In a recent speech president Barack Obama criticizes plans of certain republican legislators to reduce the federal deficit. Interestingly enough, he seems to use those of us with autism as a pawn for his own political purposes. He states:
It’s a vision that says up to 50 million Americans have to lose their health insurance in order for us to reduce the deficit. Who are these 50 million Americans? Many are somebody’s grandparents -- may be one of yours -- who wouldn’t be able to afford nursing home care without Medicaid. Many are poor children. Some are middle-class families who have children with autism or Down’s syndrome. Some of these kids with disabilities are -- the disabilities are so severe that they require 24-hour care. These are the Americans we’d be telling to fend for themselves.
This from a president whose administration continues to fund the work of neurodiversity rogue Morton Gernsbacher, who has probably funded through the NIMH and other public sector funding bodies work of people who have coauthored articles with Isabelle Souleries and Michelle Dawson, persons who have stated that autism is a harmless condition.
Worse yet, he has appointed Ari Ne'eman, a 22 year old with no experience in anything to two government bodies who make decisions for disabled persons. This person has stated that curing autism would be morally reprehensible. He has implied that parents who support charitable organizations who have stated that they want to cure autism are morally complicit with murder. He has stated that he does not believe that autism and Asperger's are disabilities and was dishonest about that, claiming he never said that autism was not a disability until autism's gadfly documented otherwise, catching Ne'eman's hand in the cookie jar.
Barack Obama, if any politician wants autistics to fend for themselves it is you, with your proneurodiversity, anti-cure, anti autism is a disability actions. For you to criticize congressman Ryan and possibly other conservative republican congresspersons and senators is ridiculous. I would say that you are the pot calling the kettle black, but a number of your supporters, particularly neurodiversity proponents who want people like me to be crippled and sick and to fend for ourselves would call me a racist. Instead I will just state that you are throwing stones from a house made of fragile glass.
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6 comments:
Appointing Ne'eman, Gernsbacher's research and other areas you disagree with Obama is like killing the baby because it has a diaper rash. It's illogical.
Ne'eman and others have no effect on autism or the wider autism community. Cutting Medicaid though does so I don't agree with your lumping them as equal evils. Its a case of seeing some dead bushes so lets burn the entire forest down.
You might want to ask those families that are on Medicaid if they would equate Ari Ne'eman's appointment is as an important issue as funding of Medicaid. Fortunately for you, you don't need Medicaid, therefore, you really have no idea its importance to millions of people. Cutting Medicaid is far more dangerous than Ari Ne'eman's appointment. You only elevate Ne'eman by equating the two and I'm sure he enjoys the elevation you gave him.
fauxtist: Medicaid and whether or not these people would cut it out as obama is claiming are not the relevant issues to this post. The relevance of this post is that Obama in his appointment of Ne'eman and funding of Gernsbacher does not give a shit about me and my disability, yet he is using me as a political pawn and that is wrong.
I could not agree with you more Rodger on the Autisms – the real diagnosis is what causes the problems the person has, not the façade, convenient and in lieu label. For this reason, I now advise parents of kids with late onset regression to object to the diagnosis; once the child has the label, he/she is placed in a little box within the education, governmental and health care systems and all issues magically become explained and normal.
As for Obama making references to autism, is that hypocrite and a pure political exercise, a genuine concern or simply an acknowledgement of today’s issues?
http://leftbrainrightbrain.co.uk/2011/06/the-white-house-blog-meeting-the-needs-of-people-with-autism/
We must stress that references to autism are made a lot more commonly now across topics. As an example, I read tonight an article, totally unrelated topic, on male/female issue and see this:
“Tom: In the course of my work with "The Good Men Project," I've spoken to thousands of men about what it means to be good--from inmates to celebrities--and one of the things I have come to is that goodness is a self-defined concept. For one man it might be taking care of his autistic child and for another it's risking his life to take pictures of the truth of the war in Iraq. How do you define "good" as it relates to manhood?”
Would you criticize this as being dishonest and manipulative?
Non-Sequitor. Have you seen this article:
Roelfsema et al. "Are Autism Spectrum Conditions More Prevalent in an Information-Technology Region? A School-Based Study of Three Regions in the Netherlands." Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, DOI 10.1007/s10803-011-1302-1, Published Online 17 June 2011, 6 pages.
I was able to download this for free. I'm curious to know your take on this paper.
Actually, red-tape, your comment is a completely nontopic nonsequiter to this post. However, I am responding to your post because I did see the news commentary about that article. I'd like to read the article. However, when I tried to download it, it was behind a paywall and I don't have or feel like spending 35 bucks on a 5 page article. I would be very curious as to how you could download it for free, as I was unable to do so. Or are you just making this up.
From what I did read about the article, I do find it hard to believe that there is in reality a 2.25% prevalence of autism anywhere. Baron-Cohen has stated that the prevelances are higher in the silicone valley in california yet givces no evidence of that, and the regional centers contradict this, showing the actual prevelance in the San Andreas Regional Centers are like 9th out of 21 and the prevalence in Los Angeles area regional centers is quite a bit higher. So, though I would not have the scientific training to interpret the data or know how they found this, I am dubious of the results.
Also, as you may know, if you are familiar with my writings, I have posted on how ignorant baron-cohen is on the rudiments of genetics and how he does not understand about spontaneous de novo mutations are in actuality responsible for autism staying in the population rather than selective mating. I don't have the URL handy for my article autism genetics is my suffering necessary for society handy, but you could probably find it. I hope this answers your questions.
Again, if you can refer me to a website where i can download that article for free, I would appreciate it.
This is my first time i visit here. I found so many entertaining stuff in your blog, especially its discussion. From the tons of comments on your articles, I guess I am not the only one having all the enjoyment here! Keep up the good work
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