Ghost Dance

The Native American tribes of the Northern Plains, forced onto reservations and near starving in 1890, were drawn in large numbers to a new religion called the Ghost Dance. Led by the shaman Wovoka, this mystical cult sought through ritual dancing to bring about a magical restoration of the world that they once had known. If they performed the dance with a pure heart, Wovoka assured them, it would bring their ancestors' ghosts back to life and bring the great herds of buffalo back to the plains.

The Ghost Dance soon lost its popularity with the tribes when no restoration happened. The buffalo remained on the verge of extinction for many years, and the families on the reservations continued to live in poverty. The tribes lost much of their history and culture when large numbers of children were taken away to boarding schools to learn English and to become assimilated into an America where their skin color would always mark them as second-class citizens.

Now, over a century later, the world we live in bears little resemblance to the one that the Ghost Dance believers sought to restore. Buffalo herds are no longer a rare sight, thanks to bison conservation efforts and commercial ranching, but they no longer have the cultural significance that they had when the tribes relied on hunting for survival. And while a modern lifestyle of burgers and fries, pickup trucks, paychecks and mortgages does indeed have some advantages in that most people nowadays don't have to hunt anything to put food on the table, it also has its constraints. In today's world, we almost never look out over wide-open landscapes, breathe in the magic of a new day and feel confident that the Earth will provide for our needs. We just stop at the local burger joint for a take-out meal.

Sometimes I feel like a ghost blogger, sending forth my words to dance on glowing screens in the hope of restoring a world that has been altered irrevocably. When I write about autistic people and our way of life, I have in mind a social minority culture that existed long before today's labels and diagnostic categories. This culture, the one in which I grew up, strongly encouraged a love of learning and of the natural world. Passionate interests were often discussed at length, not stigmatized as symptoms of an unfortunate disorder. Like the tribespeople when the buffalo still roamed the plains, we felt an almost mystical confidence that there would be a place for us in the world.

This is not, however, the existence that many of our young people know. Like the conquered tribes struggling to survive on the reservations, their natural way of life has been taken from them, forcibly suppressed and branded inferior. Many autistic students attend segregated schools where, like the Native American children in the boarding schools, they are taught that they must change almost everything about themselves before the majority population will grudgingly tolerate their presence.

At some point in the future, mainstream society's greater awareness of autistic differences can be expected to have more positive outcomes. Schools and workplaces will adapt to accommodate our needs. As with other minority groups, our diversity will be accepted and our contributions to society valued. Our right to self-determination will be protected. Our culture and way of life will be recognized as legitimate.

And yet, when this happens, we will no longer be the same people.


Crossposted to Shift Journal.

Good Ol' Boys

This town's for normal folks, see. You know, the good folks that look and sound and act just like the rest of us. Them others what ain't normal, or got kids what ain't normal, well—they don't none of 'em belong in this town. Let 'em keep to their own kind. And one thing's for sure, they ain't got no business putting their brats in our schools, right next to proper-acting kids. Fact is, them what ain't normal just need a good beatin' to teach 'em their place.

'Course, we know they ain't never gonna be normal, however much we beat tar outta 'em. See, they ain't really human like us. But we just like to whup on 'em anyway, 'cause it's fun, and maybe if we do it enough we'll finally beat some sense into their thick ree-tard skulls and run 'em outta town.

Just now heard tell there's some agitatin' in Congress about seclusion and restraint in the schools. Seems we got us some damn fools who think it's cruel to lock ree-tards in broom closets or duct tape 'em to chairs. They even set up a National Call-In Day to do more agitatin' about it. Hoo-ee, ain't they ever gonna stop yappin' about civil rights and interferin' with the way regular folks do things? It was bad enough when we had to let the Nee-groes into our schools, and of course they started gettin' too friendly with our daughters, and now we got us a moo-latto in the White House. Country's goin' to hell in a handbasket, I tell you. Ain't no wonder we got troublemakers as want to be nice to ree-tards.

Don't let 'em fool you with all their agitatin' about civil rights. You know, that's just a code word for the Satan-worshiping commie Illuminati conspiracy to set up a world government, take away all our guns, and burn all our Bibles. Well, I got plenty guns in the cellar, and even a Bible down there somewhere under all the ammo, and anyone fool enough to come for my guns is gonna be pure-dee daid. Got me a rope for any ree-tard what tries to get too friendly with my daughter, too, and a big ol' tree picked out to hang him from.

Now, if any good normal folks want to find me before the Klan meetin' tonight, I'll be out on the lake fishin' with a bottle of Jim Beam…

Behavior and Respect

Just read an interesting post by Mark Stairwalt about the management of workers in fields such as information technology and library cataloguing, where an autistic cognitive style is prominent. He cites a Computerworld article by Jeff Ello, which points out that among such employees, a workplace culture has developed that places much more value on getting the job done accurately than on social pleasantries. Others who lack understanding of this culture often stereotype the workers in terms similar to those often applied to autistic people, calling them egocentric, antisocial, and so forth. Such behaviors, however, are usually a reaction to incompetence in the organization. When managers take the time to learn what kinds of internal procedures and structures make the work flow smoothly, they are likely to find that their employees are much easier to manage. In the same way, those who describe autistics in terms of stereotyped behavior problems lack understanding and respect, which gives rise to many frustrated reactions that would not otherwise have occurred. As stated by Dr. Morton Ann Gernsbacher, reciprocity needs to be mutual and symmetrical.

To elaborate further on this point, although social skills often are defined to mean the set of scripted behaviors preferred by the majority, that's really not what genuine social competence is about at all. Rather, a socially competent person is one who understands that there are many different subcultures with their own social preferences, and who makes a respectful effort to understand those differences and to interact with others in ways that they prefer. Instead of sending autistic people to social skills workshops to learn how to behave as if they were not autistic, we ought to be sending everyone to cultural competence workshops to learn that they shouldn't expect everyone to behave the same way. We've learned this lesson, for the most part, with ethnic minorities; it's time to apply the same principles of respect and inclusion to neurological minorities as well.

A particularly egregious example of what happens when autistic people are stereotyped as nothing but a collection of behavioral deficits can be found in the case of Zakhqurey Price, an 11-year-old boy who has been charged with felony assault based on resisting restraint at school. ASAN has created an action alert describing what you can do to help protect this boy's rights—a concerted effort by our community is needed here, so please take action.

Autism Speaks Loses UK Affiliate

Hat tip to Socrates at The New Republic.

This latest misadventure of Autism Speaks has demonstrated, yet again, arrogance and ineptitude on a truly epic scale. When Autism Speaks finally ends up in the history books (where, less than four years ago, it declared its intent to put the world's entire autistic population), the tale of its demise will be one of hubris befitting a classical Greek tragedy.

To briefly sum up the debacle, before releasing the I Am Autism video in September to widespread condemnation from disability rights groups, Autism Speaks had presented its text as a "poem" at a May meeting with British supporters in London, where it was received with about as much enthusiasm as a heap of decomposing Thames flotsam. After that, having apparently concluded that it didn't matter what the Brits thought and that no propaganda was too extreme for the United States, Autism Speaks went ahead and created the video anyway. Not only did it suffer a major media embarrassment as a result, it also lost an international affiliate, as the UK nonprofit group that had been a branch of Autism Speaks has now formally cut its ties with its former parent organization and has renamed itself Autistica.

Although the newly renamed group seems to be just as interested in genetic research as the old one, it seems to have at least enough sense not to openly advocate eugenics. Its mission statement describes its purpose as follows:


Autistica seeks to use biomedical research to bring benefits to individuals and families affected by autism spectrum disorders.

Autistica is dedicated to raising and investing funds to support high-quality peer reviewed research which focuses on determining the causes and biological basis of autism spectrum disorders; improving diagnosis; and advancing and evaluating new treatments and interventions. We are committed to ensuring that increased understanding and new scientific knowledge will improve the quality of life for all those affected.

Autism is one of the most significant but least researched developmental disorders and Autistica has set itself the task of achieving major breakthroughs within ten years.


Nothing in there about prevention, eradication, prenatal screening, or putting autistic people in the history books. Fancy that.