How I understand neurodiversity...

Post Reply New Topic

Does it make them unavailable?

Not sure i follow the logic elderly person has severe dementia. The family expect the decisions about her treatment to be made by "fit and proper individuals". By that i mean decisions based on science fact by those who went to medical school, passed all the exams and knows what they are talking about. Not an internet mob of unqualified keyboard social justice warriors acting to false science dogma, its no different with severe autism.

Why would you want to influence someone else's treatment anyway, with respect what business is it to you or anyone else unless you believe abuse is going on then its a matter for the medical authorities / police.

Bit of sarcasm here but :-
Next time your at the doctors can you get him to run your treatment program through me and my internet group to see if it meets our approval first? If it doesnt fit our belief system we may veto it even if its not in your best interest. None of us have been to medical school by the way!

Ok just joking but:

Autistic / Neurotypical are simply labels created by science to make it easier to describe what they are refering to. The ND movement have has unfortunatly evolved to create 2 manufactured identities out of them which is just fake science.

Do wheelchair user groups talk about bipedals in a such a way?

Regarding falsly claiming to be autistic, this link goes some way to explain this.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ity-severe.

Things like this explain the last fact.

https://www.iol.co.za/lifestyle/health/ ... m-15746657

Many may correctly think im being frivilous with the robbie williams link BUT
When womanising bed hoping social butterfly's like robbie williams seriously thinks he has autism (undiagnosed) you know something has gone terribly wrong with the public perception of what autism is. How many like him have been over diagnosed? Isnt that dangerous for really disabled people getting thrown in with fully functioning millionare celebrities?

Nothing more dangerous to the man who's drowning when everybody thinks he's ok.

As far as the point about ND supremicists being entertained by those lower down the spectrum. I believe he's refering to the fact that many of those with autism are lonely and vulnerable and when a group comes along that tells them they are special and different its immediatly attractive.

ND needs these people as their foot soldiers because there are more "disabled" autistics than "able", able meaning in work, living independently etc... this can be obviously seen in the autism statistics where the vast majority are sadly not in work or living independently.

The claim is they sadly use these people for their own self interest, acting as a drag on new developments in the medical sector keeping them permanently in a disabled state while those at the top get their "identity" which they use to their own advantage.

In other words making turkeys support thanksgiving.

^ I see ASD as being varying amounts of a disability and a gift. For some there's a microscopic amount of gift about it .
Yes there's aspie supremacists who want to make out that being on the spectrum has endowed them with super powers , but most NDs accept it's a mixture of pluses and minuses.

They are not against help being targeted at what people struggle with . They are against anything that would eradicate the positive effects as a result of 'curing' a person .
That IMO is an intelligent and sensible position to hold .

As a patient you have a right to disagree with your doctors scientific diagnosis based on the your non scientific experience. This is not the 1950s where people just accepted what the doctors said. Gay people did not accept the scientific consensus that they were mentally ill. One should respect the scientific consensus, factor in that scientific expertise is more likely to be correct then ones personal feelings. But one should not accept the conclusions of experts as if they were the word of God because they are not God, they are human and make mistakes.

I am not denying the Autistic/Aspie supremacists exist. I have been a member here since 2013 and have read more then my share of Aspergers is the next step in evolution type posts then I wished I had. I am the OP of the Autism Defense Again thread meant to decry the use of autism as an excuse for criminal acts. And it rubs me the wrong way when celebrities such as Dan Ackroyd, Moby, and David Byrne claim autism based on little or no research. But based on my extensive reading, most ND movement leaders and WP members who hold ND views do not look down on the more severe autistics nor do they view autism as solely a gift that makes them superior to NT’s.

IMHO the perception that the ND movement is defined by elitists, supremacists, shiny aspies, autism wannabes etc is greater then the actual problems these people cause.

FYI while the term “autism” was coined by scientists the term “neurotypical” was coined by ND activists.

I fully agree a person of sound mind ( meaning able to make decisions and is aware of their reality ) has the right to refuse treatment.

Thats why i gave the severe dementia example. Unfortunatly this can include those with psychosis and severe autism.

Those decisions should be a balance between family and qualified proffessionals.

To sum up the award winning autism scientist article he provides serious evidence on why autism is a pathology and not a natural difference.

He also says ND has had a very negative effect on disabled autistic people in general and a positive one on only a minority. Its hard to disagree given how divided and polarised the community is and the state of diagnosis (see link 1)

The only positive thing i can see is that with greater numbers come more research funding so more people are potentially helped.

However the scientists to use the british expression "can see the writing on the wall" cant see the situation lasting much longer maybe DSM6 with a new Aspergers awaits?

Just extremely hard to get them and quite often the services are bad.

I was misdiagnosed with psychosis and given treatment that made me completely unfunctional. Whenever I tried to say the treatment was wrong, my protests were attributed to my alleged psychosis and reinforced the specialist's belief in it.
I was lucky enough to get out of it but how many people out there got dumped like that forever? How many "low functioning" autists are in that limbo?

For a true case of unable to make ones own decision legally it is going to be the family or legal guardian who makes the decision, ND advocates have no say. It then becomes a matter of who decision maker listens to. I think it would be wise to factor in experiences of those who have lived with the condition and not assume because the autistic advice giver is "mild" enough to be able communicate advice giver should be ignored on the sole bases that the advice not having severe enough autism.

If anti cure advocates are incompetent to advise parents that their autistic offspring does not need or want a cure is it not hypocritical for pro cure advocates to assume the autistic offspring wants or needs a cure? We conclude the severe autistic wants or needs a cure based on our standards and assumptions. This dilemma is particularly acute with autism a condition heavily defined by communication difficulties. Consider the case of Carly Fleischmen a person who presented as severe by any definition. It was assumed she would never be able to communicate until one day typed. It turns out she understood every horrific thing said about her in her presence by people assuming she would not understand based on apparent ID. She does want a cure and has had a lot of difficulties and is non verbal but became a blogger started her own interview podcast that was well received and appeared as a guest on a late night TV talk show. Is she an outlier or are there a lot of autistic peoples assumed to be "ret*ds" that do understand but can't communicate in a way that is understood?. That is what ND advocates tend to mean when they say they want a change in research priorities.

But who are the anti cure activists, how many of them are there, what proportion of the whole autistic community?

More importantly what are their medical qualifications and motivations?

Does everyone get to influence the treatment of strangers? 99% of NTs dont because their not qualified.

If they want to influence then they need to jump the same hurdles as NT people no different. Go to uni become a scientist or medical proffessional and advise on the merits of leaving someone severely autistic with a life expectancy of 40, because its in their interest as opposed to curing them.

Do Jehovah's Witness get to advise on treatment for accident victims where a blood transfusion is necessary for survival regardless of religion of the patient? They dont believe in blood transfusions by the way.

Ive really cant imagine an 18 year old complaining to his parents about curing him from severe autism.

Its not impossible but highly unikely, sadly many people want to end their life or want to die but ive never heard of someone wanting to be severely disabled.

Usually the mildest forms of autism dont usually get picked up until later childhood by which time they would be able to make their own mind on cure or no cure.

Carlos, I think you miss one important point:

Cure for severe autism is unavailable.

Not because of any kind of activism but because the research world still haven't figured out autism well enough to even understand the underlying mechanisms.

Claims that ABA can "cure autism" are false and harmful - dog training one to pretend to be neurotypical does not ease their suffering by an inch.

I'm all for curing autistic persons from everything that gives them life expectancy of 40. But there is building up evidence that autism itself isn't that thing. Autism impairs communication and makes it much harder to figure out what the autistic person needs to be cured of.

Yes, the quality of the services may be the point. Can you commute to a city for them?

Yes the no cure at the moment is true, doesnt have to be in the future though.

Its really about the harm ND does to the autism community by its manufactured "identity" due to "natural difference" which is fake science (see prev)

This leads to their no cure policy that divides the community and will probably lead to a split in diagnosis labels eventually.

Its funny because hypocrisy among NTs was mentioned.

Where's Steve Silberman today? Did he wake up in a mental hospital, has he got autism? Maybe he's in his mansion counting his money maybe?

I would really love the neurologists to figure out autism on neural / biochemical / molecular level.
It appears to be way more tricky than anyone expected.
It's possible that what now is "autism spectrum", one day may end up split into several different conditions, based on different neurological mechanisms behind similar external symptoms - possibly some curable, some not.
It's likely that a lot of other psychiatric conditions will also go through a similar rebuilt. Diagnostic standards based on external symptoms are not really useful for treatments, you need to know what is the mechanism behind to solve the problem where it exists.

I would almost definitely say that there are “autisms” rather than the monolithic “autism.”

Magz hit it right on the head.

There should be more Autistic autism scientists, therapists and so on.

People of one religion are always trying to convert people of other religions. Strangers are always giving medical advice. It is up to the individual or carer to decide if they want to listen. It was a small group of parents and a professional not specializing in autism that ended up convincing people that autism is not caused by refrigerator mothers. It was non professionals including ND activists that ended automatic institutionalization of autistics and cut a lot of aversive ABA. Several people who were severe as kids and not “Aspies” now are anti cure. Temple Grandin comes to mind.

Celebrating My Life Amy Sequenzia won’t stop celebrating her autistic, disabled life.


How many autistics are pro or anti cure? I’d love to know myself. As far as I know polling in this regard has been pretty scarce.

If the scientist evidence is correct the difference between mild and severe could just be number of neurons that never reached their destination while in the womb and where they ended up.

Also means an end to the vaccine debate.