Melting Down an Autism Stereotype

Image: Three Mile Island nuclear power plant


By now, I expect we've all seen plenty of articles, books, and other media depicting the "autistic meltdown," wherein a slight change in routine supposedly triggers some kind of massive brain short-circuit and an instant eruption of violent rage. This image, which a few years ago was found mainly among the haters at FAAAS and other similar bigots, is now being plastered all over the public consciousness by mainstream authors such as Jodi Picoult in her recently released novel House Rules.

The inevitable result is widespread discrimination, of course, when hiring managers and other decision-makers start looking upon autistics as walking nuclear disasters who might explode at any moment. If any other minority group had to contend with a hugely damaging stereotype like this, you can be sure they'd be screaming bloody murder about it. But the autistic community has done very little to oppose it; rather, many of us are continuing to use the word in routine conversation, perhaps trying to redefine it a bit around the edges, but taking for granted that it really does refer to something unique to autistics.

However, there's no scientific evidence to support that belief, no matter how the word might be defined. Nowhere in the diagnostic criteria does anything about "meltdowns" appear. Brain imaging studies have not identified structural differences that would account for them. As far as I know, there haven't even been any research studies—with appropriate controls for the subjects' baseline level of stress and other relevant factors—establishing whether the frequency of "meltdowns" is any different among autistics than among the general population. (If you know of any such studies, please post a link in my comments.) In short, we're talking about a stereotype that is based on nothing more than anecdotal stories.

Of course, I'm not arguing that autistic people don't have unpleasant reactions to stress and overload. Certainly we do. We're only human, after all. But what I'm disputing is the idea that "meltdowns" are something intrinsic to autism, rather than a consequence of what chaoticidealism accurately describes as an "underlying, dangerously-high stress level." What I think happens, in many cases, is that the stress of living in an autistic-unfriendly environment builds up over time; and then the blame for the resulting "meltdowns" ends up being wrongly attributed to some sort of mysterious autistic brain cooties, rather than being placed where it belongs—on the detrimental situation that created the stress.

So let's start recognizing and acting in our own best interest, people. If we want equal opportunity in the schools and workplaces, we're not going to get there by meekly letting ourselves be described in terms that cause school administrators and employers to see every autistic person as a threat to public safety. And if we want accommodations to make our environment more comfortable and reduce our stress levels so that we can be more productive at school and work, we're not going to get those, either, if every time we react badly to a stressful situation it's just presumed to be the way autistic people naturally behave regardless of the circumstances.

Crossposted to Shift Journal.

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.

Autistic Parents: Not Such Rare Birds

Melody, the administrator of the AS Parenting website and forum, has announced that she is seeking new members and contributors. The site had been inactive for the past few months because of her family's move to Dallas. She says that she envisions the site as "all encompassing. Not only for parenting tips, but general life tips and for policy/politics."

I hope that those of my autistic readers who are parents will consider participating in this very worthwhile effort to provide an online community and positive resources for parents on the spectrum. At present there is a great dearth of such resources, not because autistic parents are uninterested in them or exist in numbers too small to benefit from them, but because the widespread stereotypes to that effect have discouraged their development.

We've all seen claims that autistic parents are as rare as unicorns, but it's actually quite common for a parent to be identified as autistic after his or her child has been so identified. The flourishing autistic community on the Internet has made autistic parents, through their presence on websites, much more visible; I'll note that the Autism Hub alone has at least ten autistic bloggers who are parents. As for the small but vociferous group of haters in the Maxine Aston/FAAAS orbit who contend that many children are growing up neglected by autistic parents, their unfounded stereotypes also can be effectively rebutted by the existence of positive parenting communities like AS Parenting.

It's pretty hard to stereotype autistic parents either as near-nonexistent or as cold and unfeeling when many of them are actively posting on parent community forums and seeking advice on their kids' playdates and homework, just like their non-autistic neighbors in suburbia.

More Positive Autism Awareness: No Myths PSA

The Florida-based Dan Marino Foundation and the Autistic Self Advocacy Network sponsored the No Myths public service announcement (PSA), which was filmed by Kent Creative in the Parthenon in Nashville, Tennessee. Inside this full-scale replica of the ancient Greek temple, myths about autism are laid to rest by an autistic cast consisting of Ari Ne'eman, Dena Gassner, Ben Liske, and Jacob Pratt.





A captioned version of No Myths is available at http://www.overstream.net/view.php?oid=udtvrbt0rlao

More information can be found at http://www.nomyths.org/ about the film and its production. That site states, "The purpose of the PSA is to tell society that, with the right supports, people with autism can do anything anybody else can do, even if it isn't in the same way." Many thanks to all involved in the making of this excellent PSA, which does a very effective job of dispelling autism myths and stereotypes!

Relationships and Stereotypes

In a blog post yesterday, Zach at AspieWeb critiqued an article in which ComputerWorld editor Don Tennant opined that "the question of whether Asperger's syndrome is a disorder that needs to be treated is answered by the fact that human interaction is a prerequisite for making the world a better place."

In fairness to both ComputerWorld and Mr. Tennant, this editorial was a response to comments expressing aspie supremacist opinions that were posted by a few readers of a previous ComputerWorld article, and it is possible that Mr. Tennant simply made a careless choice of words and did not intend to suggest that all autistics were incapable of engaging in meaningful human interaction. The previous article, which discussed the high number of autistic workers in information technology, expressed a very favorable view: it contained links to pro-neurodiversity websites and suggested that employers should do more to support and accommodate their autistic workers.

Regardless of how it might have been intended, Mr. Tennant's editorial gives an unreasonably literal interpretation to a previous commenter's wish to be left alone. Perhaps he imagines that all autistics, in the absence of "treatment," develop an irresistible compulsion to live as hermits in wilderness cabins with no human interaction whatsoever? It's a rather absurd stereotype.

When viewed in the context of an intolerant society that regards many forms of cognitive diversity as disorders in need of treatment, a request to be left alone simply reflects a wish to have one's right to self-determination respected. Among other things, it means that neither Don Tennant nor anyone else should presume to declare other people's neurological differences to be "a disorder that needs to be treated." As with any other difference or disability, whether any therapies may be desirable is a personal decision and should be left entirely up to the individual, in consultation with professionals and family members as appropriate.

There's also a broader point that needs to be made, which is that a person's ability to form relationships is highly dependent on social and cultural factors affecting his or her interaction with others. For example, when an autistic man does not have a girlfriend, people often assume that it is because he lacks the ability to develop romantic relationships with women in general. Indeed, after many rejections, he may even think so himself. This assumption, however, does not take into account the fact that autistics are a small minority group, widely scattered throughout the world and often misunderstood by others. Compatible mates are therefore hard to find. Historically, it was common for dispersed ethnic minority groups to rely on arranged marriages within their small communities, but most autistics do not have that option. Thus, an autistic man's lack of a romantic relationship is likely to be blamed on his personal failings, even if he has never had the opportunity to meet a compatible and unprejudiced woman.

Autistics also end up getting unfairly stereotyped as lacking social abilities in many other situations, such as employment interviews where managers often make hiring decisions based on such factors as whether an applicant's speech and body language appear to be "normal." Even today, there are many people who do not recognize this attitude as a form of prejudice and who blame the victims for their difficulty in finding work.

Whenever any group of people is widely regarded as lacking essential social characteristics (and autistics are by no means the first minority group so described), it creates a self-reinforcing negative loop. The majority population can easily justify its prejudices because exclusion and segregation are seen as the natural order of things. Befriending or hiring minorities is thought to be a futile effort because they are assumed to be incapable of proper human interaction. The more they are excluded from mainstream society, the more their culture and behavior necessarily diverge from it, and the resulting differences are cited as proof of their inferiority.

If we fail to understand this historical pattern, we surely will repeat it.

Open Letter to a Publisher

Dear Unnamed Publisher:

One of your marketing people sent me an e-mail recently, offering to give me an advance copy of a "true story of autism" for my review.

I ought to have known better than to click on the "more info" link. After all, insanity as defined by Albert Einstein consists of doing the same thing over and over again, while expecting different results. And I've seen enough of the publishing industry's exploitation of autism so that the results of clicking on that link were all too predictable. Still, I had a tiny speck of hope that perhaps there might be something different this time—something other than the usual melodramatic litany of an agonizing disease with hellish symptoms, a puzzling and ever-worsening medical mystery, et cetera. That hope was, of course, promptly dashed.

No doubt stories like that are quite profitable for your company. You wouldn't be printing them otherwise. And of course, your readers would have no interest in a true story of an autistic person who was just as happy with his or her life as anyone else. They'd die of boredom reading about the very ordinary day I had yesterday: After work, I watered my ordinary suburban lawn for a few hours, pulled some weeds, bought a new pair of oven mitts, cooked dinner, and watched the first half of Monday Night Football.

Your shareholders probably would toss you out on your ear if you ever jeopardized their profits by considering the social implications of what you print. Like any other company, you're in business to make money, regardless of who gets trampled in the process. Why should you care if an autistic child gets excluded from school because the administrators, caught up in mass hysteria, are afraid to have him in their classrooms? It's none of your concern, is it, when an autistic job applicant is rejected because the hiring manager assumes that she is a tragic sufferer with hellish symptoms and would surely cost too much to accommodate? What does it matter to you if a landlord evicts an autistic tenant because of unfounded prejudices?

I'm sure that in a few more years, when the market for autism horror stories has been saturated, you'll cheerfully move on to whatever the next fad may be. You won't even give a moment's thought to the millions of people worldwide who will have to spend the rest of their lives struggling against the prejudices that you took part in creating. In fact, you probably stopped reading this letter several paragraphs ago because you decided that your time could be spent more profitably. There's always someone else to exploit, after all.

FAAAS, Karen Rodman, and the Autistic/Asperger Meltdown Stereotype

Many of us think that we have no problem recognizing ignorant, prejudiced stereotypes when we see them. I discussed a particularly egregious example when I wrote a post last week about a newspaper article that claimed, without any factual basis whatsoever, that autistic individuals were prone to sudden fits of rage. The article even went as far as to quote Karen Rodman of the Massachusetts hate group FAAAS, who advocates exclusion of autistic children from the public schools, for the proposition that an autistic adult would be likely to explode in sudden rage if "you gave them the wrong sandwich."

As I also mentioned in my post last week, this stereotype has been conclusively debunked in the scientific literature. Statistical analysis has shown that autistics are no more likely to commit violent acts or violent crimes than their non-autistic counterparts (Murrie, Warren, Kristiansson, & Dietz, 2002; Barry-Walsh & Mullen, 2004). Let me say that once more, just to make sure there's no one who has missed the point.

Fact: Autistic people are no more violent than anyone else.

So why haven't we been able to bury this ugly stereotype? Is it because the haters are too strong and have the power to spread it everywhere, no matter what we do? Well, no, that's not really what is going on. To find the primary culprit, the autistic community needs to take a good hard look in the mirror.

All too often, when we get upset because we can't do something that a non-autistic person would take in stride, or when an autistic child gets upset for reasons that the parents may not understand, these behaviors end up being characterized as a "meltdown" or as an "autistic meltdown." Many people within our own community take it as gospel that it is a uniquely autistic trait to lose one's temper in everyday situations. Some of us even write blog and forum posts that describe anger issues as an "Asperger symptom" from which we suffer, or similar language.

And that's just plain wrong. To become upset and frustrated when struggling with difficult situations is not a uniquely autistic trait. Rather, it is a characteristic of the human species as a whole. Such behaviors happen just as often in the non-autistic population, but because the triggering events often are different, our society does not look at them in the same light.

Here's a brief scenario to illustrate the point: Let's say a mother takes her two young children, one of whom is autistic, with her when she does the grocery shopping. The autistic child starts crying because he is overwhelmed by the bright lights and the busy, crowded, noisy environment. The mom grabs a few groceries and hurries to the checkout. Then the non-autistic child starts whining and crying because the mom wouldn't buy her a toy. The mom pays for the groceries and angrily marches the kids out to the minivan. When she gets home, she's still fuming, and after sending the kids to their rooms to take a nap, she goes to an Internet support forum and vents about her son's "autistic meltdown" for the next half-hour or so.

All three people in this scenario lost their temper because they had trouble handling a stressful situation. The autistic kid hadn't yet developed the coping skills needed to deal with the sensory difficulties of the supermarket; his sister didn't know how to manage her frustration when she was not given the toy she wanted; and the mom got upset because of the noise the children were making and, perhaps, because of the embarrassment of being in a public place with two noisy children. But only the autistic kid was described as having a "meltdown."

Instead of using such negative and inaccurate language to describe our own behaviors and those of our children—which has the effect of stereotyping ourselves and giving the haters the rope to hang us with—we should take a proactive and non-stigmatizing approach and recognize that these problems are situational, rather than specifically autistic. When stress becomes a problem, we should consider what changes to our environment would help to reduce our stress. And—last but not least—from now on, let's reserve the word "meltdown" for circumstances where its use is more appropriate.

Such as, for instance, Chernobyl.

Vancouver Sun Prints Bigoted Article on Adult Autism

Although a Sunday article in the Vancouver Sun entitled "Researchers pulling back the veil on adult autism" contained a large number of offensive stereotypes and generalizations, actual cites to research were conspicuously lacking.

The author gave as an example of an autistic person an "office clerk who beat up a woman on his way to the bus stop one morning for the simple reason she was in his way." She further stated that "their social skills are disastrous" and suggested that autistic adults often receive a diagnosis after "they're reprimanded at work for making an inappropriate comment, or charged with harassing or stalking."


canada.com/topics/bodyandhealth/story.html?id=ea98c743-7305-439e-9ae8-3d32c3224f92


Karen Rodman, founder of FAAAS, was quoted as an authoritative source for such pronouncements as "There's no rhyme or reason (to an autistic person's behavior)." Here's a little background on FAAAS: The acronym originally stood for Families of Adults Afflicted by Asperger's Syndrome, but the second "a" was later changed to "affected" as a bid to improve the group's public image when FAAAS was booted out of the International Asperger's Year event because of its reputation as a hate group. Its membership is composed largely of spiteful ex-wives involved in bitter custody disputes with autistic men, and it has a long history of inventing imaginary psychological syndromes and throwing around nasty and groundless stereotypes.

Several autistic self-advocates wrote to Patricia Graham, the Sun's editor-in-chief, to express our concerns about the article. She replied that she did not believe there was anything wrong with it but that she would consider a correction if specific inaccuracies were pointed out.

So we provided some data. We cited the US statistic that only 4.5 people per year assert autism as a defense in a violent crime case, out of almost 1.5 million violent crimes per year (source: Autism Society of America). We pointed out that research studies have proven that autistics are no more likely than non-autistics to commit violent acts or violent crimes (Murrie, Warren, Kristiansson, & Dietz, 2002; Barry-Walsh & Mullen, 2004).

Unfortunately, we got no reply to that, and no retraction or correction was printed. I suspect that when Ms. Graham told us that she would consider a correction, what she really meant was "I'll consider it if I get some complaints from normal people, but I don't give a rat's patootie about anything you freaks have to say." Or something along those lines.

We need united action to make it crystal clear to Ms. Graham that prejudiced articles of this sort are totally unacceptable. Letters and calls from parents, professionals, and other allies are needed, as well as letters from autistic self-advocates. Also, if you have the time, please write blog and/or forum posts about the article and copy Ms. Graham's contact information, listed below:


Patricia Graham, Editor in Chief, Vancouver Sun
Address: #1 - 200 Granville Street, Vancouver BC V6C 3N3, Canada
Phone: 604-605-2318
Fax: 604-605-2668
E-mail: pgraham@png.canwest.com


In the wake of the Michael Savage controversy, there's a reasonable likelihood that Ms. Graham may be amenable to issuing a correction/retraction and a public apology if we can put enough pressure on her. Bigoted statements about autistic people can have real consequences in the form of lost advertisers, as Mr. Savage has discovered.

Better Than It

Back when women first started to attend universities, the fortunate few who got admitted were often praised for overcoming the mental frailties of their gender and for learning how to think like a man. Everything that a successful woman accomplished was inevitably contrasted against the presumed intellectual inferiority of her gender. Charlotte Whitton, the first woman mayor of Ottawa, Canada, described the struggle of these female pioneers as follows: "Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good."

I was reminded of this unfortunate history while reading a San Francisco Chronicle article that spewed the usual high and low functioning autism stereotypes and quoted ignorant pronouncements from Bryna Siegel about social deficits. I never post active links to this sort of bigoted crud, but here's a partial URL for those who don't mind copying and pasting:


sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/07/13/BAJC11J9AU.DTL


The author interviewed an autistic university student named Andrew Van Etten and praised his ability to socialize and make friends, which he attributed to his frequent participation in clubs and activities:


"They are ways to show myself that I can be beyond this diagnosis," he said. "I can choose a life path that says I've defeated it. Or I'm better than it."


One might wonder what Andrew Van Etten was thinking when he said this, but I can make a pretty good guess. He probably grew up hearing that autism made a person inferior, mentally deficient, a burden to society, and so forth. Most likely, he internalized that view and learned to despise his own kind, like so many people before him who belonged to the "wrong" race or gender or religion and who thought they could never succeed in life without first denying what they were.

It was an ugly heap of prejudiced garbage when other groups of people had to contend with it, and it's an ugly heap of prejudiced garbage now. And yes, Andrew, you are better than it—better than the stereotypes of inferiority that have come to be associated with an autism diagnosis. So are all the other 50 or 60 million autistic people on the planet. I hope that one day you'll learn to see your experiences in historical perspective and to understand that you are not so different, after all.

On Metaphor and Culture

Autistic people often are described as having significant deficits in the ability to understand figurative language and symbolic representations. The professional literature and the popular media have characterized autistics as extremely literal-minded, sometimes to the point of being incapable of understanding the most basic metaphors without extensive remedial education. Folk sayings and slang expressions often confuse autistics.

As noted by Bev in a recent post on the Asperger Square 8 blog, however, scripted language is a form of metaphor. Scripted language—that is, the use of phrases borrowed from another setting (such as favorite lines from movies or TV shows) is extremely common among autistics. If you visit an Internet forum in the autistic community, you're likely to find a mix of quotes from Tolkien and Heinlein, lines from Star Wars and Dr Who, computer analogies that encompass everything from the workings of the human brain to simple daily life activities, rebellious lyrics from various anti-establishment musicians, video game references, and much more, all bubbling cheerfully away in a richly creative anarchic stew.

So what's causing the confusion here? Why are autistics likely to have trouble understanding popular sayings, and how did mainstream society go so far wrong in believing that autistics lacked the capacity for abstract thought?

Well, I'd put it like this—to understand a metaphor correctly, one must first understand the culture to which it belongs. Metaphors, and the ability to interpret them, do not exist in a vacuum. Bev's post addresses this point (metaphorically) by linking to a summary of the Star Trek episode Darmok, in which Picard's Enterprise encounters a group of aliens who speak entirely in metaphors taken from the cultural saga of their race. Although the universal translator on the Enterprise can render the literal meaning of their words, no useful communication is possible without knowing the context.

Because speech does not come as easily to autistics as it does to others, we often try to compensate by analyzing words and their possible intended meanings in detail, as Bev also has described. This causes us to see ambiguities in commonly used phrases and, sometimes, to become confused by them.

Many of today's folk sayings have their origins in a pre-industrial society that no longer exists. For example, the phrase "make hay while the sun shines" doesn't mean much of anything unless you first understand that a farmer must cut hay on a clear day, so that it will not get wet and spoil, and that villagers in the past who failed to gather sufficient quantities of hay to feed their livestock over the winter were quite likely to starve.

A non-autistic person who was not in the habit of analyzing the meaning of every sentence would simply file such a saying away in his or her mind, upon first hearing it, as an unfamiliar phrase. He or she probably would not ask what it meant and would not take any action based on it. After hearing it a few more times, in various situations, the person eventually would learn its usage (while still being unaware of its origin) from context.

However, an autistic who heard this phrase for the first time probably would try to reason out the intended meaning and, not being familiar with its history, might reasonably conclude that he or she had just been asked to go to a farm and cut some hay because the work would be pleasant on such a nice sunny day, or something of the sort. Far from reflecting a lack of imagination and analysis, this misunderstanding actually would be a consequence of applying more imagination and analysis than the circumstances required.

On the other side of the cultural/linguistic divide, non-autistics often fail to understand the metaphorical nature of autistics' use of scripted language because they haven't had enough conversations of this kind to learn the context. Autistics are a small minority, and most people, no matter how well-intentioned, just aren't going to talk with us enough to get a good grasp of how we use language. As a result, an ugly stereotype has developed that characterizes autistics as little more than robots or tape recorders, repeating phrases randomly with no intelligent thought.

Cross-cultural communication is always fraught with the potential for misunderstanding, even under the best of circumstances. When the majority group makes the arrogant assumption that it is intellectually superior, that potential increases exponentially. Andrea just posted an excellent list of potential pitfalls in cross-cultural relationships; you may want to take a look at it and think about the implications for a while!

Poo Humor: It's the Context

Kim Stagliano, who believes that she was un-doo-ly criticized for blogging about her autistic daughters' toileting problems, has written a follow-up post in which she argues that many parents tell humorous stories about their children and that there is nothing wrong with that.

Indeed, there's a whole genre of parenting humor that consists of anecdotes about messy, inconvenient, and embarrassing incidents in daily life with the kids. And it's not unusual for such stories to involve toilets. After all, toddlers often have bathroom misadventures, and older children sometimes do. I don't object to poo humor, when it's in the general context of parenting humor.

Unfortunately, poo-smearing has become part of a very ugly stereotype that characterizes autistic people as something less than people—as pitiful, disgusting, subhuman creatures, incapable of ever holding jobs or contributing anything of value to society, not worth the expense of educating, not entitled to human rights or even life itself.

I don't mean to suggest that Kim Stagliano had anything to do with creating this stereotype; to the contrary, she has made it clear that she strongly opposes eugenics. But when dangerous ideas like that are floating around in the social ether, we need to be aware that words and humor that may appear perfectly harmless in some contexts can be seen as highly offensive in others.

Here's a brief scenario to illustrate the point: Let's suppose that a grandparent living in the Southern United States decides to have a family picnic. The grandkids stuff themselves on the food served at the picnic, which includes fried chicken and watermelon. The two youngest grandchildren are particularly messy. After the picnic is over, the grandparent writes a blog post humorously describing their eating habits, calling one of them the Fried Chicken Fiend and the other the Watermelon Queen.

Looks like just an ordinary, affectionate family story, doesn't it?

Now let's add a few more facts. The Southern grandparent is white, and the two youngest grandchildren are adopted black children. The blog entry mentions their color more than once while making those fried chicken and watermelon jokes, and the author also suggests that black skin is comparable to cancer because black skin can come in darker or lighter hues, just as cancer can be more or less severe.

Even if such a post was written with the best of intentions, and with genuine affection for the two grandchildren, it's clear that the author would soon be flamed to a crisp.

One could say that this scenario is different because autistic people are not a race. But really, it doesn't matter. Whether we look upon autistics as a race, or a tribe, or a social minority group, or a part of the disability community—stereotypes and negative analogies are just as damaging.

I'm not arguing that we all need to be poo-litically correct and avoid poo jokes toot-ally. Butt we doo need to be caca-gnizant of the social environment in which we make such jokes.

The Essential Features

A recent post by Kristina Chew discusses the Rain Man stereotype that "autistic people frequently fail to see... the essential features of what is required."

There's a page on the Autism Speaks website that purports to illustrate this alleged lack of intellectual capacity with a photograph of a 4-year-old boy at the Lincoln Memorial, standing underneath the engraved words of the Gettysburg Address and looking at cracks in the wall. The boy's father writes that he "has already taught himself to read and to write and is more than capable of reading the speech" but instead finds the cracks in the wall more interesting. Supposedly, this little boy's lack of interest in the words of the speech shows the mental challenges that autistic children face.


autismspeaks.org/community/ownwords/intheirownwords_picture_words.php


This left me pondering the question: What sort of expectations would a parent ordinarily have for a non-autistic preschooler on a visit to the Lincoln Memorial? Even if a young novice reader, of any neurology, could identify the words in the Gettysburg Address, he wouldn't have nearly enough life experience to grasp their historical context or their political significance. Is it any wonder that he might prefer to look at a crack in the wall, or a bug crawling across the crack, or other such objects of interest to small boys?

If Autism Speaks can show me a 4-year-old boy—anywhere—who has a deep and abiding appreciation for the profound wisdom of the Gettysburg Address, I'll eat Bob Wright's hat with whipped cream and a maraschino cherry on top.

And what's more, any 4-year-old who is capable of teaching himself to read has a pretty doggone good ability, compared to other children of his age, to identify the essential features of all those little squiggly marks on the paper.

If that young boy had been born in another generation, free of today's "autism awareness" hysteria, his father would no doubt be bragging about his son's intellectual gifts, rather than bemoaning his lack of interest in the Gettysburg Address as proof of a devastating mental impairment.

I really have to wonder what Autism Speaks and its supporters are thinking. To me, it looks like they're frequently failing to see the essential features of what is required.

Self-Respect Is Not Denial

After reading a blog entry that dealt with a subject other than autism, but that contained a gratuitous discussion of the stereotype that autistics lack theory of mind, I wrote a comment politely explaining to the blog owner why his post could be considered offensive.

Another reader posted a comment immediately after mine, addressed to the blog owner, in which she characterized his post as follows:


As someone who has been within the disability "field of discourse" for ten years, I find it raises red flags and could cause unnecessary emotional distress to people who may already be in pain...

...broadcasting it across the blogosphere, to those who may come across it in varying stages of grief and/or acceptance, is likely to be hurtful to someone.


I was left wondering whether she intended anything in her comment to refer to mine. It's possible she meant to suggest that parents of recently diagnosed children might be upset, or something along those lines. I really don't know, and I wouldn't want to make an assumption one way or the other.

But I've noticed—in general—that there seems to be a certain patronizing attitude among some people in disability-related professions, to the effect that a challenge to a stereotype (especially one created by psychologists or other professionals) reflects a denial of one's limitations and a need to grieve and accept the reality of one's unfortunate situation.

This is what I have to say to anyone who has that attitude: You're the one in denial. You are denying that stereotypes of disability are cultural constructs. You are denying that certain kinds of people are capable of rationally evaluating their own strengths and limitations. You are denying that there are many healthy and productive responses to human differences, other than grieving. You are denying that much of what we call reality consists of our subjective, culturally conditioned perceptions. You are denying that there are as many ways of looking upon one's existence, or one's way of being, as there are stars in the sky.

And I think it's about time for you to grieve and accept the reality of human diversity and the fact that you're not divinely entitled to occupy a superior position in the universe by virtue of not having a disability label.

Empathy Quotient 2.0

There's a well-known online test called the Empathy Quotient, created by Simon Baron-Cohen, which purports to measure a person's level of empathy by means of a questionnaire that asks how the person reacts to various situations.

This test is chiefly responsible for spreading the ugly stereotype that autistics lack the mental capacity for empathy. It doesn't measure much of anything, in fact, because the questions are vaguely worded and culturally dependent. (The issue is much the same as when racial minorities get low scores on culturally biased intelligence tests.)

So I've taken the liberty of putting together a new and improved test with more detailed scenarios—Empathy Quotient 2.0—which is designed primarily to measure the empathy level of non-autistics. You'll find an answer key at the end of this post.


Question 1: You are a middle school teacher. One of your students is getting bullied every day for being a "nerd." Do you:

(a) Suggest to his parents that they enroll him in a social skills class, so that he can learn to act more like the other students and avoid the bullies' attention;

(b) Punish the bullies and inform their parents that their behavior is unacceptable and must stop;

(c) Ignore the situation because that's just how kids interact and "nerds" are natural targets;

(d) Feel sorry for the "nerd" and tell him that he can hide in the classroom during recess.


Question 2: You are a hiring manager. One applicant clearly has better technical qualifications than the others. When you interview him, you notice that he rocks in his chair, does not make eye contact, and speaks in a monotone. Will you:

(a) Hire him because he is the most qualified candidate;

(b) Hire him, even though you think he's creepy, because you're afraid of being sued if you don't;

(c) Talk with your buddy in Human Resources about how to cover your ass when you reject him;

(d) Just tell him flat-out that you don't hire his kind. So what if he sues you? The jury probably won't like him any more than you do.


Question 3: A new family just moved into your neighborhood. Someone tells you that their son is autistic. Do you:

(a) Warn your kids not to go near the autistic boy because you've heard people like that can be dangerous;

(b) Don't say anything, but keep a careful eye on your kids whenever they go near the new family's house, and try to distract them from doing so;

(c) Insist that your kids play with the autistic boy, whether they want to or not, because it's their charitable duty to befriend the disabled;

(d) Teach your children some basic facts about autism so that they will have a reasonable understanding of the new neighbor's behavior.


Question 4: You supervise a group of software engineers. One of them, a quiet and shy woman who always has been a reliable employee, tells you that she just got an Asperger diagnosis and feels stressed out. She asks you if she can work from home next week. Your response:

(a) Tell her that's fine, and while she's gone, call a staff meeting and warn all her co-workers that she is mentally unstable;

(b) Say that she can stay home next week and just relax—there's no need to do any work while at home. Make sure nobody hears the conversation, so that you can fire her for absenteeism;

(c) Grant her request because you know she can be trusted to get the work done;

(d) Helpfully offer to let her telecommute permanently—that'll save you the trouble of having an autistic employee in your office, and you've heard those people would rather be alone anyway.


Question 5: You discover that your tax money is being used for genetic research to develop a prenatal screening test for autism. You feel:

(a) Outraged—since when did the government have any right to decide what kinds of people are worthy to exist?

(b) Unconcerned—you don't know much about autistic people, but you've heard they are nothing but trouble, and you figure the government probably knows what it's doing;

(c) Ambivalent—you might not abort for that reason yourself, but you're reluctant to pass judgment on others who have different views;

(d) Gleeful—you're hoping for a future where autism is nothing but a word for the history books.


Question 6: Your sister is engaged to marry an autistic guy. Do you:

(a) Wonder if her boyfriend is capable of a long-term relationship, because you read somewhere that autistics rarely marry, but you don't say much because you don't want to be rude;

(b) Go into a tirade about the terrible fate she'll be dooming her children to suffer;

(c) Give her your congratulations and best wishes for a life of happiness;

(d) Suggest that she keep her finances separate, just in case any problems arise, and mention that you know a good divorce attorney.


Question 7: You are driving your teenage daughter and some of her friends to soccer practice in your SUV. You overhear a conversation about something foolish that a boy did at school. "That's so autistic," your daughter says, giggling. Do you:

(a) Enjoy the conversation and laugh along with the girls;

(b) Feel mildly uncomfortable, but say nothing—after all, your daughter probably doesn't know what "autistic" means anyway;

(c) Ignore it because that's just how kids talk, and it's no big deal;

(d) Have a talk with your daughter about respecting human diversity.


Question 8: You are a psychologist with an interest in autism. In the course of your work, do you:

(a) Teach mainstream social behaviors to autistics, without giving much thought to the reasons for their differences;

(b) Scrupulously ensure that you follow the scientific method and avoid making biased assumptions in your research;

(c) Drum up support and grants for ethically questionable research projects by describing the autistic population as a crushing burden to society;

(d) Create bogus online tests and irresponsible stereotypes.


ANSWER KEY:

Question 1: a=3 points, b=10 points, c=0 points, d=6 points.

Question 2: a=10 points, b=6 points, c=3 points, d=0 points.

Question 3: a=0 points, b=3 points, c=6 points, d=10 points.

Question 4: a=3 points, b=0 points, c=10 points, d=6 points.

Question 5: a=10 points, b=3 points, c=6 points, d=0 points.

Question 6: a=6 points, b=0 points, c=10 points, d=3 points.

Question 7: a=0 points, b=6 points, c=3 points, d=10 points.

Question 8: a=6 points, b=10 points, c=0 points, d=3 points.


If your score is:

64-80: Bravo—you are a very fair-minded and enlightened person. Too bad the rest of society isn't like you.

53-63: You have above average empathy, but it could stand a little improvement.

33-52: Your level of empathy is in the average range. Unfortunately, you are "normal."

0-32: Ever thought about working for Autism Speaks?

Welcome to Italy

In the widely read essay Welcome to Holland, having a child with unexpected needs is compared to having your flight diverted to Holland when you had planned to visit Italy. The author advises parents that they should appreciate the landscape of the place where they happen to be, instead of feeling upset because they did not end up where they had anticipated.

The essay does a good job of pointing out that the issue is one of expectations and that different is not necessarily worse. Still, it doesn't go far enough because it takes for granted the existence of vastly different expectations for people who are sorted into various social groups, instead of challenging those expectations as the artificial, prejudiced, stereotyped cultural constraints they are.

So I've written my own essay describing how an autistic parent might react to having a child with unexpected needs. (Note: this parody does not reflect my actual opinion of non-autistic children. It's meant to illustrate why people would be better off if they did not go into parenthood with any particular set of expectations.)


WELCOME TO ITALY

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a constant need for socializing—to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this...

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a restful vacation trip to Holland. You do some Internet research on the history of windmills and other fascinating topics, and you make your plans. Quiet, leisurely art museum visits. Peaceful walks through tulip fields. Painting windmills in a pastoral landscape. Maybe you'll read train timetables in Dutch. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Italy."

"Italy?!?" you say. "What do you mean Italy?? I signed up for Holland! I'm supposed to be in Holland. For years, I've perseverated on going to Holland."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Italy and there you must stay.

The important thing, you tell yourself, is that Italy is not a horrible place, even if it's full of chattering crowds and soccer hooligans. It's just a different place.

So you must do more research. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met... and a lot more of them than you might have wanted to meet... and they'll be calling your home phone at all hours of the day and night, wanting to talk to your child...

But it's just a different place. It's noisier than Holland, less comfortable than Holland. After you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Italy has pretty gardens and museums, too, even if they're always full of yammering tourists.

Your friends are sending you e-mails from Holland, with attached photos, and telling you how much they enjoyed the quiet tulip gardens and the windmill tours. You know that they're just sharing their experiences and don't mean to be unkind, and you try not to let it bother you, but you always find yourself saying, "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned." And that feeling of loss will never go away.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Holland, you may never learn to appreciate the joys of stadium crowds stomping their feet on metal bleachers, birthday parties with dozens of giggling adolescents, celebrity magazines strewn all over your floor, and boom boxes blaring popular songs with totally unintelligible lyrics... in Italy.

Cinderella and Other Fairy Tales

When I was eight years old, I sometimes jumped rope with the other girls at recess, if I wasn't wandering around picking dandelions or looking for shiny pebbles. A favorite jumprope chant started with "Cinderella, dressed in yellow, went downtown to meet her fellow."

It had many different endings, but no matter what happened, Cinderella never could manage to live happily ever after in romantic bliss. She always had some sort of tragic mishap. (Among other things, she made a mistake and kissed a snake.)

I was reminded of that old jumprope chant recently when I looked at the RDI website (farrsite.org) of Dr. Steve Gutstein. At first glance, counseling parents on how to explain and model social relationships seems reasonable enough, and some parents have indeed found this approach helpful. However, this claim on the site, regarding the autistic spectrum, is absurdly reminiscent of Cinderella-dressed-in-yellow:


...less than 10% are expected to gain full-time employment and less than 5% are projected to live independently. Friendships and relationships outside of the immediate family are rare and marriage is almost unheard of. Debilitating anxiety, hopelessness and isolation become the norm.


Translation: Parents, if you don't immediately fork over the big bucks for RDI services, you'll never have any grandchildren and your autistic kid will be living in your basement playing video games and popping Prozac for the rest of his life.

Of course, Gutstein isn't the first psychologist to make outlandish claims like this to hype a particular therapy, and unfortunately he won't be the last. What irks me is that it's so obviously false. Even the most cursory look at blogs, lists, and forums in the autistic community will turn up plenty of married autistics, for instance, and gay autistics in long-term committed relationships. There are even lists and forums specifically for autistics and their partners to discuss relationship issues.

It's enough to make me think that the government ought to start an investigation of this false advertising. Oh, wait, this is the same government that wants to spend a billion dollars combating the existence of its autistic citizens. Never mind.

There's a more significant issue here, anyway. Whatever the actual numbers of married autistics and employed autistics may be (and I don't believe there are any accurate statistics because so many of us are "in the closet"), teaching autistic children how to interact in conventional non-autistic ways does not address the underlying problem.

What is that problem? Well... when I first encountered the American workplace in the 1980s, professional women often wore pantsuits and brightly colored "power" ties, carefully avoided "girl talk" while at the office, and practiced walking with a confident stride and speaking in a lower-pitched voice. These "social skills" were supposed to compensate for the handicap of having less natural authority than men. When they went home at the end of the day, however, many of these same women put on Wonderbras and skimpy dresses and plenty of additional makeup before heading out to the clubs. After all, they would never be able to attract a guy if they made the mistake of looking too masculine after hours...

Going back a little farther in history, the first African-American millionaire was a woman known as Madame C.J. Walker. She made her fortune selling hair-straightening products to women of color. Other black entrepreneurs sold creams to whiten the skin. There was always a demand for these products because, if a woman had a naturally dark complexion and strong African ethnic features, she was seen as inferior goods in the black community and had very little chance of finding a husband. That prejudice persists to this day.

Minority groups always have tried to cope with intolerance by teaching their children how to look and act more like the dominant social group. That only strengthens the prejudices, however. When the particular traits of the majority come to be accepted without question as essential human traits, bigotry becomes so deeply ingrained that it is not even recognized for what it is.

Maybe someday we'll know better... and the fairy tales will end with everyone living happily ever after.

Human Strengths, Human Weaknesses

I got an e-mail a few days ago from a person who wrote that he understood why neurodiversity activists would want to celebrate autistic strengths and culture, but he didn't see why we wouldn't want to cure autistic weaknesses.

That reminded me of a passage from Amy Harmon's article two years ago, How About Not Curing Us, which suggested that children could be taught "to use their autistic strengths to cope with their autistic impairments."

I've never had any objection to the idea of improving one's weaknesses generally. All human beings have to work on developing new skills; otherwise, nobody would ever learn anything. I do have a problem, though, with the description of some cognitive traits as autistic strengths and the characterization of others as autistic weaknesses. Yes, autistics (like any other group) tend to be stronger, on average, in some areas and weaker in others. But an average is just that—an average. When we go beyond talking about statistical averages and start to characterize certain traits as belonging to certain groups, that's stereotyping.

When this sort of language is used to describe other groups of people, the stereotyping often is painfully obvious. For example, women, on average, tend to score higher than men on tests of verbal ability and interpersonal skills, while scoring lower on tests of mathematical and spatial skills. (This is where Simon Baron-Cohen's "extreme male brain" description of autism came from.) But when we're talking about gender, most of us would be sensible enough not to say that verbal ability is a female strength or that math is a male strength. We understand that there is a broad range of ability across both genders and that stereotyping unfairly constrains the potential of both.

And we certainly wouldn't advise girls to use their female strengths to cope with their female impairments. Nor would we suggest that there ought to be a cure for female mental weaknesses.

When an autistic person who has limited speech ability works on improving his or her speech, I'd put that in the same category as a woman with poor math skills making an effort to learn more math. It's probably a good thing to do (assuming that it isn't pursued so strenuously as to cause high levels of stress), but it's not a cure for anything, and no one should ever be treated as an inferior or defective human being on account of a lack of speech skills, math skills, or whatever.

We're all just people, with human strengths and human weaknesses.

The Best of Times, The Worst of Times

I finished reading Unstrange Minds about three weeks ago, but I've only just now gotten around to writing a review of the book, in part because it took me some time to ponder the contradictions.

I'm not referring to factual contradictions. All of the historical and cultural information is meticulously researched, and its logical presentation supports Professor Grinker's conclusion that the recent increase in autism prevalence is due to a broader application of the diagnostic label, rather than an actual increase in the number of people with autistic traits.

When it comes to the personal views Grinker expresses, however, the book is a turbulent microcosm of society's ambivalent and conflicting attitudes toward the autistic population. In the introduction, Grinker frames the discussion in these paradoxical terms (p. 6):


"Autism is a terrible, lifelong disorder, but it's a better time than ever to be autistic."


As Grinker sees it, this is the best of times because our society has more understanding of neurological differences than ever before. Far more children are being identified as autistic, often at younger ages; and more services, special education classes, and vocational training programs are available for these children. Their parents are no longer being blamed by psychoanalysts for causing their autism by being neglectful or aloof. Most of the abusive institutions that once existed have been replaced by modern group homes. Better medications are available, and governments and nonprofit organizations are providing much more funding for research to improve our scientific knowledge about autism.

I'll acknowledge that these points are all true, in and of themselves. However, in the context of the prevailing cultural attitude that "autism is a terrible, lifelong disorder," one could also argue that it is the worst of times to be autistic. This is how I see it:

Far more children are now victims of society's prejudices against autism than ever before, taught from earliest childhood to think of themselves as disordered and defective. Their parents often are driven to panic and despair by a widespread mass hysteria that declares their very existence to be a devastating tragedy. They may be placed in unsuitable special education programs that do not meet their needs, and they may be given only the most basic vocational training. Although many institutions have been shut down, some still exist, and a group home can be just as isolating for residents who may be shunned or taunted when they venture outside.

The myth of Refrigerator Mother has been replaced by other myths that are equally damaging to families, such as the urban legend about vaccines causing autism, which has spawned an entire industry of conscienceless quacks who prey on parents by convincing them that they must immediately buy all sorts of bogus treatments to save their child from a terrible fate. Behaviorists also put enormous pressure on parents to go into debt to pay for intensive therapies that are touted as vital for "early intervention," although the science isn't there to support those claims. Although psychiatric medications have been improved in recent years, they also have been prescribed much more broadly and indiscriminately to autistic children who may not need them and who may not be able to tell anyone about painful or distressing side effects. And yes, there is more autism research these days, but much of it consists of eugenics research to develop a prenatal test.

I'm not sure if Grinker made a conscious choice to gloss over these controversial topics to avoid alienating potential buyers of his book or if he just hasn't given some of them much thought.

As a cultural anthropologist, Grinker is well aware that disorders are socially constructed. Indeed, the book explicitly states as much in several places, including this passage (p. 11):


"...autism, like all disorders, does not exist outside of culture. It is culture that sees something as abnormal or wrong, names it, and does something about it..."


Grinker gives us many interesting glimpses into different cultural constructions of autism, from a South African tribal culture where autistic children often are thought to be cursed and are taken to witch doctors, to the status-conscious Korean cities where children with developmental disabilities are largely ignored, to the families in India who prefer a diagnosis of mental retardation because there is so much stigma and ignorance surrounding autism.

But when he describes his life with his autistic daughter, Isabel, it's not at all clear that Grinker understands the extent to which his own attitudes have been shaped by our society's prejudices. Clearly he is a loving father who dotes on Isabel, even taking her to visit France when she develops a strong interest in Monet's garden. However, he seems to assume without question that Isabel will never leave home or marry (p. 24) even though he proudly describes her school successes, her extensive knowledge of wildlife, and her ambition to become a zookeeper (p. 300).

As mentioned by Autism Diva in a recent post, Grinker already has acknowledged that he erred in failing to interview autistic adults when he researched the book, so I won't belabor that point. It appears that, after the book went to press, Grinker became more aware of autistic self-advocacy and the extent to which his culturally-based assumptions about autistic people might be in need of some adjustment.

It just goes to show that none of us, however well educated, can step outside the constraints of our own cultural assumptions and analyze them objectively, no matter how much we believe we can.

If you've bought Unstrange Minds, or are about to buy it (and it's a good read, especially for those who are interested in history and the social sciences), I suggest that you buckle up your mental seat belt. You're in for a bumpy but fascinating ride.

Blame Where It Doesn't Belong

Once again, the so-called Asperger Defense has reared its ugly head in a school stabbing incident that involved a teen with an AS diagnosis. I've already made it clear what I think of turning bigoted stereotypes into legal defenses, in a post I wrote last year, so I won't repeat myself on that issue. I would, however, like to thank the Asperger's Association of New England for issuing this statement:


"Physical violence is not at all typical of people with Asperger Syndrome (AS). AANE has worked with thousands of families, teachers, and other professionals for more than a decade. In that time, we have never before heard of a comparable event. We hope the public will remain open minded and open hearted, and not compound this tragedy by forming a sweeping negative stereotype about all people with AS."


It is absolutely true that physical violence is not typical of AS (or any other autism spectrum condition). The diagnostic criteria for AS describe differences in social interaction, as well as repetitive behavior. Other autism spectrum conditions also are characterized by speech differences and delays. There is no mention of violence or aggression anywhere in the DSM-IV criteria for any form of autism. To put it another way: Whether or not a person has displayed violent behavior is completely irrelevant, from the standpoint of a clinical psychologist, to the determination of whether that person should be diagnosed as autistic.

Moreover, there is (to the best of my knowledge) no statistical evidence indicating that autistics commit any more violent assaults than the general population. The image of the autistic berserker who might explode into homicidal rage at any moment is a vile and groundless stereotype that has been spread intentionally by greedy fraudsters such as Mark Geier and David Geier, by dishonest journalists such as David Kirby, by melodramatic TV hacks such as Dr. Phil, and by a few criminal defense lawyers scrounging for any excuse to get a client off.

So I was dismayed when I read a post on Susan Senator's blog that contains the following response to AANE's statement:


"I think it is a little disingenuous of the AANE to claim that physical violence is not at all typical of Asperger Syndrome. I know at least two children whose behavior can cast doubt on that statement. But more to the point, what is really not helpful about this is that the AANE seems to be in effect seeking to separate themselves from those other disabled people who do have profiles of physical violence (like some people with more marked forms of autism, perhaps)."


As long as we're throwing around anecdotes in place of science, I know at least two Aspie teenagers who are the most responsible, even-tempered, and nonviolent kids you'll ever see, and they deserve much better than the ugly prejudices and discriminatory treatment that they are going to have to face as a result of misinformation of this sort.

What's more, I don't see any intent on the part of AANE to separate themselves from "people with more marked forms of autism," as suggested by Ms. Senator, and it is completely untrue that such people "have profiles of physical violence." As I discussed above, there is no mention of physical violence in the diagnostic criteria for any form of autism, however "marked" it may be. Of course, that doesn't mean an autistic person can't be violent—we are human, after all, and violence is an unfortunate characteristic of the human species in general—but there is no basis whatsoever for a broad assertion that those with more pronounced autistic traits "have profiles of physical violence." To the contrary, autistics in all diagnostic categories are much more likely to be victims of violent assaults than to commit such assaults.

I believe there has been a lot of public confusion caused by the widespread use of imprecise language such as "meltdown" to describe both tantrums and sensory overload experiences of autistic people. Sensory overstimulation is fairly common among autistics, but tantrums involving physical violence toward others are much rarer.

A tendency toward sensory overload should not be carelessly equated to a propensity for physical violence, especially in the context of a homicidal assault.

The Depths of Higher Education

I am very thankful that I was able to get my education before American universities had any so-called Asperger's support services, back when it was still possible for an autistic student to be treated like a human being.

Take a look at this abominable news article (thanks to Lana for the link) entitled "Students on the Spectrum," with the barf-worthy subtitle, "A Dream Not Denied."

nytimes.com/2006/11/05/education/edlife/traits.html

The article declares that colleges are "in a panic" about the enrollment of autistic youths as they "scramble to figure out how to accommodate this new, growing population of disabled students" more of whom allegedly are considering college as a result of "earlier and better intervention" and "intensive therapies." Many college administrators have been attending conferences about Asperger's support services, including one conference that was sponsored in part by the Yale Child Study Center:


The director of the center, Dr. Fred Volkmar, helped define autism and Asperger’s for the American Psychiatric Association in the early 90’s. "Twenty-five years ago," he says, "I would have been stunned to learn that I was going to put together a conference on colleges for these kids. Twenty-five years ago, the stereotype view was that they were not very bright and not college material."


I'm giving Dr. Fred Volkmar my Barefaced Liar of the Year Award for that one. You know how many children diagnosed with Asperger's were thought to be "not college material" because of stereotypes 25 years ago?

Zero. Zip. Zilch.

There weren't any children diagnosed with Asperger's 25 years ago. The concept of autism spectrum categories and the ugly stereotypes it spawned didn't exist (except in a few theoretical academic papers) until Volkmar and his cronies cooked them up in the early 90’s. Before then, most autistic high school students were considered to be normal, and those who attended college were admitted on the same basis as anyone else—high school grades and admissions test scores. And many of us got our degrees, found jobs, and got married or found romantic partners without benefit of the demeaning "services" that the article describes:


At Keene State College, in New Hampshire, fellow students act as "social navigators." Their assignment: change their charges’ "outsider" status by introducing them to their friends. The mentors get $10 an hour (and sometimes course credit in psychology) by helping students on the spectrum make small talk, date and get consent at every level of romantic advancement.


Yecch. Just how is a phony friendship with a paid-by-the-hour psychology student, who may be conducting research for a class project, supposed to make the "mentee" feel like anything other than a lab rat? And someone really needs to explain to those ding-dong psychologists that it's not the autistic guys who are committing date rape—most autistics are quietly studying on any given evening. Rather, it's the beer-chugging party-animal jerks who could use more "social navigators" in the form of probation officers teaching them how to behave around women.

But wait, it gets worse:


At Marshall University, the West Virginia Autism Training Center operates a program in which graduate students work daily with students with Asperger’s, reviewing assignments, helping with time management and teaching classroom etiquette. They take the students on field trips to Wal-Mart, to restaurants and to the movie theater to let them practice social skills. Bottom line for parents: $6,200 a year.


Field trips to Wal-Mart? WTF? Here's a little anecdote about how I learned to do my own shopping when I went away to college. While I was unpacking my clothes and linens in my dorm room, I noticed that I had forgotten to bring a pillow. So I asked my dad (who had driven me to the campus) if he would take me to a store. He informed me that I was living on my own now, that it was my responsibility to do my own shopping, and that he was quite sure I was capable of buying a pillow. Then he left. I sat there on my pillowless bed for a few minutes, sulking about the unfairness of life and parents, and then I went and got my bicycle from the rack and rode a few blocks to the nearest discount store. I bought a pillow (well, gee, it wasn't rocket science after all) and rode back to the dorm with the pillow balanced across my handlebars, which taught me a valuable lesson about planning ahead.

That's one of the best support services to help an autistic kid learn how to live independently: Parents who have the good sense to administer a few well-aimed kicks in the rear, figuratively speaking, when they're needed. Thanks Dad. (And he didn't have to pay $6,200 a year for it, either.)

To make myself clear on this point, I'm not denying that support services can be useful or that there should be more of them available on campus. I can think of many services I didn't have (or didn't take full advantage of) as a student that would've been helpful, such as testing to identify my areas of strength, career counseling to match my strengths and interests to suitable jobs, occasional meetings with an academic advisor to provide guidance with my class choices, and some general advice on time management and adjusting to independent life. But these services—which would also be helpful for many non-autistic students—can and should be provided in respectful ways that don't stigmatize the recipients as grossly incapable.

Some college officials, according to the article, have been wondering why more autistic students aren't seeking out their support services:


"The Asperger’s population is much bigger than we think it is," according to Larry Powell, manager of disability services at Carnegie Mellon. "But students aren’t disclosing that..."


Well, duh! Here's a teensy hint for you, Mr. Powell. It's not because Carnegie Mellon hasn't been offering enough field trips to Wal-Mart. Maybe you ought to take a closer look at how the folks on your campus have been treating students who disclose, such as Valerie Kaplan, a student featured in the article. Although she scored a perfect 1600 on her SAT, that didn't save her from being treated as some sort of tragic mental defective by a Carnegie Mellon professor who


encouraged her to explain her cognitive difficulties to her teammates and ask them to be direct about what they wanted her to do. Dr. Pausch says the results were beneficial not just to Miss Kaplan but to the others. "They found a way to work with someone who opened up to them about something that was very embarrassing," he says. "Once she puts that on the table, what else can anyone feel embarrassed about having to divulge?"


Guess what, dude, a lot of things are more embarrassing than the simple fact of belonging to a social minority group as a result of a natural genetic difference. Such as being a bigoted professor who sees nothing wrong with teaching a bright, capable student to feel ashamed and embarrassed about who she is. Or being an ignorant journalist who happily laps up vicious prejudice like that and presents it as a wonderful insight into social interaction.

To all the "autism aware" colleges and universities out there: Clean up your act. Show a decent respect for human differences. Educate your faculty and staff about neurodiversity, rather than "symptoms." Make it clear that you intend to strictly enforce your non-discrimination policy. Respond promptly and appropriately when you receive complaints of discrimination against autistic students. Replace degrading pseudo-services with genuinely useful ones. Maybe then your autistic students won't be afraid to come out of the closet.