2 comments on “So what does an autistic adult who really would shoot people have to say about all this?

  1. Please tell me more about your distaste for Autism Speaks. Why? I want to know your experience. My son is almost 7, he was diagnosed last year at his school. This year they wanted to know the meds he was on because his development “is remarkable”. I was offended and replied that he is not on medication! I love my son and everything about him. I understand his ways and think he’s such a beautiful boy. He has such a heart that will overwhelm with emotion when he understands another’s pain. He is safe with me so he can express this! He would NOT express or even know how to with anyone else he doesn’t understand himself! I work with him and encourage his loves and passions and it really isn’t hard to do. I ask about Autism Speaks bc his schools professionals, whom work with him very well, often suggest involving myself with this organization and if there should be caution made before looking into this, I would like to know and judge for myself. I am still learning. The “normies” at my sons school highly respect me as my autistic sons mother and would love to hear a difference of opinion concerning this organization if provided. Thank you for your time.

    • Okay. This reply is going to be somewhat verbose because I feel a need to communicate a number of points. Please read it through to the end before replying or reacting, and carefully internalise what I say here. Remember, too, that the person you are addressing is potentially what your son will think and feel in another twenty years.

      Now, first of all, if there is anyone who needs education about the reality of being on the autistic spectrum, it appears to be more or less everyone at the school you speak of. I will not ask you to name names. But I can tell you without a second of pause that many of the parents of autistic children that I am in contact with would, on knowing which school you speak of, avoid it like I avoid certain grass types.

      I will not comment concerning the midsection of your statement (specifically, “I understand his ways”), because this is a bit of a bold statement to make for anyone who is not autistic. Hell, it is a bold statement even for other PTSD-suffering Powell types to make about me. Please remember at all times that your son is nearly seven years old, and will change very dramatically during the next five to ten years of his life (especially in the latter part of that timeframe). Assuming nothing and remembering that every thing not only you do and say will be reflected in another ten years, but also every thing that everyone else does and says, is crucial.

      Now, having said all of that, I do not care how well the school’s “professionals” work with him. They have two options here. They can either expose themselves to the truth about Autism Speaks, or they can ship out. There is no middle ground here. Anyone presuming to work with or for the autistic should not ever give this group the time of day. Now, I know you do not have the same abundance of time on your hands as I do, but searching online journals for articles concerning the ludicrous amounts of money Autism Speaks’ executives pay themselves or where the money is going would be a good start. There are several articles on this journal you are reading now that talk about why Autism Speaks would be labelled fraudulent and deprived of any tax exemptions if they were “representing” individuals with cancer or diabetes (both of which I suffer from) in the same manner as they purport to represent the autistic. That is just for starters.

      Now, the reason I was so very concerned about what you have to say concerning the people at your son’s school is because their view of your son is sounding suspiciously like the view that Autism Speaks want them to have. That they can even suggest getting involved with Autism Speaks to you strengthens this fear. Autism Speaks have always viewed and spoken of autism to the public with a disease model view of autism. Now, I do not know about you, but when someone tells me a neurological variance that I was born with, and others chose to respond to by abusing me in ways that get less justifiable every time I think them through, is a disease, I get angry. Diabetes is a disease. It shortens your life expectancy, causes your body to break down faster, and if the dice rolls go exactly the wrong ways at the wrong times, will kill you. Cancer is a disease. Even the most benign versions of it leave enormous scars and manglings that take a lifetime to adjust to (as I have partly shown elsewhere in this journal). When you look at it with this kind of context, Autism Speaks’ view of autism is not merely insulting. It is Nazi-like. And I know I raised an eyebrow by describing it that way. As one folk tale said before Disney defaced it, if the shoe fits, wear it.

      Looking through YouChoob is also a good exercise. Try to start by finding Autism Speaks’ adverts. Watch a few of them, and think to yourself. Does this bear even the slightest relationship with how you know and view your son? Pay special regard to the fact that Autism Speaks will not allow comments on most (if not all) of their videos. This is because Autism Speaks do not want potential donors (or suckers/collaborators, as we elder autistic individuals call them) seeing how badly they are thought of by the same people that they claim to represent. Also worthy of note is the similiarity, previously spoken of by me elsewhere on this journal, between Autism Speaks’ ads and the snippets of Nazi propaganda films that Michael Burleigh dissected in the documentary Selling Murder: The Killing Films Of The Third Reich (a documentary I wish were easily available, as it is an awesome educational piece). Then, go and look for videos made by people who are autistic. Not the parents of children on the spectrum, actual people who are autistic. To say that there is a massive disconnect between how Autism Speaks present or see themselves, and how the autistic see them, is like saying that Pol Pot had a tiny bit of an intolerance for anyone who was not basically a redneck.

      Finally, I do not know what the community or size thereof around you is. I live in the backyard of a city where millions of people go through every day, which in turn connects to a bigger city where parts of The Matrix were filmed (I have walked down the same street Larry Fishburne and Keanu Reeves did in one plot-explainer, numerous times). If you can find any kind of community group where autistic adults meet, do so. Go there a couple of times. On the first try, explain to them that you have a recently-diagnosed child whom you want to get a better understanding of how to prepare for the future of. And listen to what they talk about very carefully. Of course, getting someone to mind your son whilst you are there is an important part of this process.

      Now, I have to be exceedingly honest about this point. In a school where certain professionals recommend you participating in whatever Autism Speaks does, it is impossible to see them as respecting you. Whilst I cannot speak for every single person at that school, what I can tell you is that if they are not condemning the people who recommended giving Autism Speaks anything other than the finger, then they are on board with Autism Speaks. That might sound paranoid, but articles in number on this site illustrate why this is true. I do not know these people, and there is a slim chance that I might be mistaken, but there are parallel models to how you should view the relationship between your son and Autism Speaks. The Jews and the Nazis. The Ukranians and Joseph Stalin. The white farmer and black South Africans. I hope I do not need to go on.

      A good, somewhat more lighthearted, place to start on YouChoob would be this video. Just cover your son’s ears as you watch it. Any further queries or comments are, of course, welcomed.

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