal for them, but they never want to try to make it that way either.
So many divergent voices have gone into Quinni to ensure she wasn't this manic pixie dream girl, or this false stereotype of Autism that we've had far too much of.
Social media has played such a big role in not just your acting work but also your advocacy. Most recently, you've made headlines speaking about your experience at the Harry Styles concert, leading to you working with Marvel Stadium to make changes. Platforms like TikTok have also largely been attributed to an increase in people accessing an Autism diagnosis. How have you seen people meaningfully engage with these platforms to build community, learn more and speak up?
I think we're in a really cool time period where people who haven't had the opportunity to have voices before now can via their social channels. The amount of people that I have reached, particularly because of TikTok, that would never have known about Autism or cared to learn…because of watching my TikTok videos, it’s changed their opinions entirely, or they’ve realised that they are Autistic themselves and gotten that diagnosis. I’ve built my community via social media and discovered more people were like me because of it. It's such an incredibly powerful tool.
To finish up, I'd love to ask you, when you are in Sydney, what do you like to do? And where do you like to go that makes you feel most authentically you?
I love surfing. So going and finding surfing spots is always a fun thing. I'm also obsessed with sharks. So going into the aquarium and standing in the shark tunnel is my favourite thing ever.
Have you seen Progress Shark yet?
Oh, my God, I was in Sydney the other day and I drove past and was like “Oh my God, Pride Shark! Slay!”
Slay indeed.