Why does autism have such a stigma to it?

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When I was started researching autism seven years ago I didn't perceive that it was stigmatised. But then I didn't read pro-cure books or websites. I would have been reluctant to self-diagnose as being on the autism spectrum if I had thought autism had a stigma.

Autism has less of a stigma than schizophrenia.

Autism, stigma?

hasn't anyone seen Brüno? Autism was in.

I agree!

Probably because it's what sells in Big Corporate media.

Not many people really seems to care about the auties/aspies that are kind/caring/affectionate. They only want to show the negative side.

As someone here stated before me, shocking, negative, bad, blood-on-the-wall, scary stories are what sells to the public. Pure and simple. It mostly boils down to good ol'-fashioned stereotypes and generalizations. It really shouldn't be that way, but it is.

I agree. Has anyone seen one of the later Medium episodes? They seemed to have added to the stereotype that Schizophrenics were all blood-thirsty, cat-mutilating, unemotional fiends.

I know, right? I've always been able to see past the NT crowd, and not really get into the things that NT's think is cool. Never smoked, drank, or done drugs (other than my prescription meds, and then only the assigned dose), I never spent booku bucks on clothing and stuff just because everyone else had them, never treated other people like dog s**t because they were unpopular. I've become the person I am today all because I didn't think with the crowd.

Indeed, the way people describe autism reminds me of the Matrix. "A prison without walls or doors... a prison for your mind." But if anything, I'm convinced that the REAL Matrix is not autism but the lack thereof.

Which brings up a valid question. What if the Wachowski Bros. (Directors and masterminds behind the Matrix trilogy and the Animatrix) were Aspie? Or even the director for Ghost in the Shell, which is one of the inspirations behind the Matrix trilogy? I may be getting off-topic here, but the parallels are so close here it's scary, and to me it doesn't seem like mere coincidence.

Autism/Aspergers is stigmatized due to the fact that people don't totally understand either of these disorders other than media portrayals. When I tell people that I am on the autism spectrum, the first thing out of people's mouth is usually in regards to Rain Man (can you count cards, etc).

I have found that people that are more educated, open-minded, and/or have a family member friend on spectrum have a tendency to stigmatize austism/AS less.

I think it has a lot to do with parents of those with autism too... a lot of parents, while they don't admit it, will want the sympathy from others. They say things like "my child was stolen from me", "He/she will NEVER be able to do that..."

They discount what we can and can't do before our lives even really start, then go on and on and on to anyone who will listen to it. Word of mouth will/can travel very quickly if in the right setting... and for a lot of people, if they see that the person really has an autistic child, they will be more inclined to listen closely. "This person is legit because they deal with it every day"... and not see the whole "This person thinks it's worse than death because they can't force the kid to be normal".

I'm not saying that all of them are making it sound a lot worse than it is, I'm I'm willing to bet a good chunk of them are doing just that. Some of them really do have it rough... but the others... their children reflect who they are and they have issues in dealing with that altogether. So they make the escape from, "parent with a poorly behaved child" to "this poor lady who has to deal with this every day".

It would be nice if autism spectrum disorders came with a physical feature to set one apart.

.... if we lived in a nicer world. The way things are now, I think that could invite discrimination.

How so?

Actually, the character in that episode was a NT girl who spent years imitating the symptoms of schizophrenia so that she could lay the groundwork for an insanity defense when she and her older brother later murdered their parents. The only non-NT person in that episode (her roommate) was actually a victim. But there have been plenty of other instances where the "motive" for killings on TV is that the person is schizophrenic.

Some parents are stupid.

Socially we are in the "Uncanny Valley". Nearly high functioning enough to appear "normal", but there's that *something* that disturbs other people. The more an aspie tries to emulate it's peers, the worse it appears.

I think that people are disturbed about the special interests and obsessions that we have.

Autism has a stigma attached to it because of all the falsely diagnosed people who aren't autistic but rather brain damaged.

High functioning autism or AS at least is a variation in the brain. In reality however most people diagnosed do not have this variation but instead they have a form of brain damage.

Another factor is how the NT mothers and psychologists take the lead in the struggle to "enlighten" the world on the subject of autism. They want disabled little teddy bears to head pat and patronize, not an alternative breed of humans.

..or like it's unusual that we could be good artists. Lots of times autistic people with average skills get huuuge praise like they're soooo smart for figuring out how to do something like a normal person. And even when it IS a neat unusual skill like being able to remember a whole cityscape, it's still kind of treated the same. Like "wow, I can't believe an AUTISTIC person could be so skilled."