BBDO New York, How About Some Real Respect

Special Olympics sponsored rallies and other events today to promote its Spread the Word to End the Word campaign, which asks people to respect individuals with cognitive disabilities and to refrain from using the cruel and dehumanizing word "retard."

The advertising agency BBDO New York contributed posters supporting this campaign, in which the R-word is explicitly compared to ethnic and other slurs. (Edit: these posters are pretty strong stuff—thanks to cripchick for suggesting that I add a trigger warning for this link.)

Unfortunately, the agency's history demonstrates that its concern for avoiding offensive descriptions of people with disabilities may be less than genuine. As many of us will recall, BBDO New York was responsible for the Ransom Notes advertisements in December 2007, which compared autistic children and others with disabilities to tragic kidnap victims whose lives were being destroyed. Those ads were so full of offensive disability stereotypes that they were withdrawn in response to public outrage less than three weeks after their release. BBDO New York was also responsible for the Autism Speaks television ads that compared the odds of having an autistic child to dying in a car crash, being hit by lightning, and other such imagery carefully crafted to give the impression that an autistic child was about the same as a dead one.

Although BBDO New York would no doubt like to convince us that it has had a genuine change of heart, I'm more inclined to believe—especially after reading this New York Times article published yesterday—that its Special Olympics ads are merely part of a cynical strategy to "pay attention to the disabled" so as to appear more responsible during the economic downturn. The agency's CEO, Andrew Robertson, has been a board member of Autism Speaks for the past two years. I'm not aware of any efforts he has made to end the routine use of cruel and dehumanizing language by Autism Speaks in describing autistic people. How about ending the hypocrisy too, Mr. Robertson?

Affirmation and Impairment

Dora Raymaker recently wrote a thoughtful post on the Change.org autism blog contrasting the social model of disability with the medical model and discussing a proposed new model of disability, which is called the affirmation model. She explains that although the social model views disability as arising from barriers in society rather than from medical conditions, it may not go far enough toward affirming that disability need not be a tragedy or a misfortune.

The affirmation model speaks of people with impairments, rather than people with disabilities, and seeks to promote personal acceptance of impairment. Under the affirmation model, Dora writes, "we are fine with who we are as we are: our impairments are an important part of ourselves and our lives."

I certainly agree that all people should feel empowered to accept themselves as they are; however, it seems to me that the word "impairment" is not useful for advancing this goal because of its inherently negative connotations. The dictionary on my bookshelf lacks a separate listing for impairment, but it defines "impaired" as follows:


adj: being in a less than perfect or whole condition: as a: handicapped or functionally defective…


Granted, my dictionary is a few years out of date; it's a 2001 Webster's Collegiate that I haven't gotten around to replacing. However, I expect that this definition, or something quite similar, is still the first thought that comes into most people's minds when someone mentions impairment.

Under the commonly referenced definition put forth by the World Health Organization, impairment is a "loss or abnormality of psychological, physiological, or anatomical structure or function." While this language isn't as bad as Webster's, it still frames the concept in negative terms.

It should also be noted that neither of these definitions—nor any other definition of which I am aware—provides an objective way to determine whether or not particular characteristics are impairments. Instead, that determination is made by reference to whether a characteristic is seen as normal or abnormal, which is always a subjective concept and often changes as society's values shift.

Thus, using the word "impairment" to describe a personal trait implicitly acknowledges as legitimate—and further perpetuates—the practice of classifying certain kinds of human characteristics as abnormal on the basis of society's prevailing prejudices. It is not conducive to critical discussion of whether such a distinction should exist in the first place.

We are never going to reach the point where disability is seen as a normal part of life if we continue to define the underlying personal characteristics as the opposite of normal.

Empathy and Autism/Asperger Research

As part of the ongoing effort to debunk the damaging myth that autistics lack empathy, I'm posting a citation to a research study that addressed the issue: Rogers K, Dziobek I, Hassenstab J, Wolf OT, Convit A. Who cares? Revisiting empathy in Asperger syndrome. J Autism Dev Disord. 2007 Apr; 37(4):709-15.

This is not a new study, as can be seen from the date of the citation, but I don't recall having read any articles on the neurodiversity blogs discussing it. (If anyone wrote a blog entry that I overlooked, feel free to post a link to it in my comments.) The abstract describes the study's findings as follows:


Abstract A deficit in empathy has consistently been cited as a central characteristic of Asperger syndrome (AS), but previous research on adults has predominantly focused on cognitive empathy, effectively ignoring the role of affective empathy. We administered the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI), a multi-dimensional measure of empathy, and the Strange Stories test to 21 adults with AS and 21 matched controls. Our data show that while the AS group scored lower on the measures of cognitive empathy and theory of mind, they were no different from controls on one affective empathy scale of the IRI (empathic concern), and scored higher than controls on the other (personal distress). Therefore, we propose that the issue of empathy in AS should be revisited.


The authors explain that "cognitive empathy" refers to the process of understanding another person's perspective, while "affective empathy" is an observer's emotional response to the affective state of others.

In other words, the autistic participants in the study displayed less understanding of others' perspectives than the control group; they showed about the same amount of sympathy and compassion toward others; and they experienced higher levels of personal distress when observing others in distressing situations.

As I have mentioned in previous posts on this blog, tests measuring cognitive empathy and theory of mind are both culturally and linguistically dependent. That is to say, in order to understand others' perspectives accurately, it is first necessary to share common cultural points of reference and to have a sufficiently similar understanding of the words used. The more that a minority community diverges from the majority in its culture and its use of language, the lower its members will score on such tests.

I rather suspect that if anyone were to conduct a research study measuring the ability to understand perspectives that are commonly found in the autistic community, the autistic participants in the study would show more understanding than the non-autistic participants.

Lindt Chocolate Nomination Protest

Recently, Lindt Chocolate made an unwise business decision when it chose to donate 10 cents from the sale of each Gold Bunny (an Easter candy product) to Autism Speaks. Lindt is now the target of a boycott by the autistic community. You can read more about this boycott on several autistic civil rights blogs. To sign a petition asking Lindt to withdraw its support for Autism Speaks, please visit the ASAN petition page on Change.org.

Lindt also is sponsoring a competition called Unsung Heroes of Autism, which "recognizes and honors individuals who are making a difference in the lives of others." I presume that the reference to "others" means that the individuals to be recognized are non-autistics who are busily campaigning to eradicate autism and that, in accordance with the usual pattern of denial shown by Autism Speaks and its supporters, nobody at Lindt contemplated the possibility that any autistics might submit entries. For the benefit of those who would like to expand Lindt's horizons, I've reprinted the contest information below:


Between February 26 and March 11, 2009, you can nominate yourself or someone you know to be one of two UNSUNG HEROES OF AUTISM who will be honored at a celebratory event at the New York Palace Hotel on April 1st to kick off Autism Awareness Month.

$5,000 towards their efforts and initiatives to help the cause.
Personal highlight featured in the June issue of Cookie magazine.
Travel for two, to and from the Lindt UNSUNG HEROES OF AUTISM Event in New York City.
Two night stay at the Palace Hotel for the Lindt UNSUNG HEROES OF AUTISM Event.

To nominate yourself or someone you know, please submit a 250-500 word description of how the nominee embodies an UNSUNG HERO OF AUTISM. A panel of judges representing Lindt & Sprüngli and Cookie magazine will review the submissions based on the following criteria:

Demonstration of a strong and sustained commitment to the autism cause, including a personal sacrifice.
Illustration of a creative and innovative concept that furthers the goals of fighting autism, raising awareness and increasing research initiatives in his or her community.
Impact of individual contributions on the lives of others or on their community who are affected by autism.
Identifiable changes that have been the result of his or her activities.


I'd like to encourage my readers to go to the Unsung Heroes site (lindtunsungheroes.com) and nominate autistic civil rights advocates who have made personal sacrifices in fighting bigotry, who have been involved in creative and innovative protests, whose individual efforts have increased society's respect for neurological diversity, and whose efforts have led to identifiable changes in the behavior of organizations that have been targeted by our protests—including, it is to be hoped, Lindt Chocolate.

Edit: Act quickly—nominations are being accepted only until 11:59 PM ET on Wednesday 3/11/09.

Cassandra Cult Victim Speaks Out

I wrote a post in September discussing the phony Cassandra disorder invented by Maxine Aston and perpetuated by various hate groups. According to the Cassandra cultists, being in a relationship with an autistic person causes a depressive disorder. It's a convenient excuse for vengeful ex-spouses to blame everything in their lives on their autistic former partner, and quite lucrative for Aston and other unethical counselors who profit from allegedly treating the nonexistent disorder.

Recently, I received an e-mail from a woman who described in detail—from her own firsthand experience—the bigotry and hypocrisy of the Cassandra crowd, and the wreckage they cause to marriages and families. I have edited the letter slightly for clarity and to remove personally identifying details; otherwise, the letter as posted below has not been altered.


My marriage was broken up by a woman who runs an aspergers "partners support group." She convinced my husband I have aspergers syndrome and encouraged him to leave me and move in with her. He is suffering from Cassandra disease, she has told him. I had no idea he was involved with her in any way until he announced to me on the phone from her house that he had decided to end our marriage for a woman he claimed at the time to have just met, and move in with her. But it turns out they had a long term secret involvement.

I have NEVER had a diagnosis of aspergers, and have since been told by professionals that I do not have aspergers at all. Even been asked by professionals, "who on earth put that idea into your head?" But even if I did have, this behaviour is very very wrong. Before his involvement with her everyone, including me, thought we had an ideal perfect marriage. So you see why this turn around all came as such a traumatic shock to me. And why I'm so devastated by this adultery and family devastation. What has happened (and is still ongoing) is atrocious and caused me and our daughter so much pain and devastation.

They have even gone as far as to claim I left him. So many lies have been told about me in top of all the pain and the cruel betrayal. She is extremely manipulative and has an enormous amount of control over my husband. I find this woman's actions with my husband to be highly unethical. She claims he was a member of her partners support group and she was supporting and helping him to get out of his marriage due to aspergers.

We had NO marital issues that he had ever spoken of regarding me, before she convinced him I was "defective" and he would be better off with her being an "NT." She refers to herself and my husband as "NTs" and uses terms like "we" are like this, and "they" (people with aspergers) are like that. And "they don't understand how we normal people think" or "not normal like us."

She divorced her own husband after he had a new diagnosis of aspergers, breaking up a long-term marriage and separating the children from their father. He is now happily married to a woman who appreciates him just as he is and for who he is. From what I have heard he is a good man; however she says he wouldn't agree to the treatment she wanted him to undergo after she gave him an ultimatum. I think she found it shocking to suddenly know he was considered to be "defective" being a person with aspergers.

My heart is still so broken as is our daughter's, as even though this is terrible behaviour of my husband with this woman, I still love him very much as I always have. Our family and marriage are shattered. He told me on the phone when he announced to me about being with her, that she had "counselled him" to divorce me. She claims that she is not advising people to end their marriages... but THIS IS NOT TRUE! Privately she advises people to do such things.

She has gotten a lot of support from being linked to other sites, and people tend to find her and think she is some sort of expert, as she presents that way. She makes some very broad and sweeping unfounded statements and conclusions. I so believe this needs to be exposed for what's going on. This woman even advises partners of people with aspergers not to have children with their spouses, lest they bring "another one" into the world! I see her as not unlike Hitler, but you would never dream it from how she presents. Sounds so sympathetic to the aspergers cause, or "supportive" of aspergers marriages. Please believe me SHE IS NOT! She is a self seeking fraud and a very good actor with her own personal agenda.

Support groups should not be hate groups for NT "victims" who empower each other in abuse of and play cruel mind games with their unsuspecting partners. This woman encourages the "partners" in her group to NOT disclose to the spouses they are attending her hate groups. I know this for a fact, and believe encouraging deception and secrets between marrieds is dangerous to the marriage and detrimental to any real marital intimacy. She runs her group like it's a domestic violence victims group. Very unhealthy. I believe it's rather serious to treat a certain group of people as if they are subhuman or defective, and not even deserving of their own spouses, who loved them enough to marry them in the first place (you would think).

There's much more to this very sad story, than I can put here right now...