Why everything you know about autism is wrong!

There is another way of illuminating how the deficit model - and the pernicious influences of the discourse this model generates - is not only wrong, but also harmful.

We can do this by (rhetorically?) allocating autism minority status, and comparing society’s, the medical profession’s, and (some) voluntary sector’s attitudes and practices towards it, with those of another minority group.

As an example I will use the LGBTQIA minority group. As its long acronym suggests, it is a heterogeneous group, and it suffers prejudice, but such prejudice is regularly criticised by the voluntary sector, the media and many in society.

Imagine the outcry if - especially in the run up to an election - if a politician was to advocate gay conversion therapy. It would not only be the gay community who’d object, the vast majority of society and the medical profession would be outraged and critical, as would the voluntary sector. Now consider ABA and PBS. It is similar to conversion therapy and has the ethics of a totalitarian regime’s re-education camp. It is also openly advocated on some UK autism sites. Here and here. Why no outcry? (Apart from within the autistic community). Because everything the majority of the general public (and many in the autism industry) knows about autism is wrong.

Now consider giving a bleach solution to young children who adopt a different gender identity to the one they were assigned. This would obviously cause outrage. It happens to some autistic children, sometimes via an enema - essentially child rape - and has been brought to the attention of various authorities and social media platforms for over 5 years. It continues.

The obvious disparity between public perception of autism as an ‘outgroup’, and other minorities, is telling. I recognise that everything is not perfect for other groups, but it seems to me that autism, particularly for those unable to express their objections, is suffering from the narrative provided by the medical model of a triad of impairments, which excludes the social model because the social model is qualitative rather quantitative.

A proper balance between qualitative research and quantitative research would go some way to address this problem. The present imbalance creates a vacuum where fools and charlatans can rush in.

There is another way of illuminating how the deficit model - and the pernicious influences of the discourse this model generates - is not only wrong, but also harmful.

We can do this by (rhetorically?) allocating autism minority status, and comparing society’s, the medical profession’s, and (some) voluntary sector’s attitudes and practices towards it, with those of another minority group.

As an example I will use the LGBTQIA minority group. As its long acronym suggests, it is a heterogeneous group, and it suffers prejudice, but such prejudice is regularly criticised by the voluntary sector, the media and many in society.

Imagine the outcry if - especially in the run up to an election - if a politician was to advocate gay conversion therapy. It would not only be the gay community who’d object, the vast majority of society and the medical profession would be outraged and critical, as would the voluntary sector. Now consider ABA and PBS. It is similar to conversion therapy and has the ethics of a totalitarian regime’s re-education camp. It is also openly advocated on some UK autism sites. Here and here. Why no outcry? (Apart from within the autistic community). Because everything the majority of the general public (and many in the autism industry) knows about autism is wrong.

Now consider giving a bleach solution to young children who adopt a different gender identity to the one they were assigned. This would obviously cause outrage. It happens to some autistic children, sometimes via an enema - essentially child rape - and has been brought to the attention of various authorities and social media platforms for over 5 years. It continues.

The obvious disparity between public perception of autism as an ‘outgroup’, and other minorities, is telling. I recognise that everything is not perfect for other groups, but it seems to me that autism, particularly for those unable to express their objections, is suffering from the narrative provided by the medical model of a triad of impairments, which excludes the social model because the social model is qualitative rather quantitative.

A proper balance between qualitative research and quantitative research would go some way to address this problem. The present imbalance creates a vacuum where fools and charlatans can rush in.

Good point well made!

That's very thought provoking.

Unknown said:

Why no outcry? (Apart from within the autistic community). Because everything the majority of the general public (and many in the autism industry) knows about autism is wrong.

This is what I've been trying to refer to when I say that perhaps my perception that there are (some? any?) objective medical deficits associated with autism that even a perfect society couldn't alleviate, comes from my own internalisation of those incorrect societal memes / opinions / beliefs.

And I think that your analogy holds true, in that (& I don't think this is controversial?) both autism and sexual orientation are indivisibly bound into the way that a person perceives the world and reacts to it - part of the person in other words.

Thank you for sharing that analogy........more pondering to come I think! :-)