Upset when someone says all autism is due to wheat?

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Do you get upset when someone gets on national TV and then says all autism is due to wheat?

Years ago I had an experience where I ran into that type of cult like thinking and, at the time, I tended to ignore it (out of a sense of being polite or at least the idea that maybe wheat doesn't agree with everyone); however today (2010), if I encounter that same kind of incorrect thinking - the only cause of autism is wheat/whatever, I tend to call it what it is: garbage thinking which only hurts people who falsely believe it because it's a fib (lie).

Experiences?

I get really upset, when people say that and than they call autism an epidemic, under the same breath.

Yes, I do get upset. When people don't pay attention to science, they end up with false beliefs that can cause them to do things that, at best, use up time the child could have taken to learn, and at worst, are outright deadly.

Autism is a developmental disorder. You're born with it and it changes the way your brain develops. It's not caused by wheat, or vaccines, or anything else along those lines; it's almost entirely genetic.

When people insist that it's something else, the result tends to be that they stop focusing on teaching the kid (usually it's a kid) and giving him a good environment to grow up in; instead, they assume that the kid can't have a good life until they find the magic cure. They sacrifice the child's chance to learn (which is easier the younger you are, in many cases) and ruin his childhood for something that doesn't exist.

Its just a way for those desperate parents who think Autism means their child is DEFECTIVE, to cling to hope of a cure. Since there isn't one, if they can believe in chelation, or gluten or vaccines, they can convince themselves their DEFECTIVE child can be 'fixed'.

I don't get upset when people say crazy things like that. I will assume its comedy and zap to another channel.

Upset? Why bother? People claim too many unsubstantiated things. If I got upset by that kind of thing, I'd be constantly upset. It's not worth it. I would say I've learned not to care, but it wouldn't be true. Not caring about stupid things like that, lucky for me, is just part of my AS so it comes naturally.

Yes - it pisses me off - usually because the person promoting it isn't a scientist but someone who is trying to sell a book or a celebrity with a pet cause and it means that parents are getting bad information and getting directed to the woo industry that is more than happy to suck out their money in exchange for something that at best does nothing to help the child. They don't even typically discuss what autism is at all, just that it's bad and can be fixed by their remedy-of-the-month.

Yes, I got this suggestion from nearly all of my mom's friends. None of them could get that I've had AS forever, but they were the first to blame vaccines and diet for my "disease". They treated my AS like it was significantly worse than my having fibromyalgia, a chronic illness that absolutely needs a cure. It's very frustrating trying to explain this to people.

also, an autistic kid is not a "brat who hasn't been told to cut the act out"

-- Michael Savage, you're a no-nothing ****

"Know-nothing". But yes. I remember the Michael Savage fiasco... I was worried WP was going to go nuclear from all of us being so enraged.

And I'm a grammar nazi.

...seriously. I read fan fiction and correct the grammar as I go.

All the different cures bug me. The thing that bugs me the most is when people still (again?) claim if a kid has autism it is really a totally normal kid inside the autism illness. That claim made more sense when they thought autism came from bad upbringing and the kid built walls around itself. But now when we know it's not like that, how can anyone still think the "real" kid is in there somewhere?

I don't know how it can be that hard to use logic.