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Australia – bad for autistic people

29 Nov

Recent events in Australia seem to indicate that if you are autistic then it would be a bad place to be. For a start, you can get away with murdering autistic kids.

Daniela Dawes suffocated her 10-year-old son, Jason, at their western Sydney home in August 2003, before attempting to commit suicide. She was placed on a five-year good behaviour bond after pleading guilty to manslaughter.

No prison time whatsoever for killing her son. Of course, it was good to see that the Australian legal system had its priorities right:

Handing down his findings on October 13, Deputy State Coroner Carl Milovanovich said the case was one of the more difficult he had dealt with. He said that, aside from the “tragic outcome” of the boy’s death, there had been a family breakdown and domestic violence. “Perhaps professional, timely and appropriate resourcing at an early stage may have avoided many of those outcomes,” Mr Milovanovich said.

Yeah, perhaps. Now how about legal justice for Jason? Or doesn’t he count?

And how is poor, poor Ms Dawes doing now? She’s still finding time for the odd threat:

Asked about how she was coping with the loss of her son, Mrs Dawes said: “Every day is an absolute struggle. My boy should be with me and the reason that he’s not is a result of my depression. The unfortunate case here is that parents that are struggling with disabled children do suffer depression and there is a strong possibility that this tragedy could happen again.”

So, confirmation that in Australia at least, you literally can get away with murder. Sickening.

But then, why should we be surprised? The disposable nature of disability was emphasised at the highest level of Australian government recently when Federal Community Services Minister, John Cobb MP:

…..told a group of people with disabilities that if he had a disabled child he would send it to live in an institution

Queensland Advocacy chief Kevin Cocks, who was present, claimed Mr Cobb said that “if he had a child with a disability and it was going to cause stress he would get rid of it”. “He said he had lots of children in his family and if he had a child that would cause stress he would get rid of it – they were his words,” he said.

People with Disability Australia president Heidi Forrest said she left the room in tears.

“I’ve got a child with a disability too,” Ms Forrest said. “I love my son and that was kind of saying that I’m no good for trying to have my son.”

Ms Forrest said the meeting was held to discuss advocacy for the disabled, not “shutting them away or picking and choosing who you want to live in our society”.

“Our concern was that if what he said is indicative about what the Government thinks then we’re in a lot of trouble,” she said.

I think Ms Forrest is absolutely right – Australia is in trouble. John Cobb (who’s email details you can get on his contact page) seems to have sanctioned the belief that disabled people are surplus to requirements in Australia. If only there were more fine, upstanding citizens like Daniela Dawes then Australia wouldn’t have to worry any more.

What the future holds

23 Nov

A recent MSNBC piece on autism entitled ‘growing up with autism’ was a well written, well researched and responsibly written article. It highlighted a worry that all parents of autistic kids have – the future. What happens when our kids become adults?

“Once they lose the education entitlement and become adults, it’s like they fall off the face of the earth” as far as government services are concerned, says Lee Grossman, president and CEO of the Autism Society of America…

The same is true over here in the UK as well.

The much discussed Combating Autism Act was to allocate US$1Billion to research and:

Grossman’s early wish for the Combating Autism Act was that it would address the dire needs of autistic adults, and he drafted 30 pages of service-related issues. But that part was never introduced because a consortium of activists working on the bill concluded, for the sake of political expediency, that the bill shouldn’t try to take on too much…

A ‘consortium of activists eh?’ – lets not beat around the bush here. This consortium was the mercury militia – A-CHAMP, the NAA, SafeMinds, Autism Speaks, Generation Rescue etc. They wanted the money to go on research searching in vain for a link between thiomersal/MMR and autism. It didn’t quite work out that way, but its painfully obvious that they did manage to scupper the dire need of helping autistic adults.

However, advocacy groups vow that the moment the bill passes, government funding for adult services will become their next priority

Yeah, right. I’ll believe that when I see it.

There’s a whole bunch of people here who need to wake up to reality. Autistic adults have been in existence for any number of decades. My great aunt and great uncle, both born before 1920 were amongst them. The Autism Hub has some of them. They had no services beyond institutionalisation. Autistic adults currently have little to no services. This is not a new scenario and it behooves this ‘consortium of activists’ to put aside their short-sighted, unscientific agenda and step up to plan for the future. A mad dash for a non-existent cure helps no one except the quacks who’s pockets are lined.

So what could help? Well, Lee Grossman’s 30 page document would’ve been a start. The other thing of course is challenging perceptions.

Many families are sustained knowing that, by raising awareness of autism, they have already given their children the gift of a meaningful identity. “If this was 10 years ago, my daughter’s classmates might say she’s the one who talks to herself all the time and flaps her hands,” says Roy Richard Grinker, an anthropologist at George Washington University and father of Isabel, 15. “But if you ask these kids in 2006 about Isabel, they say she’s the one who plays the cello and who’s smart about animals.”

The more peers of the same age group understand about autism, the more likely they are to be kind, caring and integrate them into community life.”

We need to start taking a long term view. This won’t be pleasant for some sections of the community to accept but we must stop looking at autism that something that affects children primarily. We must stop the headlong rush into dangerous, unproven ‘treatments’ that do nothing for autism and start looking at realistic ways we can move society and autistic people closer towards each other. We must start demanding more responsibility of those who elect to paint themselves as authorities on autism and then proceed to dehumanise autistic people with words like ‘poisoned’ and ‘epidemic’ and ‘train wrecks’. We must start to look skeptically at autism organisations who are actually single-issue groups promoting quackery.

We must start to listen to autistic people – adults – about service provision, about the future of autism advocacy. The one certainty in life is that children become adults. To ignore this issue is tantamount to burying one’s head in the sand.

Just Sayin’ Part IV

18 Nov

What Is Neurodiversity?

10 Nov

A new Yahoo Group called ‘What Is Neurodiversity’ is launched today. Here’s the front cover blurb:

The purpose of this group is simple – to discuss what is and what isn’t neurodiversity. There are no formal principles or rules but there is a lot of (mis)information about what neurodiversity is and what it means on a realistic basis as well as a principled basis. Hopefully this Group will serve to set the record straight.

This group will be open for anyone to read and anyone to join. Any questions can be asked and those who feel like answering, will. All we ask is that as much as possible we keep the tone polite and the discussion constructive. I know this is difficult when discussion gets heated but we must try.

Off -topic posting is actively discouraged. Trolls will be removed immediately and permanently.

If you’ve wondered what it actually _em_ , or if you already have an idea or an opinion – good or bad – then please turn up to debate. The purpose is not to set any guidelines or formal declarations but really just to debate what neurodiversity means to people and hopefully to alleviate any misconceptions.

Everyone – and I do mean everyone – is welcome. No one will be ejected for disagreement but the emphasis in terms of tone of discussion needs to be polite and constructive.

Come on over :o)

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