When “Vetted” Turns Into Gatekeeping
Why platforms like Neurovetted raise red flags, even with good intentions
There’s a recent trend in the small business world toward “vetting” platforms. Lists, badges, and signals that promise to identify businesses that are ethical, safe, or aligned around shared values.
On the surface, this makes sense. People are tired of being burned. Neurodivergent folks, in particular, are looking for ways to reduce risk in professional relationships.
Platforms are emerging in response to that demand. In some cases (Neurovetted included) the way vetting is structured can introduce risks to the very communities it aims to support.
Because when vetting is built without clear guardrails, it tends to concentrate power rather than protecting the people it was meant to serve.
Vetting without structure becomes personal authority
Any system that decides who is “ethical” or “safe” needs more than good intentions. It requires visible structure, defined decision-making authority, and shared governance informed by varied lived experience.
When vetting relies on:
one person’s judgment
undocumented criteria
private decision-making
ethical approval becomes a personal endorsement over a process, and with that creates an imbalance.
That’s neither fair, or sustainable - especially at scale. Even well-meaning creators bring blind spots. Without checks, those blind spots quietly become policy.
Neurodivergence adds risk.
Using neurodivergence as a framing device raises the stakes and brings a lot of risk into the equation.
Neurodivergent people already navigate environments where:
communication differences are penalized
misunderstandings carry outsized consequences
credibility can be fragile
A vetting platform that positions itself as “ND-aligned” without transparent standards or shared governance risks creating a new hierarchy: who counts as safe, who doesn’t, and who gets to decide.
That extra layer of social control is extremely detrimental to the ND community its supposed to service.
Homogeneous outcomes are a warning sign
When vetted lists are overwhelmingly homogeneous (especially along racial lines) that’s a signal worth paying attention to.
In systems where:
inclusion is gated
vetting is subjective
processes are opaque
Bias can often be unintentional, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t show, or isnt effective. Ethical systems are responsible not just for their goals, but for their outcomes.
If the outcomes don’t match the values being claimed, that creates a gap.
Pay-to-belong models distort trust
Charging a fee to be listed (and a higher fee to display a badge) creates a structural tension while also excluding ethical business owners who may not have the financial means to participate.
Once money is tied to moral signaling:
inclusion generates revenue
legitimacy becomes scarce
trust becomes transactional
Even if every decision is made in good faith, the incentive structure pushes the system away from neutrality. Ethical vetting can’t function properly when approval is also a product.
Complaint systems need clear transparency
Many vetting platforms, Neurovetted included, include mechanisms for submitting complaints about businesses.
Without publicly defined standards (what qualifies, how claims are verified, how responses are handled, what the time-frame of investigation is) those systems can easily cause harm or even informal blacklists.
Accountability always requires transparency.
What ethical vetting would need to look like
A responsible vetting system would require:
published criteria that anyone can examine, with the last updated date clearly displayed.
public aggregate reporting on how many businesses apply versus how many are approved
a diverse vetting board rather than a single decision-maker
shared or independent governance with defined accountability
transparent complaint processes with clear standards
protections against bias, retaliation, and bad-faith reporting
a clear separation between revenue and approval, with funding structured around community sustainability rather than individual financial incentive
That kind of structure is slow and unglamorous. It doesn’t scale neatly. It resists being owned or controlled by one person.
Which is exactly why it’s rare.
A final thought
Small business owners, especially those in the ND community, don’t need badges telling us who to trust, and we don’t want systems that ask us to outsource judgment to someone else’s unchecked authority.