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Autism is not a learning difficulty

VLD

Why are autistic people still portrayed on websites as having learning difficulties etc? it is demeaning and is continuing the link between  learning difficulties and Autism. I am aware that some Autistic People have learning difficulties but, you know what, so do some non-autistic people. I am trying to help my bright and highly intelligent daughter who happens to be autistic but who will not have anything to do with organisations that think she has LDs. I even found one website that said that autistic people have communication incapacities. As I said I know some do but to perpetuate the myth that we are all Rain Man is grossly offensive. 

  • its because every mental illness or personality disorder is ignorantly called a learning difficulty... its a boomer thing...

    my parents suspected something was wrong with me and kept saying they think i may have a learning disability... this is why i never got diagnosed, because they instead had me checked for a learning difficulty, someone came around and then found out i was actually smarter than the average kid my age and so i didnt have a learning difficulty lol

    but yeah, boomers call every mental illness a learning difficulty. its what they called it in their days, and it is wrong, and its why millenials and some gen x didnt get a diagnosis when they could have

  • .... Or an illness. 

    On a placard today by a foundation that supports autism, there was the caption 'Can it be cured?' 

    Well, if it's about someone who is clearly distressed, and krrps banging their heads, that could be a reason for stating this..... 

    And then someone discussing an exhibition I was told 'the artist is ill, you know.

    ' They' re autistic'

    I see........... 

  • It is indeed offensive.  I even came across one post on an autism website that said we were "mentally handicapped".  that came from the parent of an autistic person. God help us!

  • I don't like this either. But there are a few main problems.

    Socially, the issues with communication are assumed to align with morality. This has major implications and part of the reason people feel justified when saying someone who cannot read their mind lacks empathy. Should it turn out that autistic thinking and reasoning is responsible for a wealth of historical content - the engineering of technological society to where it is now, and the possibility Autistics catch matters of injustice and bad ethics in society, people having this realisation might become angry. Everyone navigates on the assumption they are inherently good, not bad. This is really the most inverted oppression faced by Autistics. 

    It should be perfectly fine that children excel and grow in different ways. We are humans, not machine. Some will need to mature in the typical fashion - socially, being thrust into 'doing' adult things like driving, getting any job and just jumping full speed into the rat race. Others will never thrive being forced down this path but will end up getting "flattened in the machine" turning on a cog never being able to mature properly, and so need a different path into adulthood, which may mean doing the things once it's mentally integrated, but being allowed to grow at their own pace with their potential. 

    Autistic and NeuroDivergent parents might make more room for their children's sense of becoming. But in this society, the ability to sense and allow for this can mean incorporating middle class values even if one is trying to navigate financial hardship. This is the biggest hinderance in our time.

  • Autism has a number of different causes, the idea of an autism spectrum conveys that it has a wide range of outcomes in regard to how it affects individuals. In none of the diagnostic criteria guidelines is intellectual disability mentioned. Therefore, intellectual disability is not part of how autism is diagnosed. However, as recently as the 1990s the proportion of people diagnosed as autistic that also had intellectual disability was around 70%. Today it is around 30% and it will continue to fall as more people with less overt autism are diagnosed. Still, 30% is much higher than the rate for the general population, at 0.4-3%. So proportionally, much higher numbers of autistic people also have intellectual disability, though the relationship is not causal.

    As to difficulties in communication, this is a bedrock of autism diagnosis. The difficulties are varied but tend to be in the realms of non-verbal communication, though some autistics have problems with speaking, such as tone of voice, facial expression and body language. There is also a tendency to literalism, and problems with idiom, sarcasm, and banter. 

  • Depends on functionality. Though, Health Services tend to compartmentalise, rather than focus on one issue.

    I believe that support will come from Voluntary Organisations.