Re: Autism and Hate Speech in the Toronto Star

[Guest guest]

> > Anything we say that they do not like is written off as the

> > ravings of one that is too diseased to know anything. Normality

> > is a prerequisite for having any value as a person.

> I have seen no evidence of this.

Lucky you.

> > As long as we are not normal, it is okay to abuse us... it is okay

> > to do things to us that would be illegal to do to prisoners of

> > war, or to convicted criminals. It's okay to deny us our basic

> > civil rights, because we are not seen as having any civil rights.

> > You have to be normal to be a real human, and you have to be human

> > to have civil rights.

> This is so completely untrue that it is useless to even try to

> discuss it.

Tell that to the people who have been told *directly to our faces*

that we're something " less than " a real person. Even that we're spawn

of the devil. That we're unfit for reproduction because we might make

more of us. (My great-aunt had to fight just to get *married* because

she and her husband were intellectually disabled.)

Tell that to the people who have been tied to our beds at night for no

reason other than that we didn't fall asleep on time.

Tell that to the people who have been killed in the name of " therapy " ,

and whose killers don't even get a *reprimand*, much less a sentence.

(This almost happened to me, and it would've been labeled an

" accident " if it had happened, because that's what it was generally

labeled where I was. So don't even *try* to tell me that because you

haven't seen it it's not real.)

Tell that to the people who've been involuntarily sterilized for being

who they are.

Tell that to the people who've been locked up in one form or another,

subjected to forced labor, given no choice of even *what to wear* or

*what to eat*, because " that's what you do to that kind of people. "

Tell that to the woman who couldn't talk and had to sit there

listening to someone say, about her, " If it was a dog, you'd just

crack it over the head and kill it, right? "

Tell that to people who are just seen as objects, to be kind of moved

around from place to place, with no worth to society at all.

If you haven't seen these things, you've lived an incredibly sheltered

life in at least one way no matter what else you've seen or

experienced. Don't try to tell those of us who've *seen* and

*experienced* what it means to be " subhuman " and an " it " that what

happened didn't really happen. There's enough people trying to

believe and/or pretend that these prejudices about what it means to be

a " person " don't exist and that these things aren't happening in the

name of those things. Those of us who've *WITNESSED* these prejudices

*FACE ON* and been *TOLD* we're less than a real person *EXPLICITLY*

might have a bit more clue than you do about whether or not we're

often considered somehow beneath other people. (And frankly I think

we're considered beneath a lot of animals too. I've witnessed things

done to people like me, and to me, that would be illegal if you did

them to a dog or a cat.)

> > We're not trying to wipe out NTs, but they ARE trying to wipe out

> > autistics.

> Again this is completely and totally false. First off ABA and

> similar programs are advocated only for the most severely autistic

> people not all autistics by any means. Even for those it is simply

> an attempt at assisting them in being able to better function in the

> arena where they have chosen to make an appearance.

I had a lot of programs like that. Are you going to try to tell me

you know better than I do whether they helped or hindered my

" functioning " ?

> And this certainly is not claiming that autistics are smarter and

> know better? It's a very distorted view.

We often know better about *ourselves* than outsiders do. Not always,

but often. That doesn't mean we're smarter. NTs know it hurts when

they get cut with a knife, we know other things hurt that affect us

differently than they'd affect them. (Or in other cases affect us the

same way it would affect them but they don't realize it.)

> Again this true probably for less than one percent of the parents of

> autistics. Most are loving parents who only want what is best for

> their children. After all parents do have an obligation to do what

> is best for their children and most take that very serious.

Whether they're loving or not often has little to do with whether

they're doing the right thing or not.

[Guest guest]

wow. logic. i had started to wonder if it had departed the autism

groups.

>

> > Nonsense. It is part of the evolutionary legacy of humans to

fear and

> > hate those that were not of their tribe. Autistics don't have the

> > innate group mind. They can (and often do) learn to hate people

based

> > on supposed groups, but it is not an autistic trait.

>

> It is a *learned* trait. EVEN IN NTs. Young children don't hate

people

> that are different until they are taught to (often VERY young, but

taught

> nonetheless). Children who grow up with other races, in an

environment

> where the races are treated equally, don't suddenly become

prejudiced

> because their evolution shows through. We are not fighting

evolution,

> either, we are fighting a learned behavior. How do you fight

against a

> learned behavior? You teach. How do you fight against an innate

behavior?

> You " cure " .

>

> In fact, I see autistic attitude toward NTs when stereotyping and

using

> prejudiced statements - like you are doing to an extent - as the

same

> behavior that we claim is " innate " to NTs. When I see NTs treated

with the

> respect we ask ACs to be treated with, then I'll believe ACs don't

treat

> those who are different worse then they treat those who are the

same.

>

> I do ask for your reasoning that prejudice and discrimination is

innate in

> NTs but not in ACs - and that prejudice and discrimination are

anything

> but learned behavior, learned from the society you grow up in.

>

> > > > By nature, NTs are pack animals;

> > >

> > > Again this is a broad generalization that is not true. It

simply is

> > > not possible to generalize like that.

> >

> > It is completely true. Wolves are pack animals... would that be

a broad

> > generalization that is not true? Certain animals are pack

animals, and

> > others are not. NT humans absolutely are pack animals. You

really need

> > to do some research into the way humans act. Again, this is so

obvious,

> > it's like arguing that the sky is blue.

>

> Autistics are pack animals by this same argument though. I've seen

plenty

> of " alpha males " in groups of autistics to think any differently.

>

> --

>

[Guest guest]

>

> I do agree with much of what you say, but I find some of your

> statements toward NTs to be unwarranted and prejudiced. We need to

> not use sweeping inaccurate generalizations, especially when we are

> trying to get the other side to do the same. See comments below.

(I couldn't get to this last night, but wanted to say I agree with

this assessment of things. Autistics are not magically (as a whole)

above the flaws of NTs, and " NT thinking " is not a synonym for the

widely-used term " sheeple " , nor is " AC thinking " always its opposite.)