Network Defends Dr. Savage
July 25, 2008 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
Talk Radio Network has announced that it will not be firing Michael Savage in the wake of his incendiary comments about autism. From the press release:
Dr. Savage has clarified that his July 16th statements concerning autism were not directed at those who are in fact challenged by this horrible affliction, but were instead addressing efforts to broaden the concept of autism beyond those who truly are autistic to a broader “autistic spectrum” of behavioral symptoms which are also manifested by persons who do not suffer from autism, and his concern that many children are being misdiagnosed as autistic due to the subjective nature of autism diagnosis (due to the lack of known biomedical indicators, such as blood tests, to definitively confirm or deny the actual existence of autism).
Dr. Savage has also explained his belief that there have been efforts by certain professionals and professional organizations to expand diagnoses of autism more broadly, for various reasons, and his concern that this victimizes and stigmatizes children who are misdiagnosed as autistic. On multiple other occasions Dr. Savage has expressed his concerns that other conditions, such as ADD and ADHD, are overdiagnosed and result in improper medication of young children, which Dr. Savage regards as abusive.
In the context of his broader concerns, it is clear that Dr. Savage’s comments were intended to suggest his opinion that, in the vast majority of cases, most children throwing tantrums, or refusing to communicate, are not autistic. Unfortunately, by condensing his multifaceted concerns into 84 seconds of commentary, the necessary context for his remarks was not apparent, and the few words he used to express his concerns were, in this instance, inartfully phrased.
Oh yeah, I get it. If only he could explained his views in 84 double-spaced pages in Times Roman 12 point font instead of those 84 seconds—but I somehow I the message would be the same, as I noted here.
An online petition calling for Talk Radio Network’s sponsors to “consider whether or not to associate with the
hateful and offensive comments” by Savage is here.
Then the nextwork is as irresponsible and as hateful as he evidently is.
People selling what little humanity they possess for the almighty mammon, eh?
Not much integrity in that, is there?
I contend that refusing to acknowledge a hidden disability in a child, and instead treating a child as Savage suggests is abusive. Refusing to treat a disorder because you don’t “believe in it” is abusive.
Expanding criteria because of greater understanding of the conditions under discussion is not.
He knows not of what he speaks.
Perhaps its only for my own benefit, an act of catharsis…but I started this yesterday:
http://www.new.facebook.com/group.php?gid=74079165120&ref=mf
How infuriating! They just keep him on because he now gets more listeners their way because of his crappy comments. They don’t care about the people but the ratings.
Savage’s comments are hateful, ignorant and inflammatory..free speech protected? You bet. My best hope is that more sponsor’s like AFLAC depart his show. Once Talk Radio Network and Michael Savage take the financial hits, watch how fast the attitudes change. He’s lost al ot of sponsors in the past as a result of his hate filled rants and I hope the sponsor bleeding continues. Unfortunately, there’s a huge audience out there for his shtick, which really makes one wonder.
I thought you had to be a vertebrate to run a network.
Presumably, all non-autistic children would benefit from this kind of upbringing as recommended by Mr.Savage?
That would be “Savage Child-Rearing: The Book.”
A recent study shows the extent and breadth of the problem of overdiagnosing autism.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18651205?
In this study 41% of all children possessed what were labelled ‘autistic traits’. Are we now headed to 40% prevelance rate for autism? Given the impression of a global autism pandemic the answer is probably yes.
One has to remember that Kanner’s definition was completly removed from the list of diagnostic criteria as published in DSM-IV in 1994, and was replaced by the vague, ambigous and subjective ‘Qualitative impairment in social interaction’. This new criteria would include introverted school chilren, immigrants who have problems in socialization skills due to problems communicating with native speakers, even such historical figures as Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and Adolph Hitler all of whom were retrospectively diagnosed with ‘Asperger Syndrome’.
Savage has no clue what he’s talking about, denigrates, as one media executive said, completely defenseless children, makes assertions that are insupportable, uses language that is offensive and demeaning to several groups, all children, and these media people act like everything he said was reasoned, measured discourse worthy of discussion. I like the way they call him “Dr. Savage” throughout. Well, this Dr. Willingham thinks that anyone who sponsors ads for this network–not just Savage’s show, but ANYONE–is now a boycott target, and Dr. Willingham has a really large circle of friends and acquaintances to get onto that bandwagon.
You know what? They don’t even have to fire him…but for them to defend him is in itself indefensible. Spineless. What they need are sponsors peddling backbones.
Am sure they (networks) appreciate all the attention, however harsh and critical.
It makes me so angry that he can spout ignorant hatred and be defended for it. There’s a petition to demand his termination here: http://go.care2.com/15869712
Cleveland, Ohio just cancelled him.
http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/entertainment-0/1216974668106870.xml&coll=2
horrible affliction???
Short version,
“We stand behind Dr. Savage because he makes us a big humping pile of money. When he stops doing so, we will reconsider our position on the issue”.
Or at least that’s how I see it.
Savage Child rearing *Snicker*
Sadly there’s already quite a few torment children into obedience and fear with sticks books out there.
And that seems accurate, Regan. For some reason Savage makes these folks a ton of money, but I can’t see why anyone would want to listen to him when there’s music to consider.
“his concern that this victimizes and stigmatizes children who are misdiagnosed as autistic.” I don’t buy it for a nanosecond.
And since the good ‘Dr.’ hasn’t the capacity to artfully phrase his concerns in an 84 second hate filled rant, shouldn’t they rather be concerned that he will use this talent for inartful phraseology in the future to the toon of lawsuits in some future tirade?
BS”D
Michael Savage is getting support from atleast one segment of the disability community: the psychiatric survivors movement, because he is among the few who have the courage to blaspheme psychiatric drugging and Big Pharma. As an example, listen to this recent clip of his show interviewing Dr. Peter R. Breggin, a hero to many psychiatric survivors:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eocYUcoWoxM&feature=related
Now none of this can excuse the 84 second rant calling autistic kids “brats,” but it is important we judge the whole picture here and not split the self-advocacy community into rival camps, especially when autistics are endangered by Risperdal and other toxic psychiatric drugs. (As an aside, I am a misdiagnosed Aspie, so I am able to see both sides of this.)
I don’t buy it.
This implies that in order to discuss the issue of possible overuse of medication that it is somehow necessary to have as the public avenue for such discussion be that of a homophobic, xenophobic shock jock stating statistics plucked from the air to call fraud and advocating that the way to shape children up is to call them names. I believe it is disingenuous and probably inaccuate to say justifiable anger at this media personality for that broadcast is somehow necessarily divisive to the autistic community.
Certainly the issue of possible overreliance and longterm safety is important, but I don’t feel that I have to excuse or embrace Dr. Savage to give it public attention, because there are those who do so without asking us to ally ourself to the rest of the rant or the man involved.
The Medicated Child
Frontline/PBS
The above does not exhaust the books and persons who have also brought up the matter in media and academic work.
Indeed–judge the whole picture, and in that case, judge the whole picture.
BS”D
Regan,
Please don’t get me wrong. What Savage said about autistics is inexcusable, and he has certainly offended many other minorities in ways that are equally inexcusable. My concern is that in the rush to condemn Savage based on one clip released by a leftist interest group without digging deeper into the matter, and understanding why Savage may have his defenders among advocates, we are causing unnecessary antagonism between the autistic self-advocacy community (or for that matter, the wider disability community) and the psychiatric survivors movement and its allies, when these two communities can and should be together on so many issues, especially against medical/psychiatric paternalism, forced drugging, and the need to be listened to as self-advocates. That is the tragedy here, and that is where I am aiming my remarks.
The only way to shut up Mr Wiener is to:
1) Hurt his pocketbook in the form of lost advertisers.
2) Litigate against Mr. Wiener (class action) for causing parents of autistic children stress which makes them miss work and or causes them to question whether or not they are simply bad parents of brat children which leads them to physically or verbally abuse their children and cause them harm due to the suggestions of the nefarious Mr. Wiener.
Nuff said.
Stephen Mendelsohn,
Discuss the issue by all means on objective merits and substantive points, but my experience is that it’s a bad idea to get in bed with the Devil in order to do so merely because he agrees with you–my suggestion is to find or create a better venue.
It’s nice that he’s branched out from ethnobotany and wingnuttery into updating the DSM-IV.
I got a kick out of TRN referring to him as “Dr. Savage” throughout the response: gives his position that much more credibility.
Here’s a friend of mine and her husband interviewed on the Richard French show for RNN TV (Hudson Valley) about Savage.
I think it’s not only the clip, but everything Savage has said in its wake that have been cause for so much concern. He has not indicated an interest in listening and acknowledging what is problematic in his views.
“Wingnuttery”—-a new academic discipline, perhaps!
I’m with Regan on this, completely agree.
“On multiple other occasions Dr. Savage has expressed his concerns that other conditions, such as ADD and ADHD, are overdiagnosed and result in improper medication of young children, which Dr. Savage regards as abusive.”
Well, I consider what Dr. Savage said to be abusive.
BS”D
Storkdok (and Regan),
Have you ever experienced coerced psychiatric drugging yourselves? If not, perhaps you should listen to the experiences of psychiatric survivors who have; check out http://www.mindfreedom.org for the psychiatric survivor perspective.
As abusive as you find Savage’s remarks on autism to be — and I am not at all condoning them — as an autistic self-advocate, I find the militant pro-cure agenda of Autism Speaks et. al to be far more dangerous to autisics. The fact that Autism Speaks has ties to the company that manufactures Risperdal is revealing. I can easly refute anyone who calls me a “brat” or a “moron,” but it is much harder to fight back against do-gooder psychiatrists armed with a couple of hypodermics full of brain-disabling, diabetes-promoting neuroleptic drugs, who assault us in the name of cure with a perfectly clear conscience, and with state power to force them on millions of unwilling victims.
When you and others are willing to defend my right and that of millions of other politically powerless people, particularly autistics, to be free of the brutality of forced drugging (please stop euphemizing as “medication”), then I would be more willing to join you in criticizing Michael Savage for his hurtful ignorant rant. But not until.
No, I have not, but a relative has, and has tardive dyskinesia. I also have strong concerns about the use of overmedication as chemical restraint for those in hospital, institutional or school-based care, or substitute for more parsimonious methods based on functional assessment and such as positive behavioral support or CBT.
Example:
Antipsychotics No Better than Placebo for Aggression in the Intellectually Disabled
Medical News: General Psychiatry
referencing
Primary source: The Lancet
Source reference:
Tyrer P, et al “Risperidone, haloperidol, and placebo in the treatment of aggressive challenging behavior in patients with intellectual disability: a randomized controlled trial” Lancet 2008; 371: 57-63.
Additional source: The Lancet
Source reference:
Matson JL, Wilkins J “Antipsychotic drugs for aggression in intellectual disability” Lancet 2008; 371: 9-10.
Do not confuse the man with the message. If me supporting him is the ticket to admission for your agreement–then we will have to agree to disagree.
If there are any lawyers out there that are starting a class action on this let me know I would be happy with a check for 1 penny. If we as parents and grandparents allow members of the media to use propaganda to down play one of the largest disabilities on the planet because the services will cost too much, we will be right back to locking them away in institutions and jails.
“When you and others are willing to defend my right and that of millions of other politically powerless people, particularly autistics, to be free of the brutality of forced drugging (please stop euphemizing as “medication”), then I would be more willing to join you in criticizing Michael Savage for his hurtful ignorant rant. But not until.”
OK. Done. Consider yourself defended. Now…join.
This will open a can of worms, but some thoughts on Risperdal and autism education.
“When you and others are willing to defend my right and that of millions of other politically powerless people, particularly autistics, to be free of the brutality of forced drugging (please stop euphemizing as ‘medication’), then I would be more willing to join you in criticizing Michael Savage for his hurtful ignorant rant. But not until.”
Umm…
It’s not about the “drugging”, if you will, as much as the fact that Savage isn’t even really taking up that viewpoint as a main point of his argument. His was, really, an attack on the usage of autism as a general label, as generally being a way to get finances.
Now, I can’t personally say I am against all medication. I don’t agree with forced medication, and I further don’t agree with attempting to medicate away autistic symptoms at all. Do I see that it might be used to the same effect on autistic people as others, like with anti-anxiety? Yes, and I think it can be used as such.
But you’re picking a very, very wrong crowd to fight with over this issue. We don’t even disagree with you! We’re talking about Savage’s rants about autism “being a fraud”, and how regressive in understanding neurological conditions such statements are.
Cliff
This kind of radio is the reason I have Sirius. They have a Left channel.
I agree with Mr Savage, tell it like it is,in his view of things no matter what its about today most people worrie about what others will think about what they say he is sure of himself and says what he thinks.
“he is sure of himself and says what he thinks.”
Having a right is not always the same thing as being right or having no responsibility for your words. How and when you exercise it, matters.
Michael Savage, at least in my opinon, practices a calculated version of what we used to refer to in the Bay Area as “street theater”–the real purpose to incite public catharsis through outrage, and in his case, to also bring in money for his sponsors and himself; if the thought is that it’s always sincere, I think that might be a naive point of view–uh, because, talk radio is “entertainment” as much as anything.
What I am more concerned with is the promulgation of misinformation through the public airways, and influencing the public psyche without necessarily taking personal or corporate responsibility for the consequences.
“Better to keep your mouth closed and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.”
Mr. Savage hasn’t learned this sage advice.
I’m quite surprised just how much influence one has allowed the pharmaceutical industry to have in psychiatry in general, in the USA in particular. Also, the absolute naivity that seem to prevail among americans regarding how to assess guidelines, research and websites heavily funded, or represented by, the industry – blows my mind. You have developed a strong paranoia for government (elected by democracy), and an acceptance for industrial influence which is again – hard to believe.
All evidence suggest, in these days when we all must base our practice on evidence, that research, guidelines and websites funded by the industry is not accurate. That’s where the evidence points. There is no such thing as a free lunch.