Published on 12, July, 2020
You know I am not want to quibble about language I would normally say you should use whatever terminology most quickly and accurately conveys what you’re trying to say regardless of whether it’s politically correct. Autistic person or person with autism it makes very little difference to me. High functioning or low functioning yeah I think we all understand what that means now. But there is one terminology that I am seeing but I am not a fan of.
people who say that this person is profoundly autistic or very autistic or severely autistic. Because they’re not talking about the core symptoms of autism being more serious the lack of social skills the special interest are repetitive behaviours. They’re talking about intellectual handicap. As if people who have an intellectual disability are somehow more autistic than people who do not. and the logical extension of this is that they are more deserving of sympathy and help and special accommodations. and these intellectually disabled autistic people are the true autistic people the profoundly autistic people and the ones you have to take seriously not like these high functioning autistic people. they don’t really need help. at least that is a subtext which is conveyed.
I mean no one says “he is so profoundly autistic he kept me talking about quantum physics for an hour even though I tried to change the subject multiple times and then tried to follow me in to the ladies loo to keep talking to me about quantum physics.”
no one says, “he is so severally autistic he thought a good icebreaker would be the group discussing what sex toys we have.” Even though this would be the proper use of the term.
no when they say profoundly autistic they mean “he’s 26 and has a mental age of 12.” I really wish we could stop people and I guess by people I mostly mean parents from using this terminology.
I understand your frustration, intellectual disability is just a comorbidity of autism and assessment criteria for autism make no mention of intellect at all. Profoundly autistic is a term that should be reserved, in my opinion, for autistic people with average and above intellect who are non-speaking, or whose sensory/communication/anxiety problems impact their ability to function in society very negatively. It is arguable that it is as illogical to give people with intellectual disability who also have poor social skills the primary identifier of 'autistic' as it would be to give Intellectually disabled people who are highly sociable the primary identifier of 'allistic' (or 'neurotypical').