Why do folks treat Autistic people like this?

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I've noticed a lot of people seem to treat autism/asperger's as a disease that can be cured Some parents have had their children taken away just because it was found out they're on the spectrum, which is one reason I'm scared of an official diagnosis... I used to tell people that my brother had Asperger's, until I learned it had very negative reactions that had very serious consequences.
I just read an article on Parenting.com called "Autism is not a shameful secret" and the mom who wrote the article says that it was incredibly painful to have someone tell her that her son has autism. There's apparently a mourning period where they mourn the loss of the child they expected to have! I cannot understand how it's painful, or how it's something to mourn. And then she says that people can recover from autism! I am having a very difficult time understanding this.

This occurs with the mentally ret*d, deaf, blind, those missing limbs, and minority groups as well.
Examples of this are:
"The first female astronaut"
"The first Hispanic Senator"
"Girl missing arm competes in surfing competition"
It makes me ponder the motive(s) behind such reporting. Conferring some sort of special descriptor upon such individuals not only downplays their achievements (which were made through hard work, perseverance and dedication), it promotes inequality (by assuming that persons of a specific minority group cannot normally engage in a specific activity or hold specific positions, especially those in authority).

Whoever brought up the word majority... Refer to it as the Collective Ego. They all tell eachother what they want to hear.

And just think, there is no such thing as "perfection" in this imperfect world.
But you know, reporters have to have a "hook" to catch your eye and draw you int the story. That is why they do this..
Actually, the surfer thing? She lost her arm to a tiger shark. So returning to surfing was a bit remarkable. And she harbors no resentment towards the shark, either. This is more newsworthy, is it not?

Sincerely,
Matthew

I think the issues form outside can be boiled down to ignorance and a failure to understand/learn the complexity of AS and the like. Reporters and announcers tend to simplify the storys and their storys and they don't tend "get it" in the first place. Their jobs are making money off the storys by selling advertising or services so that removes another layer of substance from the already skewed content. The fact is that minoritys make great ready made public intrest storys, just ask TLC the TV channel.

People with an ASD are almost always viewed as inferior by those who can be classified as normal so any outlier perormance will be noted as exceptional.

if everyone knew what an ASD really entailed (pros/cons) and not just what a puzzle ribbon ment I think meny of the people with it would then be seen as legit and capable citizens in the world and their accomplishments in the world may begin to go more unnoticed as far as the personal intrest news cycle goes. That day is not coming in my life time though so i'm not wasteing any time dreaming.

As for the mom mourning I suppose if you had your kids life mapped out before they were born the dream may have died. I would think a very high percentage of WP members have managed to shatter their parents pre birth plans, me included. So what was it you loved, the kid or the dream?

Its not our world we live in its theirs, sure we have our fair amount of stock however its the non-voting kind.