Cures for Autism

[miyakoume]

I pretty much agree with all of your answers.  

[ginseku]

miyakoume

What would a cure do? Do you think it would strip away what makes us us? Or should it be optional? Or maybe is it good? Or is it vile? Is it something that should be fought with every ounce of our being? I started my guild called Autism rights movement supporters based on my opinion and several other's opinions that it should be fought with every ounce of our being and strength, along with the prenatal tests, the idea that autism is a disease/disorder, and the abusive environments of hospitals, therapeutic centers, and schools.

One Professor wrote an article titled: "Autistics need acceptance, not cure!"

anyway, here is the article

Autistics Need Acceptance, Not Cure

[The following was originally published in the Wisconsin State Journal, and is reprinted here with permission from the author.]

Saturday, April 24, 2004
Morton Ann Gernsbacher

This month, which is Autism Awareness Month, I'm hiding my eyes and those of my autistic 8-year old son from the media.

National headlines that describe autism as an epidemic, or pandemic. Public service announcements liken autism to being kidnapped.

A government Web site defines autism as a "devastating scourge." An autism "expert" decrees that autism is worse "than Sept. 11 and AIDS combined." An Autism Society Canada board member proclaims that autism is worse than cancer — because people with autism have normal lifespans.

Have you — like my son and me — ever heard parents say how learning that their child was autistic was like experiencing a death in their family? Have you ever been at the playground when a mother classifies her children, standing right there beside her, as this one who is autistic but these other two who are — thank goodness — perfectly normal?

They say that autism entails difficulty taking another person's perspective, appreciating how another person might feel. But when I read or hear such hate speech I wonder: Exactly who has a problem taking another person's perspective? Who can't appreciate the feelings of others?

My son surely can. He understands quite well that there are so-called autism "advocates" who despise autism, who march thousand-fold against it with placards calling for its defeat, its demise. His demise.

Oh, you say, those people don't want to get rid of my son, they just want to get rid of that part of him that's autistic. But research demonstrates that autistic traits are distributed into the non-autistic population; some people have more of them, some have fewer. History suggests that many individuals whom we would today diagnose as autistic — some severely so — contributed profoundly to our art, our math, our science, and our literature.

Most poignantly, many autistics affirm that it would be impossible to segregate the part of them that is autistic. To take away their autism is to take away their person hood. Despite our politically correct labeling, they are autistic; they don't "have" autism any more than homosexuals have gayness or lesbianism. Like their predecessors in human rights, many autistics don't want to be cured; they want to be accepted. And like other predecessors in civil rights, many autistics don't want to be required to imitate the majority just to earn their rightful place in society.

I'm a middle-aged psychology professor who holds an endowed chair at a major research university. But my son has taught me far more than I ever learned in my lab. Every time he walks by a poster avowing that autism must be eradicated, he teaches me grace. Every time he ignores one of the countless scholarly articles that tower above my desk, asserting he is disordered, he teaches me tolerance. Every time he embraces a world that so frequently rebuffs him, he teaches me unconditional love.

What if next year we celebrate the diversity of social interaction observed within and across all cultures? What if this "awareness" month marked a time to appreciate the variation that all humans demonstrate in their style and competence in communication? What if it heralded an era during which we marveled at the determined focus that in my occupation often wins indefinite tenure but in a precocious child gets labeled as diseased?

Then, neither my son nor I would feel compelled to hide.

Gernsbacher is Vilas Research Professor and Sir Frederic Bartlett Professor of Psychology, UW-Madison.

Copyright © 2004 Morton Gernsbacher


I think it should be accepted!

My little brother is Autistic. D:
I totally back this up.  

[notmatt18]

i think it should be up to the person alone to chose wheter or not to take the cure once we have one but until then they need to be acepted ( even tho they laugh at you because your grades are worse then theres even tho you know your takeing a much harder subject then be in a privet classroom where you play tag and are graded on your behavure rather then your knowlage.  

[Verderbnis]

I have a huge repect for some of those people, since I have seen what they are able to. There are people who can hear how many cars a loaded in a train, while the train moves, there is a twelve year old boy who is not only a maths genius, but also a great jazz musician, another one has redrawn Rome in two days on a large sheet of paper, another one sees an animal on a photo and remodels it with clay and perfect properties. And another one reads foreign newspapers upside down and understands them!

That doctor who compares it with 9/11 and AIDS together would probably get fired if I was his boss, since I know there are autists with great abilities. "Healing" people would have a more crippling effect to them. A lot of them are not able to live alone or can not even speak three words forward. But they have learned to live that way with their autism. I don't think they should be "healed"...  

[Gopher dude]

What is autism?


Also on another subject if it's a disease or an illness or somthing not supposed to be there.

Stemcells. Miracle cure all. Like the blue-prints and the reconstruction box all in one.  

[unrequietedCat]

I think it depends on how sever the case is. Some Autistics have special abilities (called Savants), and this is a special sort of case I think. If you've been given a specific gift as amazing as these Savants have a cure may kill the gift. But these cases are extreamly rare, very few autistics have these abailities. My cousin is autistic, and my family is extreamly close so he may as well be my little brother. I've watched him grow up and while we all love him and accept him for who he is it is still rather heart breaking. He cannot talk, the only emotional expression open to him is noises. And while his laughter makes your heart swell, you can never expect to be told what is hurting him when he cries, or what is upsetting him when he's screaming. But the whole idea of a cure is rather far away. Doctors aren't even sure exactly what it is that causes autism, or even what exactly autism is. Before you can cure something you have to understand all aspects of it. Finding a cure for autism at this point is about as likely as being able to cure mental retardation. I think at this point in history we need to except the fact that not every baby born will be born perfectly healthy or "normal" by any standards set by society. It's the same way that no one is exactly the same, we all have quirks. Some just have quirks that are harder to deal with than others. As a whole we need to learn to accept alot of things, not just mental defects. Though, personaly, I've never been out in public with my cousin and seen anyone treat him in a way that made me think they were unaccepting. Most people understand that this is something he has no control over and treat him kindly. The only problems we've ever had was when he was very young and the other kids where so mean to him because he was different, but kids are mean it is the way of things.  

[Muckluck7]

I myself am autistic, but not severely. I actually like my autism, as it is one of the things that makes me me. I have been ridiculed for my autism, but I would not like my autism cured. There are some who probably would want to be cured, like people with terets and severe OCD.  

[Dolix Pullo]

miyakoume

mother classifies her children, standing right there beside her, as this one who is autistic but these other two who are — thank goodness — perfectly normal?

that's dispicable, that a mother would do that. it's just not right.  

[Dolix Pullo]

Muckluck7

I myself am autistic, but not severely. I actually like my autism, as it is one of the things that makes me me. I have been ridiculed for my autism, but I would not like my autism cured. There are some who probably would want to be cured, like people with terets and severe OCD.

i have tourrette's, and i feel the same, as frustrating as it can be, it's who I am, and taking away who someone is is awful. (i also might have slight OCD, or maybe i'm just particular, and "terets" isn't how you spell "tourrette's"! gonk )  

[Firlodge]

DISCLAIMER: The following post is my humble opinion ONLY, in its entirety. By highlighting and reading it, you accept that there was no intentional offensiveness on my part. The example was merely the first one that came to mind.

If a cure was developed, it would need to be optional. There's lots of variables. Acceptance, not cure. People who have been 'cured' of autism? Uhhh...no...I don't believe that for a second. Cured of the symptoms? Sure.

For those of you struggling with the difference: If someone has a broken arm, and they take painkillers, the symptom (arm hurting) may not be there/felt anymore but the cause is still there - the arm is still broken.

As it stands here and now, I don't think I trust humanity with a cure, to be honest.

I've said this before, in other places, and I'll say it again: My main concern is that as we are now, any cure we develop for autism, will slide into a bogus-cure, like the one used for Judaism in WWII.  

[BluePod]

While this is a good idea in theory the problem is that you have to change the mind set of this western society that thinks if anyone is too difrent they should be given drugs. I wish you luck but your in for a long haul. Your going to have to change the minds of all of society.  

[Arenlor]

I have already been cured, of the world. I don't give a fsck about crap that normal people do. It's the next evolution. Seriously autism is good. I have more than just it so I'm on meds that 'help' with it and all, but really if I'm upset I do what a normal human would and talk to my friends and family. There isn't anything TO cure. We ARE the cure for the world. We don't need acceptance, we need to accept them.  

[Master Strategist Kess]

Well, Arenlor, autism is being diagnosed more and more, and in a class I took we asked why this was happening. It could be that it's this idea of evolution, but we had other ideas as well. One thought was because science understood autism enough to realize they were labeling some autistic people as mentally retarded. However, there were several different catagories that were created that took away from mental retardation, and the ratio doesn't make up for why so many people are being diagnosed. So perhaps you're right.

Another theory is that we diagnose everyone and their mother with some mental issue or another. More than likely I'd be diagnosed as bi-polar, ADHD, depression, and who knows what else. Autism, in truth, is more prominent in males. Males, though they aren't all diagnosed, usually show autistic behavior. We don't show our love as affectionately as females and our social interactions are far more basic. So quite possibly it is that we just diagnose too many people with autism.

My question is I've heard all of this talk about a cure for autism, but where is the cure? It's genetic, isn't it? This would imply the cure would be gene therapy. So an autistic cure-all sounds ridiculous.

Truth be told, the best way to "cure" the issues with autism is training of the parents. Yes, the parents need to be trained to accept the child. For those of you who can post, you both seem very intelligent and capable. You may have your issues, but I'm sure you've seen the child who is put so far behind by autism that instead of teaching him the common curriculum in a school, they teach him life skills such as how to clean and cook. These parents had numerous dreams of their children, and as sad as it is to put it this way, these dreams, depending on the level of autism, are crushed.

Also, the parents must learn how to treat the children. You can't always show affection to a child with autism the same way you would a child without. Miyakoume stated it feels awkward to be in a social situation or to be hugging (I believe, I'm sorry if I got this wrong). In short: it's just incredibly important that they train the parents, and most studies in trying to get autistic children to function at acceptable levels (a lot of times above where experts said they could function) was proper training of the parents.

I read about satiation issues, as well. There is one thing, or a few things, autistics really cling to, but they can get lost in that item. I also read this skewers the ability to use the more common reward and punishment system used with other children. For most of the children, instead of paying attention when they act out and giving them what they want, the parents were taught to ignore them until they acted in a non-disruptive manner. Those of you posting here seem quite advanced compared to any of the kids I observed, as well as any of the cases I read, but do any of you know anything about the satiation in your own experience?  

[Kamira Erythren]

BluePod

While this is a good idea in theory the problem is that you have to change the mind set of this western society that thinks if anyone is too difrent they should be given drugs. I wish you luck but your in for a long haul. Your going to have to change the minds of all of society.

I must agree. The society we live in needs to take a step back and realize people exist with or without Autism. Hugs, not drugs!

Living with Autisic siblings teaches you to look at things in a different light. I think that there shouldn't be a "cure" for it, but more acceptance and perhaps to look at things from "their side of the wall." I know it sounds hard and for our society, it is hard but it is necissary.
One can learn from an Autistic. My brother has taught me how to work a few different games and computer programs that I had problems with before. No, I'm not kidding. His social, genetically-induced "weakness" in our society proves to be his strength in our homelife and our schooldays and his communication with our world (he's high-functioning but he still has problems occasionally). I also learned from Donna Williams' autobiography. I learned how they struggle with what we see as normal. You learn from them, they learn from you. It's a cycle that teaches us everything we need or want to know.
Everyone who says a child with Autism cannot function to our society's normal is wrong. My mom works at a Daycare with an Autistic 3 year old. The child's mom babied him and he thinks he can get away with a lot. My mom is able to teach him easily. I don't know if this child is high or low functioning, but either way, the child learns. He has learned how to feed himself, be potty-trained, and is learning to speak. I mean, come on! He's three but he's learning!
Autistics need the defence that they cannot provide for their barrier. They're just like us, just not exactly. They're people too!

(Geeze, that was longer than I expected.)  

[Andromeda Zreng]

It's funny. They call it a developmental disorder, but really, it's not. Autistic people are often smarter than non-autistics. They just don't learn to express it like everyone else. They're not diseased or weak or stupid, they're just different. My dad is so autism-phobic, but he doesn't understand that a majority of autistics are geniuses, if only misunderstood. Most people look at autism as a bane, but really it's just another type of personality.