Autism "cure"= good thing

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MrXxx, I am with you all the way on this thread.

I totally respect people who wish to remain the way they are.
However that does not give them the right to enforce (or speak in a tone which suggests they would rejoice in the enforcement of) continued suffering of others who may be on the spectrum and could really benefit from some hypothetical future medication to relieve them from some of the worst aspects for that individual being on the spectrum.

Imagine if a hypothetical future medication were to become available that merely improves sensory intensity issues.
Then the authorities remove the license for it, so nobody can ever take a trial of it or attempt to feel the benefits, because a select community of anti-curebies have protested loudly enough to get it banned under the cause of "we don't need to be cured".

Also there is no reason to spin the subject of autistic research, into forced medication or forced personality changes. They are completely separate subjects.

A politically brainwashed child in North Korea would not imagine living in Western countries because their perception that they are evil and would never want to be 'forced' to see the rest of the World because they have already concluded that the rest of the World is evil. Only when they see the real World are they able to make a well educated judgement of where they would really like to be. Surely the same thing applies to people on the spectrum?

^^^^Great points!^^^^

I think the fear of a "cure" stems from the thinking "If there is a cure, someone may force it on me. Therefore, I don't want there to be a cure."

But if we live in a society that CAN forced a cure on anyone unwillingly, then we really have a much bigger problem than the fact that a cure exists. And that is a different problem that isn't preventable by stopping the search for a cure.

The existence of a cure does not mean that everyone who has autism will be forcibly cured.

The problem I have with that "logic" is that while it uses the argument that if a cure exists, we may all be forced to submit to it, and that is bad, the same line of "logic" then concludes that there should be no cure. And that is contradictory. First, if we are forced to submit to a cure, we are being submitted to a totalitarian ideal of some kind. Second, if we then use that as "reason" for no cure to be sought for anyone, then we ourselves are promoting the same kind of totalitarian thinking in reverse. In essence, what we would be saying is that because WE don't want to be cured, NOBODY should be. And that, in itself, is a form of totalitarian thinking.

Rather than insisting there should be no cure, we ought to be promoting the idea that we all should have the CHOICE. And that means we ought to bugger out of whether others want to seek a cure, and instead work toward the ideal that if there is a cure found, those who WANT it ought to have it, and those who don't can choose not to.

Another thing I think is being missed by those who insist there should be no cure, is a bit more subtle. The fear of a cure, I think, comes from the fact that we don't yet understand exactly WHAT autism is, much less what causes it. Add to that the complication that most of us function fairly well with it, and don't know what effects a "cure" might have on us, and many of us want nothing to do with a cure.

But here's what I think is being missed. In order to solve any problem, we have to understand the problem. In order to "cure" anything, we have to understand what we're curing. To cure autism, we have to know what causes it first. And there could be many different causes, and therefore there could be many different cures. That being said, some cures may not work for some people. If any cure(s) is/are found, curing any individual's autism isn't likely to be as simple as "Here. Take this pill."

The thing is, for there to be a cure or even a number of cures, science has to understand autism far better than it now does before that can happen. So it's not as if suddenly there will be this pill, or this injection, or operation that will suddenly eradicate autism altogether, even though we don't understand what the heck it is or what causes it.

We HAVE to understand it far better than we do now before that can happen. If we come to a full enough understanding of it to actually come up with some cures, or "a cure," we should by then also understand that not everyone needs to be cured.

But to simply think in a way that excludes those who may want and need a cure is, to me, purely selfish.

"In order to solve any problem, we have to understand the problem."

Yes of course. On some threads on WP, the mere mention of research into understanding autism without mentioning anything about medication or treatments, is enough to get some regular members to chant their anti-cureby killer instinct.

Another thing; what if a medication were to become available that reliably relieves specific sensory issues that are known to be preventing some people on the spectrum from getting a job, issues that are keeping them on disability benefits.
Then that person refuses to take that medication. Should they still be allowed to claim disability benefits?

Without autistic sensory intensity issues we would have no high definition television technology because neurotypicals are satisfied with mediocrity as far as sensory experiences go.

Temple Grandin has criticized the old analog televisions because these televisions create annoying stroboscopic flicker as a result of interlace scanning technology. It was the geeks of the computer industry that championed progressive scanning technology to eliminate this annoying flicker but the neurotypicals in the television industry continue to champion scrambled interlace scanning calling this abomination "Full High Definition 1080i". Autistics insist that only 720p can be considered high definition and are persecuted because of that belief.

If there were any medications that were specifically targeted at treating this girl's specific functional challenges (remember, "difficulties" or "challenges" to many people on the spectrum would mean "dealing with Neurotypical people"), then even if she wanted to try out some particular medication really badly, I'm sure there will be hundreds of anti-curebies trying to get that same medication banned.

With some people on the spectrum, the impaired Theory of Mind means they cannot understand what it is like to be for other people, or understand other people's desires from the context of other people's lives and situations. Therefore if a person with a highly impaired Theory of Mind happens to feel good about being on the spectrum, then such a person is more likely to preach an ideology that everyone else on the spectrum should have a similar attitude. That's why usually when someone mentions medical research on WrongPlanet formums, they get their head bitten off by an anti-cureby.

The impaired Theory of Mind also suggests they might not understand how NT people are able to enjoy life outside of the spectrum, doing things like chatting, drinking, sexually-realated mind games, flirting, gossiping, talking about nothing etc.
Some aspies have mentioned NT world as somehow 'toxic' compared to their own orderly structured ways. Although I respect their own views, I might add that the impaired Theory of Mind prevents them to really understand that other NT people can enjoy the very things that they would find sheer hell, as they can only view the NT world from their own perspective.
Maybe that is what scares some aspies to turn nasty on any suggestion of medical research into understanding autism related disorders.

A common reaction I've read from some aspies is to suggest that NTs are incapable of the highly logical thought processes that a particular aspie might pride him/herself on. From the many NT people I have lived and worked with, the NT person has a choice in getting fulfillment from both highly logical thought activities *as well* as other activities that the aspie would find sheer hell. The NT has the choice. The aspie doesn't.

Like the brainwashed North Koreans who love their own dictator, they won't know how good life might be until they really are able to appreciate life outside your own boundaries/borders. The impaired Theory of Mind, is the border.