Autism Speaks' Token to Neurodiversity

I decided to indulge my inner Aspie today by taking a couple of bus rides around downtown and familiarizing myself with the routes and the route of the Metro subway just for fun. Sure, it took longer to commute home from work but it was a $3.50 well spent for an MTA day pass.

Now that I'm done rambling, let's just say I found it shocking that Autism Speaks even mentioned the Neurodiversity movement on their website and that is why I came back blogging after a long period of inactivity. This news article that derives from a report on ABC's Good Morning America talks about the Neurodiversity movement. Apparently, Autism Speaks actually finds us to be an actual threat on their radar. Therefore they decide to summarize our position in a link to the one article that at best fails do the position of Neurodiversity justice and at worse portrays the people in the movement as dangerous deluded (I happen to know Ari and I thought he gave very good responses to the interview questions. Professor Chew gave good responses as well. I'm just talking about how the report was actually presented and the matter in which they were quoted in context about the article).

The article doesn't outright call the sanity of people on the spectrum and their allies into question. However, the use of loaded words in the article can subtly influence opinion of people who have never heard of the movement.

[Ari Ne'eman and Kristina Chew] are part of a controversial group hoping to radically change the way others look at autism.

The connotation for controversial means that many people have heard of this movement to have severe doubts about it. I doubt all that many people outside of the Neurodiversity movement have even heard of it, so to call it controversial right off the bat would give the unfamiliar reader an uneasy feeling and a degree of discouragement from even wanting to associate with people who believe in Neurodiversity.

Ne'eman was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, a less severe form of autism, as a child.

Can we please stop talking about autism in terms of just the word severity? If I wrote the article, I would have said a Asperger's was a variation of autism that does not include speech delay and ultimately has many different potential outcomes. It really doesn't not matter of Asperger's autistics don't have a significant speech delay and Temple Grandin did. We don't all become Temple Grandins.

Parents like Chew and autistic adults like Ne'eman joined forces several months ago, after seeing an edgy new campaign to fight autism from the New York University Child Study Center that implied children with autism are held hostage by the disorder.

Ne'eman and his supporters protested so loudly, that the ads were cancelled three weeks after they were released.

The ransom note campaign was just very bad. Period. This article made us look like a bunch of buzz kills at a college frat party by putting a positive spin on what the ransom note campaign was. If I wrote the article, I would have stated that Ne'eman and his supporters petitioned courteously/considerately for the withdrawal of ad campaign that will further perpetuate negative stereotypes of people with disabilities.

Although the article did let Ms. Chew have the last word, they article just had to set it up so that Lenny Schafer and Dr. Insel could get the reminder in that there are many people on the spectrum who almost completely lack language and self-care skills. While Ari and Prof. Chew are quoted as saying they wouldn't change the people on their lives who are on the spectrum, this serves is the perfect set-up for a straw man argument that people who want to maintain this condition don't want their loved ones to improve (which is a total fallacy).

Yes I know Ari mentioned on the first page that "anti-cure doesn't mean anti-progress". However, this isn't mentioned on the same page and people might have forgotten the original point by the time they read the "counterargument" of Dr. Insel and Lenny Schafer. And it couldn't have killed the journalist to ask for specific examples of how Neurodiversity isn't "anti-progress" (e.g. necessity to stop self-injurious behavior, key goal of finding best communication method for each person be it speech, sign language, or typing, use of special diets when necessary to alleviate genuine digestive system issues, etc.). They try to make it seem like only "high-functioning" people are involved whereas it is really not the case (e.g. Amanda Baggs is a key example but I think more examples may severely weaken Autism Speaks and their ilk's argument).

Lastly, I know exactly why Autism Speaks picked this one article to represent Neurodiversity. It contains no links. None to ASAN's website, none to the Autism Hub. Both of these sites contain lots of links to other websites written by autistic people. You'd think people would Google these things, but seriously I wouldn't take any chances. Tons of people too lazy to search it up would read only what's on the article and think that's it to Neurodiversity. Seriously, it's much more complex and people need to submerse themselves with other people in the movement to grasp its full complexity. A two-page article does it no justice, and neither does failing to provide direct contact information for groups involved in Neurodiversity.

Another thing in the video but not in the article was Diane Sawyer seeing this movement and thinking it was a "beautiful way of justifying heartbreak". Seriously, is this another dismal attempt at calling our sanity into question? Sorry Ms. Sawyer. We don't need your pity. And don't think, by this token effort of respect that SEEMS difficulty to earn, we're stupid enough that you'll trick us into whitewashing your fence in terms of boosting your treasure cache of a journalism career.

How did this have to with my MTA rides today? Oh yeah, the punchline.

Sorry Autism Speaks. Your token effort is no good to ride the Progressive Metro Express.