Stand out or fit in??

I was thinking about this quote today, and wonder is it really accurate or do we really not want to fit in? Just fit in.  I understand the concept of trying to be yourself and wanting to "stand out".  But when you have a child with special needs sometimes, at least for myself, I just want him to be able to carry on in the day like typical peers mainly because I don't want him to stand out so much that he's targeted or made fun of or laughed at just because he's misunderstood by other people. It's a great thing to be able to just be yourself and I totally get that.  I'm not saying that you shouldn't just be yourself. But sometimes, even adults, can look at other adults with differences and poke a little fun between friends about it or just stare at them and I don't want that for my son. So I'm a little torn about this because I see it very often in the Autism community.  And it is a beautiful thing to just be yourself and stand out but not so much that it's at the expense of the individual. I worry about that a lot. Maybe I shouldn't, but I'm his mom so I'm always gonna worry.  And I get telling your child "don't worry just be yourself.  Don't care what anybody else thinks". But if I were standing on the sidelines and watching someone making fun of or staring at my son, I would get angry.  I've seen people when we're out staring at him because he's acting little too quirky than he probably should or he's loud or he's being way silly and doing a lot of stimming and it frustrates me that they stare at him.  But they don't get it.  They don't understand it.   I guess I shouldn't care if they don't understand.  I could say, don't worry about it, we're never going to see those people again. But I'm not just talking about strangers; I'm talking about school and work and relationships. I know it should be socially acceptable, but I don't think society is there yet. I think there's way too many people that judge a lot of the behaviors people, kids and adults, on the spectrum have because they don't understand.