without his “shock talk,” would anyone listen to Leary; I suspect not, or not so much.

I apologize if my replies are a little scatterbrained and unclear. I’m sure this must seem as though I’m jumping from one thought to another. As for my argument changing, I apologize again. I usually try to change my tactics if I’m not getting my point across the way I’m going.

I do want to address the last thing you said.

I do not think that autistic children have crappy parents. I do, however, know that crappy parents exist, and that they are not exclusively parents of non-autistic kids. And when someone has crappy parents AND autism, it makes the people you’re talking about think that they are right about autism just being bad parenting. Sure, there are crappy parents everywhere, but they aren’t going to see it that way, and it’s damaging. A single bad parent of a child with autism is like Miss South Carolina. Everyone assumes that blondes and beauty queens are dumb. They’re not all stupid, of course, but when someone like that comes along, it makes all of the intelligent blonde beauty queens look bad. And all it takes is one idiotic pageant winner and everyone will completely ignore the dozens, hundreds even, of intelligent ones. The same way that it hurts all of the dedicated and devoted parents whenever one crappy parent uses autism as an excuse to be an even crappier parent. They are the ones that CAUSE those sweeping generalized attacks.

I would never ever suggest that autism would be fixed by better discipline or beating. When I was little, my grandmother told my mother that she needed to spank me and it’d fix my behavior. My mom always tells me this story. She said, and I quote, “Mom, I could beat her until she was black and blue, and it wouldn’t do a thing.” For the longest time, my grandma didn’t understand that I wasn’t just a bad kid. I’m not angry at all parents of autistic kids. I’m just angry at the ones who perpetuate the mistaken belief that the parents are to blame.

Again, sorry if this is all over the place.

Whether someone is “faking” diagnosis is a matter for professionals and the people immediately involved, not idle speculation by the public and fodder for comedians, and even if this did carry a kernel of truth, it is a solution that would have its own baggage. To date I have not met anyone shopping for the diagnosis, but have no statement as to the generality of that experience.

Anecdotal and undoubtedly biased: Because my older daughter was a smart cookie when she was little no one could believe that her academic problems in school were due to anything but her laziness and distractibility or our laziness as parents After years of real agony for her and fruitless attempts at different organizational strategies and reward systems, and even medication, a full diagnostic panel determined that she had a specific but significant writing fluency and language processing problem that can be remediated but will always be handicapping compared to someone who does not have this specific problem. This eluded the district and us, frankly, for years because we were blinded by her abilities in other areas and which she used to try and self-remedy some of her difficulties. The positive piece is that we were finally able to address the problem specifically and apply correct instruction and supports which finally improved things. It is also helpful to her in making career choices.

Would we have chosen to seek this out–no, it was a convoluted process. Were we looking for a sticker to put on her to make it all easy–no. Real work still lay ahead.
But an external observer with nothing at stake might have very well interpreted it that way.

The point of the story–appearances can be deceptive and interpretations often tell more about our own biases than events.

Off to sweep my porch.

You ask how I’m to “know” anything about Leary’s experiences. I don’t. And guess what? Neither do you nor Leary nor I truly know what someone else’s experiences are, either. You find me some documentation, some evidence, some data, and then I’ll listen. But what you’re giving right now is sweeping damnation based on anecdote from your mother and your babysitting experiences. You’ve actually managed to find something that I get fairly incensed about. Congratulations.

You’re incensed, enraged. Your mother’s in a “fury.” I’ll leave people to draw their own conclusions about the information you offer.

You also seem to have changed your argument here, which is a bewildering turnaround that has somewhat muddied your initial observations. I don’t mean to make this seem personal, but what you say is very personal to people who struggle with their children’s issues, yet read comments like Leary’s and those of a legion of other know-it-alls on autism news stories about what crappy parents autistic children have, how they should just beat their children or discipline them better or stop making excuses for them. When you describe Leary as being “spot on,” you join him morally and ethically in these sweeping, generalized attacks.

I have had to listen to my mother relate this story in a fury. She has been a kindergarten teacher for thirty years. It’s not the kid that she’s angry with. It’s the parents who are giving their kids a terrible childhood, one where they will never be prepared for what lies ahead of them, all because they feel that after reading an article for five minutes, they are more experienced than doctors who have devoted years to the subject.

I’ve seen these first-hand, and it incenses me that people can just give up on raising their children correctly as though autistic kids aren’t worth the effort to raise, so stamping that label on their kid will give them a ‘get out of parenting free’ card.

I have, however, met plenty of people whose child or children obviously are “from France,” as our dear Susan at The Family Room might say, but the parents don’t realize it. I don’t get enraged about that either, nor do I say anything to them. They’re grown. They can look around them and figure it out. Or not.

Unless you’re living these people’s lives, as you so admirably point out, how is it that you’re suddenly able to determine what’s “genuine” and what is not, that they just ” read about it on Wikipedia” and then decided it fit who they are? How are you the person to determine if they’re right or wrong or justified? How would any of us have the right to become “enraged” over what another adult decides about themselves? You’re not that person, you don’t have that right, no more so than Leary does. Neither do I, neither does anyone else not walking in that person’s shoes. It’s just shooting off at the mouth with unsupported generalizations about things that people who aren’t wearing the other fellow’s shoes ought to just shut up about. Goethe said it best: “Let everyone sweep in front of his own door, and the whole world will be clean.”

Jesus…we are such a society, thinking that with the most limited information possible, information that’s not even confirmed, we can become enraged or furious or righteously indignant and try to tell other people how to live their lives, even as we know less than 0.01% about their lives.

Man, talk about mixed feelings. I still think his unpleasant book stinks and am peeved about the continuing justifications about being taken out of context–but Mrs. Leary was genuinely funny in the way keen observers can be, and so is her book. Of course she also seems to be sticking to that which she actually knows about.

I know that I don’t ‘get’ what it’s like to be autistic.

Aspies may not have the same problems as those with autism, but they still have problems, and those problems are nothing to sniff at. No, I don’t have any idea what autistic kids my age have to live like every day. And you know something? I’m proud to be an Aspie. I’m proud to have a family history of schizophrenia, too. It gives me an understanding of life that many people don’t have.

The point I”m trying to make here is this: don’t play the game of whose life is worse. Let’s not sit around arguing whether I am less miserable than you. Not only is it pathetic and pointless, but it’s just plain wrong. Imagine that, due to financial problems, a family in a fairly nice suburban home cannot afford to feed their children this week. This may seem insignificant to a child in a third-world country who’s starving and ill. But that won’t lessen the middle-class family’s hunger pangs.

Just because they are not your problems don’t mean that they aren’t problems.