Local Autism Event Not ASD Friendly

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Yeah Elaine, you're probably right. NT kids want their own space too and perhaps a break.

How about an Autistic / NT Alliance club on school campuses? That would attract certain NTs....possibly ones desiring to work in education.

I like this idea ... I think "gay/straight alliance" groups have been fairly successful in high schools that have them.

Bea, that's where I got the idea. The Gay/Straight has worked.

Those are the types of NTs that want to make all the teachers and administrators think they are saints for volunteering in the self contained classrooms and Perdue degrees in exceptional education or speech pathology. These NTs look down on autistic people and think they know everything about autism even though they are really clueless about it. These NTs are condescending, prissy, spoiled, rich girls. These are the types of NTs that would turn me off from joining an autistic / NT alliance club.

As a kid, I would have hated this type of stuff.

I hated anything which reeked of "forced socialization."

It's just thing is other autistic kids aren't really any safer to be around. I've been in exclusive private schools for kids with autism my whole life and I can make out a pretty good list of the number of times I've been teased, bullied and even assaulted.

I think people who seem to think only nts are the ones who are mean or unlikable or whatever, have never spent time around a lot of other autistics.

One last thing....

You act like nobody has tried ASD events only geared to the 5 to 22 crowd.

My school district has tried on 4 separate occasions to have ASD only 8 week day science/Lego camps. No NTs allowed. No sibs allowed. All the staff worked with ASD children. The parents had input. The camps were put on neutral sites. Child had to have a 504 plan or IEP be accept.

The cost was well below market rate for a similar camp. There were scholarships.

At the end of the day, will all the advertising, all the community outreach, all this isn't this great, the camps had on average of 5 students sign up. The district was good about letting the camps run for that summer, but they were expecting around 30 to 40 kids based on school estimates in the district.

I worked for Camp Invention (science based week long day camp). Boatloads of kids with ASD. We had no special training. No special catering to sensory issues. The camp was much more expensive than the ASD camp.

I asked one mom why her son wouldn't like the other camp better? Better ratio of campers to counselors. More in turned to his needs.

What she told me was also what the district found out with the post marketing surveys. The kids with ASD don't want to be ghetto-ized. To the kids, the ASD camp just reminded them how different they were compared to their friends and siblings. Better to sink or swim at the regular camp, than to feel different. The campers that did go to the ASD camps were between ages 4 and 7. I don't think their opinions about going or not factored into attending

The district ASD camp was geared to Level I kids.

Believe me, my area is all Autism awareness, being inclusive, etc etc etc.... but at the end of the day, ASD only events just aren't well attended. I'm sure there are ages that would work (16-20 year olds), but for younger kids it's a wash.

My AS son would definitely feel more comfortable at (and likely to attend) such an event if his NT little brother were present.

I only wanted to hang out with one kid throughout my childhood. And my dad.

Otherwise, I would have attended these gatherings—but unhappily.

My DD middle school had the ASD/NT type "club/alliance", and it was all sorts of cringe. They got rid of it this year at the request of the sped teachers.

The NT kids who joined it did it to pad their resumes for high school. It wasn't a club of equals, it was a club of pity. The autism awareness stuff during autism week was just gross. Picture how the Europeans treated the "poor savage" Native Americans. UGH.

The ASD kids were just there for the ride. My DD friend who has ASD flat out refused to go after awhile.

The teacher who ran that stupid program retired, and that school start up a new drop in center staffed by 8th graders from a broad section of the student body. Anyone who needed a soft place to land could come in a chill. The room had different areas. Like a sensory corner. Anyone could come in. The friend with ASD loves the dimmed lights and bean bag chairs in the sensory area.

Being gay is not a medical issue. You don't get accommodations for being gay. A gay person can have the mother of all melt downs and no one blames his/her meltdown on the sexual orientation.

Autism is hard with clubs/support groups whatever because it is a health issue. People want fix, over help, make excuses, over look issues and usually it's due to the symptoms the ASD person is having. So the groups get a little parentalistic with the NTs running the show.

That how the mental health support groups and alliances degrade where I live. I'm not too ill not to know what is going on, but the group leaders treat us as such.

I've been to LGBT support groups and the vibe is totally different. The parentalistic under tone isn't there.

I agree. Nobody should feel excluded.

Same, I've got a friend with ASD who invited me to go to an event made for ppl with ASD but I know I'd hate it. I dont want to socialise with ppl and stuff for no reason

I probably wouldn't want to go. But if I did I'd feel a lot better having Liam with me.

I dislike children period, doesn't matter if they're autistic or NT. Children are loud, grimy, they run around and manhandle things, they have no patience, a limited ability to wait their turn, and, whether they're on or off the spectrum, they have a penchant for arbitrary shrieking that drives me to near-meltdown in seconds. I wouldn't attend any event that was geared towards both children and adults. I have a hard enough time navigating around children in my everyday life.

Even if it were an adults-only ASD exclusive event, I still wouldn't go, because as many here have pointed out, I feel much safer when my NT friends or family members accompany me to strange new places. I don't like going anywhere new by myself because it sends my anxiety skyrocketing, and the probability of my having a meltdown in crowded areas with unfamiliar people increases exponentially, and my friends are the only ones who know how to keep me safe and not arrested during one.

Well you can't NOT let the siblings or family come. That wouldn't be right. Alot of people support these kinda things because they have family members on the spectrum so to not let them come and support wouldn't be right.

Tawaki, you really hot the nail on the head. I feel the same way about the NTs that use the self contained classrooms to get volunteer hours for scholarships and pad their resume. I hate the autism awareness week stuff so much. It feels so patronizing and demeaning.