THE WORD IS OUT ABOUT AUTISM

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For everyone who reads the writings of Michelle Dawson, this is the latest. Its about the legal situation of Autistics in Canada (of course).

http://www.sentex.net/~nexus23/naa_sen.html

Is there any update on the progress on this recommendations? Maybe there's some way Autistic Canadians could receive political assylum in the US in the mean time?

Michelle Dawson fully deserves our support. For a supposedly progressive, civilised nation, Canada certainly seems to treat autistic people as Untermenschen...

More power to her. Hopefully someone will take notice of her recommendations (though I'm not hopeful based on previous responses she has had).

Political asylum? I don't think so. But perhaps they COULD claim refugee status if they went to the states. If they're treated inhumanely in Canada as defined by US constitution, surely that would be an adequate claim for refugee status? I'm not entirely up to speed on such things, but it seems logical.

From what I've been reading, It sounds like it's only a matter of time before Canada comes up with a final solution to the Autistic question.

Not likely. The Autism agenda in Canada is set by a collective group of organisations under the umbrella of FEAT, which also counts most American organisations under it aswell.

In Canada, the liberal tenants are used against Autistics where it just isn't possible in the US.

I guess it's for the best that AS was not a recognized diagnosis when I received my other diagnoses for the comorbid disorders. My Mom seems to be influenced more easily by the people that claim mercury causes Autism than the genetic explainations and she would likely have found her way into one of those pro-cure, pro-ABA groups. Plus, being a minor at the time, I would not have had any right to informed consent regarding any of their "medical treatment". Since I learned about AS when I was 18, if anyone (hypothetically) wanted to try and force thir brand of "intervention" on me, not only would I have informed consent, but they also better consider it worth risking their life over. Does anybody know if any member here has ever claimed to have benefitted from ABA or any other intervention therapy?

Yes, I think my mother's own form of "intervention" worked wonderfully. My mother was a firm believer in "spare the rod, spoil the child". ABA is nothing bad, in truth, it only depends on what and how you apply it. Autism advocates aren't entirely against ABA, just the method of application. Truly, some behaviors are bad and should be controlled. ABA should be applied, not by punishing unwanted behaviors, but by rewarding desirable behaviors. Nevertheless, a little negative reinforcement is still sometimes a necessity, if judiciously applied. Everyone, autistic or not, learns from experience: an oven is hot, if you touch it you will be burnt. ABA applies this learning to behavior. I am not sure how far anti-ABA advocates take the idea that ABA should not use negative reinforcement, but not all negative reinforcement is a bad thing.
This, at least, is my view.

I'm not familiar with this Canada thing... What's happeneing to autistics there???

I haven't read much by Michelle Dawson before now, but I'm going to be following her stuff now. I didn't even know my country was so anti-autistic. I'm Canadian, obviously, and The only classic autie I ever knew was being treated at home by his family and they were paying big bucks to try to figure out how to help him.

I'm undiagnosed, so I've never run into any issues for myself.

The whole situation reads like the US government trying to erradicate mutants in the Marvel Universe. It's sick.

Which is exactally why I am so for leaving NTs and fearing NTs (Ive been compared to Magneto many times before but I dont want to hurt NTs just keep auties and aspies from being hurt.) Do you think any aspie/autie has never been seriously bullied, hurt, and/or abused by a NT. I wish we could all just buy our own Island where we could live without all of that but sadly it wont ever happen even if we do do it governments would begin to fear us and wouldnt let us stay independant of them.

Danlo,

That's not quite right either. One of the bigger ethical problems with Behaviourists is when they ignore their own science selectively. The idea of Operant Conditioning means that a behaviour must have an organism and a stimuli, without one there can be no behaviour. This means to the effect that every person does something for a reason, so the laws of Operant Conditioning state that removing that reason will remove the behaviour. In ABA-Autism, this is ignored and the behaviour is dismissed as 'spontaneous' and 'internally stimulated', this is a Special Pleading fallacy.

This results in the valid reasons an Autistic child might have for doing something being ignored, whilst a stonger deterring stimuli is applied against it. BF Skinner himself said that adversives do not work, especially in people as when they are aware of the effects of Operant Conditioning, their resistence to it expands. Oh curse that human gift of sentience! Skinner noted that adversives became less and less effective over time. At best, they merely hold attention.

It's not until you start producing 'bad' behaviours that you find neccessary and other resolve to remove them that you begin to put yourself in someone else's place.

I used to have respect for Canada. Now they are pushing it way too far. If tehy try a final solution there shall be a suicide bomb attack....

Wow. I am in shock. This article is no exaggeration???

Who wants to join my militia? I shall create a website tommorow.

My mom has a friend with autistic kids, and she says their treated fine.