"I'm an expert, I have a cousin/child that has it."

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I believe it was Will Rogers who described an expert as "A man fifty miles from home with a briefcase."


I think our struggle will be harder than that of the LGBT community. In general, their community has better social skills than ours and they can point to specific historical people of similar orientations with definitiveness.

We can guess at whether or not historical figures had autism, but we can't prove it definitively in most cases. Anyone wishing to doubt has more room to doubt.

Additionally there have been thriving LGBT communities throughout history, such as Venice where the masquerades allowed for anyone to negotiate politically and where identities were withheld allowing for LGBT's to meet up more easily.
We can't come up with an example of an Autistic community (As the label divide hadn't existed. )

Additionally, we have yet to gain the popular support. The LGBT community has always had a foothold in the arts that we simply don't have (at least not that we know of) and when we do, we are seen more as an oddity.
The LGBT community greatly benefited by having folks like Rob Halford, Freddie Mercury, and John Elton, to aid in popular acceptance.

One thing I notice in news media links that people post from USA media is that they rarely give more than one point of view, one side of the story. They don't bother seeking balance (?)

It's a bit different here because balance is a statutory requirement, for the media, and press, and there are statutory appointed bodies for both that you can complain to if the code of standards is breached. Do you have this in the USA?

Anyway, when we were starting out in the 1970s one of the first things we did was contact newspaper editors whenever we saw a one-sided article representing the status quo - and made an appointment to see the editor to discuss how to remedy this - eg we gave them the option to interview us/write an article about us or to print an apology. In the course of this process, not a single editor refused, and we never had to take a formal complaint to the press or broadcasting standards association. And we got our message out there. This was the start of relationship building even with people who were initially very hostile to our cause; some of them came round as we sent them more and more valid material, and I became their "go to" person for comment whenever the topic was in the news. I am HFA, and had no previous media experience, though I had enormous determination and commitment. It can be done; but you don't get overnight success, that's for sure.

Eventually I was "fighting the fight" in interviews on tv, radio, and press; it snowballed very quickly. So more and more people read about it and joined the cause, and helped in one way or another - I handled the parliamentary submissions, parliamentary liaison and public relations. Others helped in all sorts of ways, answering phones, holding meetings, organising national conferences, lobbying their local members of parliament, lending time and equipment, offering peer support, fundraising to cover our costs (eg I had to fly back and forth to parliament, make lots of long distance calls). It started with a meeting at my place with 8 people and snowballed into a solid organisation of 5000 people. No-one ever thought we would succeed. (Ha!!) The opposition was immense. I received abusive phonecalls (par for the course) but not that many.

I don't think it was easier for gay people. Or would be harder for us. Not if you had dedicated and able leaders with appropriate planning and other skills.

More difficult or not, in the words of Sir Nicholas Winton (again) - "If a thing isn't absolutely impossible, then there MUST be a way to do it". That's the motto I have tried to live by, and it's taken me and my favoured causes a very long way...

APOM wrote: "In my view our biggest problem is internalization of the negative things being said about us"

I completely agree with this. "Internalised Oppression" - where the stigmatised individual buys into the stigma by believing it and acting as if it is true - is the biggie. You might as well attach a set of chains to you head - if you are chaining your consciousness to the ideas of your oppressors. All the rights in the world won't help unless you unchain your mind.

Well, this person did start by calling us "ret*ds," so I don't expect much respect for our intelligence...

Forget about those who scoff at our intelligence:

We know what we are about!

Lovaas also wanted to "cure" LBGTQs with his ABA "therapy." When the APA started suggesting that it would be better for psychiatrists to refer gays to support groups to help them come out of the closet, Lovaas was indignant and said that would be "inappropriate" and "irresponsible."

You don't hear about that from Autism Speaks now do you? In fact, I've noticed that you don't even seen his name associated with ABA that much anymore.

Another thing he said is that ABA wouldn't be effective if you didn't use electric shocks.

Someone with a relative with autism may be an expert on dealing with people whose autism manifests in that particular way but it doesn't make them an expert on the whole thing. Same as everything else, people want to think they know it all. Back when I was having babies, everybody was an expert on the best way to do it based on their own experience or the experience of someone they knew. I found the way that worked for me. It was the same way with ADHD back when my kids were young, any time a kid acted up or didn't pay attention, someone was there to tell you that your kid should go get a diagnosis and ritalin. I agree with you about the experts who have a relative with it. They are experts on that one particular person or possibly on a particular behavior, but not on autism as a whole.

However, I think a cure should be available because AS is a lot more than just difficulty socializing and fitting in. We have a lot of other issues caused by the autism and not by "oppressive NT society" that can be more difficult than just fitting in. Sensory problems, processing problems, perception problems, etc pose a bigger problem to a lot of us than not being able to look someone in the eye or sucking at small talk.

When you portray AS as simply a social impairment then it does seem petty and shallow to try and find a cure or prevention for it. When you factor in the other very real and very problematic issues that many of us face due to the autism itself then you can get a clearer view of the reason that many people including myself, want a cure.

While society does require us to try to fit into certain distinctions and follow meaningless traditions and protocol, and could be more AS friendly thus stopping any thought of a need for a cure, if it were purely a social disability there is nothing you can do about the light of the sun which causes some people sensory problems, and nothing you can do about noises in many places, or crowds or smells or sudden changes in routine or even simple stress overload. You can't change society to take away all the problems caused by autism, and to write off the idea of a cure as pure social bigotry is harming those who have serious issues with nonsocial autism issues by downplaying AS as simply an unaccepted personality type.

_________________
I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
My forum is still there and everyone is welcome to come join as well. There is a private women only subforum there if anyone is interested. Also, there is no CAPTCHA.

The link to the forum is http://www.rightplanet.proboards.com

I don't think anyone here is saying it is "just a social disability". The OP cited someone who was abusive and insulting, and added to the offence by using false justification.

Some light relief at this point in the thread?
http://archive.autistics.org/library/bingo/card-01.jpg

You know what I'm fed up of? People assuming because they don't want a cure and a bunch of other people with an ASD don't want a cure, nobody with an ASD wants a cure. It's far easier not to receive a cure that has been developed than it is to receive one that hasn't, so really you're just being selfish and ruining it for those that do want a cure.

If they don't accept themselves now, being selfish and making them remain as they are isn't going to change that, and if the potential for a cure exists, it may very well make things worse for them. As far as I can tell the only benefit to not having a cure is a bunch of silly "we should all accept each other for who we are" crap that will undoubtedly never happen.