Autism Politics - Insulted At Everything You Disagree With

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I feel that calling someone a label should be an individuals choice and not an assumption of societies. There is nothing to be worried about if the political and social frameworks are adjusted a bit. I am a person not a label but it is other peoples choice to call themselves a concept based on pathological logic.

I want to inform you that I was mainly talking about the Autism video you mentioned, up until the victim part, because I felt they were victimizing the people in the video. Then I went off on a tangent, like I usually do...

However, this thread has really opened my eyes. I saw that I could be bigoted in some way. I was looking at B and C. If B, then C. But there's also an A, as well. Actually, there's a whole bunch of variables. And to this I am referring to various ways parents become desperate and the treatments they seek and why they seek them. Basically, there's a bunch more to it than I originally thought.

Ah, the cure debate. And, desperate parents. I was thinking today about the whole issue. I can totally understand how parents will be panicked and worried. So, I've decided. I find offensive, although not really offensive, so much as highly concerning, advocates of dangerous treatments/cures. Things like chelation which has killed in the past (is it so bad that you have to risk seriously injuring or even killing your child?) and also not vaccinating your children. The latter has caused outbreaks in places like the UK. Way to turn back time to when childhood illnesses were something to be feared... Also, esp. not getting MMR can cause boys to become sterile if they catch those diseases. Also, any child can become brain injured. If a family doesn't get their kids vaccinated, if and when they catch the disease, they better get a doctor to come to their house or go to a special clinic. This is because infants under a certain age will be at risk of catching the disease and can die. Those people who are anti-vaccine probably don't think of that, though, and then advocate for other people to do the same. This is what angers me, this selfish attitude. I guess offensive is a bad word, since I don't take it personally. I hope all of that was on-topic.

If the women think of autism as a disease at times just tell them "catch my disease baby". Hooyaaa.

On Topic.

Autism Hippie

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EstY-8NWSgE&ob=av3el[/youtube]

I think the idea that autistic brains do not function like neurotypical brains is fairly non-controversial. There are plenty of studies that show this with brain scans and the like, and they're talking about a possible brain scan that can detect autism in the near future.

As for what a cure is, a cure is something that ends a condition. What Ci mentions above as other "cures" are actually known as "treatments."

To make an autistic brain not autistic would require changing the brain into a not autistic brain.



I believe you misread my point.

I do not believe that the abortion of autistic children will be generally presented as a choice. It will more be presented as the assumed default. While women may choose to have such children anyway, it will be after being told how much of a horrible burden such a child would be. Is it appropriate to pressure women to have an abortion? Is that an expression of freedom of choice?

Like with Down Syndrome ( http://www.disaboom.com/parenting-and-f ... drome-test ):



And Down Syndrome does not receive the same extreme negative spin in the media that autism does. I don't recall that Down Syndrome has ever been characterized as a kidnapper, as replacing one's real child with an imposter, as imprisoning the real child. Has been unfavorably compared to cancer ("at least cancer will kill you").

I believe others on this forum have referenced a British government official who said that abortion of potentially autistic fetuses should be mandatory. How is this a matter of choice?



Yes, I realize the first. I did not say they were the same thing, but since the cure movement is agitating for a cure, they seem to be inextricably linked.

As for the videos, they portray autistic children very negatively, and one shows a mother saying right in front of her autistic daughter that she wanted to kill both herself and her daughter, and only her love for her neurotypical daughter held her back. I am not sure how discussing the desire to kill an autistic child is anything but hatred of the autistic child.



It does when the cure is not feasible, will suck up resources that could be put into supporting autistic children, adolescents, and adults, and when the supposed cure is actually a push for in utero identification, which would simply mean that the recommended course of action would be to abort autistic children, just as is the case now with Down's Syndrome.

Millions of dollars are being spent on making sure that as many autistic children as possible won't ever be born, but living autistic people often lack the support they need to thrive.

In the pursuit for improvements and what is referred to as the honest cure there are the radicals and then the loving and caring people. Should anyone want to destroy the pursuit for improvements they could as well do what the mother did by saying those things. Just like with anti-cure advocates you will have a few spoil the image of the whole. That's why I believe in seeking the balanced view but to some they will fear balance as it is not protecting against a perceived certain "potential" danger of non-existence of developing life in the womb.

This issue is extraordinarily dynamic in complex. The static exchange between the polar opposites does not dictate truth. Instead it seems to alienate the truth for biased reasons.

We know the brain functions differently, but functioning and 'wiring' not the same things. Wiring would be a component of functioning. It could be that the altered function of the brain is dependant on something else. e.g. the study that seemed to show (quite strongly) a major deficit in the energy providing and chemical processing function of mitochondria in the cells of blood in Autistic children. If so, then potentially a drug could maybe be developed. Then again it could be different wiring, but we don't know yet.

I agree with you, thats all bad. People should just be informed about what they are getting into without bias or pressure.

Well thats perhaps the way you read it, but I think those videos portray the children as kids like any other, but affected by Autism. Thats a distinction in that the concept they have is that the Autism is a 'thing' affecting a child.
Also if you look at the particular notorious video, it's not explicitly said but obvious that the women felt her child had no future at all and was suffering, so her wanting to kill her child and her self is a twisted concept of love. It's not uncommon and I think stems from lack of understanding and also stress. She doesn't hate her child, people who hate their children neglect or abuse them.
Thats my take on it.

No you do not know that, since the Autism mechanism(s) are not yet understood. There could be the possiblity of in-utero treatment or perhaps an understanding of what goes on and why with Autism. Thats the thing about knowledge we don't know what we don't know!

Last edited by nostromo on 15 Jan 2011, 4:44 am, edited 1 time in total.

I am pro cure, for the path to a cure comes through understanding.

As for abortion, the genetic study shows that is impossible. It is not a single point error or mutation, and the number of sites involved keeps growing. Rebuilding the Genome or rewiring brains are science fiction.

You might map Broader Autism Phenotype, at least 10%, and many of them are very useful. It will not produce a marker for abortion, but a knowledge of genetics could be useful.

As for reasons for abortion, this economic downturn has dropped the birth rate back to 1900 levels.

A few ranting parents, likely rant about a lot of other things, but that does not make the news. The hype is annoying, but that is what gets attention.

The other side comes from autistics or promoters who want to stop science, and give all that money to us. Since they claim to be happy being themselves, it should be enforced on everyone.

That has been the past, and the treatments did not work.

I am not looking for toleration, I want useful information.

I have learned more about how I am different here on Wrong Planet, than a lifetime of living in it. Professionals are trained to spot things, not to explain them. They say nothing, and then peel off a sticker and place it on the file, as a coded message for the next Professional.

Ethics? About like a Doctor not telling someone who came to them anything about their condition, just making notes in the file like their laywer said. Heart problem, likely heart attack and death.

WP has been the Wikileaks about autism. What the people in charge will not tell you. Understandable, that is how they make their living.

So pro cure where study is public, and leads to understanding. I do not expect a cure, but I would like to know of the scientific research, and the inside view of how autistics rate it.

I disagree with comparing autistics to color or gender, or even the deaf and blind. All those people have better social skills. I could use somethings like social skills in braille, but as they are an instinct, those who use them cannot explain them.

My only path seems to be working on this from the inside out.

I do not see myself as perfect as is, nor am I a hopeless case, only a differance in thought and perception, which comes in useful sometimes.

And another thing that annoys me is the statement "taking away my Autism would change my personality, it's part of who I am" - what annoys me is how can anyone know that? Where's the proof?

It could for example be that taking away the autism simply leaves a person more capable in areas without changing their essential personality. E.g. someone who has difficulty with social situations might become able to understand them (or develop the ability to learn them). Or someone with executive processing problems could become able to organise and sequence things.
They wouldn't necessarilly automatically turn into Paris Hilton!

The personality debate stems from two core components.

1. Self-esteem. I am that I am accept that. Imagine also people being bullied and not accepted and treated like they are defective when growing up.

2. The development of prenatal testing for autism.

I believe one refers to the people that got where they did BECAUSE they have AS (programmers, mechanics, etc) and the other refers to the people that say, "I'm not adapting to you - YOU adapt to ME!"

It is certainly easy to argue for tampering with someone else's neurology.

If you change an autistic person's brain to be like an NT's, they will no longer think or perceive the same way. While it's not quite the same thing, people are known to change quite a bit after a traumatic brain injury. I am not sure why extrapolation of known principles should require proof that cannot be produced (because there is currently no cure). However, when someone tells you that they do not want to undergo something because they feel it will change their identity, I do not think that is the appropriate time to make it about whether anyone has evidence or proof, or otherwise totally depersonalize the argument. You have human beings arguing for their own bodily autonomy, and are suggesting that this is "annoying."

Autistic people live with who they are every day, know that they clash with neurotypical expectations, behaviors, thoughts, interactions. Autism is a pervasive condition, and impacts those who have it in every way. How can you argue that removing that difference would only have a mild impact? How can you know this?

I know I have no interest in having my neurology tampered with. I know that it causes me difficulties. I don't know what would change with any kind of cure, and neither do you. I'm sure others would be fine with it, and that's okay.

I don't believe a cure is feasible at any rate, and I expect this to be a case for a long time. We don't even have the tools to build the tools to make brains "redevelop" in an NT fashion yet. At best there are treatments - medications - that have some success, but are not cures.

I know the cure for autism, Visnofskygirl figured it out bout a year ago after a suicide attempt she got brain damage and Asperger Syndrome left because the brain damage from the suicide attempt many people thought she was going to die but thankfully she didnt she did have mild amnesia afterwards i believe but now she is fine and she says she really misses it now that its gone because she doesnt have the smae interests or obsessions

well there you go there's your cure for you if you still want it.

personally i oppose any attempt at a cure because it forms a huge part of who i am and to cure it would make me no longer me, i have heard it once explained on here as if "i step out of my body and someone else steps in." your their but not truly there because you are literally not the same person that you were

dont you realize that personality wise your autism is a MAJOR factor its what drives your obsessions and interests that are different from most peoples and usually for the better

I don't see why we need a cure. All that is needed is a form to communicate. that is the only problem that I see with autism.
In my honest opinion, the best thing we can do is to better understand communication. So that we don't become roadblocked against the social rules.
I can remember myself wondering as a child why I need to use words. There should be a better way.

Cure is a modality that is part of public relations for research. It's a form of marketing and derives compassion so to get political and economic support for improvements. A cure for someone that cannot speak is for now augmentative technology as an example yet health insurance fails to many times cover it or cover it more then once as needed. Future forms may be stem cell and other research leading to treatments or said as cures. We cannot know what the future holds but anyone is welcome to reject treatments resulting from research derived from cure public relations.

You know the "autistic liberation" guy in the thread that got locked? I'm really offended by people like him, who insist that anybody who disagrees with them is just a wannabe NT authoritarian who's brainwashed by society. If you have to insist that someone who disagrees with you is brainwashed by society and armchair diagnose them with personality disorders, then you're not much better than someone whose idea of debate is going "NO U" over and over again or someone who compares all of their opponents to Hitler/the Nazis.