Hand out a card explaining autism? What should it say?

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So I heard about a mother who, whenever people were staring at her autistic child, passed out a card explaining he had autism with information on what autism was and links the person could go to to learn more about it.

I thought that was a brilliant idea, a great way to turn what would normally be a 'let's all gawk at the autie' experience into an actual educational experience for said gawkers. I'm going to be nannying another child on the spectrum soon, who does melt down in public decently often, and I'd like to make some of those cards myself.

That said, I'm not sure what the cards should say. I don't want the bystander to leave with the impression that autism is a completely negative thing or anything like that - I'm looking to create understanding/acceptance as opposed to sympathy. Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

I like this idea. I am sure my mom would have done it if she had thought of it.
I remember I used to have t-shirt that said, "I'm autistic, what's your excuse?"
Like what's the excuse for your rude staring behavior?

I find the description on wikipedia good enough. You can find some inspiration there when writing the text. I would like to share with you the following text from a danish brochure on Aspergers Syndrome. AS is of course also autism, but autism is not necessarily AS, so this text is just for us aspies.

You might want to look at

http://www.buttonsandmore.com/

That's where I bought the button I wear on my baseball cap "I'm not ignoring you; I have autism"

The owner is the father of an autistic child. He calls himself "Richard, Sarah's Dad". He's got cards as well as buttons and all sorts of things.

You might want to look at

http://www.buttonsandmore.com/

That's where I bought the button I wear on my baseball cap "I'm not ignoring you; I have autism"

The owner is the father of an autistic child. He calls himself "Richard, Sarah's Dad". He's got cards as well as buttons and all sorts of things.

You might want to look at

http://www.buttonsandmore.com/

That's where I bought the button I wear on my baseball cap "I'm not ignoring you; I have autism"

The owner is the father of an autistic child. He calls himself "Richard, Sarah's Dad". He's got cards as well as buttons and all sorts of things.

These cards [pack of 50] are available in the UK from the National Autistic Society. The item description may have the wording you require if you are unable to source a local solution.

ITEM DESCRIPTION

How about . .

This idea seems far too presumptuous.

People who stare at a child aren't necessarily staring because the child is displaying autistic behaviors. Also, one ought not assume that these starers aren't already knowlegdable about autism.

Also, there is an excellent point hidden in the idea about adding to the cards the fact that some of the behaviors that may be considered specifically autistic are actually things that non-autistic people also do: if you are passing out autism-specific cards to explain behavior that exists outside of autism, you are actually working against the effort to make it understood that non-autistic people do the same things by explicitly connecting those things to autism.

You could also be seen as implicitly promoting the idea that autism is some weird, gawk-worthy thing by trying to explain it, especially with a delivery as bizarre as handing out unsolicited informational cards to strangers. I mean, on one hand we're discussing sending the message that autism is not as big a deal as these staring people presumably make it out to be, but on the other hand, we're talking about taking actions that can easily be inferred to imply that it is a big deal. These seem like incompatible goals.

I saw someone who compared autism to being left handed before and I think that was an apt comparison (and am asking them if I can borrow their metaphor). Because the world is made for people who are right handed. If you're left handed in many cultures, people will try to change you and force you to use your right hand even though you're not good with it. But left handed people aren't inherently any lesser than right handed people - it's just that society isn't made for them. Some things they can do better than right handed people, like being left handed is an advantage in a lot of sports. Other things they have to use 'special accomodations' like finding a left handed pair of scissors; without those accomodations, they'd struggle. And some things they just plain will really struggle with, like trying to eat at a dinner table next to a right handed person without elbowing them. And then I was going to add that if I was passing them the card, it was probably one of those latter moments...and then add a link, saying if they wanted to learn more about autism, they could do so by going to the website.

The other person phrased it better (which is why I'm asking to use their version), but I still think it's a good metaphor and a nice, brief introduction. What do you guys think? And thanks for all the help so far!

I think the cards are well worth experimenting with.

And really, a person who stares at an autistic child is being rude. And matter-of-factly offering them a card is less confrontational than verbally saying something.

The person is likely to accept the card and is likely to read it. And they might even look up the links.