Mitsubishi corporation funds neurodiversity activism

I just read an interesting post on the left brain/right brain blog about the Mitsubishi corporation funding an ASAN program for autistic college students.  The sole purpose of this program appears to be training people to engage in neurodiversity activism.

Now a large corporation is also advocating the idea that I (and others) should live our lives as cripples under the guise of the strawman that these people are promoting some sort of human or civil rights for autistic people.

It's distressing to me that Mitsubishi could have such a cavalier attitude toward autistic persons.  They are not funding a program for medical research to live better lives, to be better educated, to help lift those on SSI or without it out of poverty.  They are not funding group homes for autistics or any constructive program.  Only the hate mongering of ASAN aficionados who want to claim all research into autism is for the purpose of prenatal abortions, who want to insult parents who want to help their kids and those of us with autism who wish a cure could be found.

The canary party, a group promoting the idea that vaccines cause autism,has written some talking points protesting this.They allege that self-diagnosis is okay for eligibility in this program.  I must admit, I don't have any documentation for this, nor does the canary party memorandum provide any links documenting this  However, if true, I don't see how this is helping autistic people if someone not diagnosed by a medical professional or psychologist can take place in this program, which apparently has only the goal of promoting a political agenda and not really giving help to anyone.

Mitsubishi is claiming the program will help with employment activities among autistic college students, but as the canary party correctly points out, no mention of employment is spoken about in the guidelines, only training people in neurodiversity activism.

Mitsubishi also, according to the canary party, mentions helping people with disabilities.  After Ari Ne'eman claimed that he never said that autism was not a disability, Autism's gadfly broke the story about Ari's Ne'eman's essay, Difference Is Not Disease, where he put the words "disabled" in quotes and stated that difference is not disability.  After this essay was linked to on autism's gadfly, ASAN engaged in a watergate type coverup, first editing their essay to state difference is only disability when not accommodated for and then deleting the essay from the site altogether.  Also, Gadfly has provided documentation of Ari Ne'eman stating that Asperger's syndrome (which he has) is hardly something anyone would call a disability.

The Canary party does make one statement in their post that is not 100% accurate:


“While the Canary Party fully supports the acceptance of all people with diverse neurological conditions….it cautions that neurodiversity as promoted by ASAN is an ideology that runs counter to the primary goals of every major autism organization in the country.”

They either don't know or are forgetting that autism speaks has funded the research of neurodiversity rogue Laurent Mottron.  The federal government has funded Morton Gernsbacher's research.  The autism society of america endorsed Ari Ne'eman's nomination for the NCD.  Alex Plank, who has stated that autism equals good, was a keynote speaker at last year's autism society of america conference.  Autism speaks has also funded Alex Plank's Autism Talk TV.   

I have to wonder why the canary party has contacted Mitsubishi concerning their funding of an ASAN project, but has not protested projects that autism speaks and the autism society of america has either funded or endorsed that run counter to the philosophy that autism is a horrible disability and health problem that needs a cure.

If anyone who happens to read this who has not already read Matt Carey's endorsement of this program or the canary party's post about this, the addresses of the people you can contact to protest these activities are mentioned in the above-linked sites.  I doubt I'll bother writing to them as this is already a done deal and it would not accomplish anything.

I just wish I knew why all these people are opposed to me and others being able to live a decent life free of disability, including autism speaks and ASA who gives money to people who are at the opposite end of their stated beliefs.

Freezer Failure: Could foul play be involved?

A few days ago, a rather distressing news story, at least to me, came out stating that a freezer containing about 50 postmortem autistic brains had malfunctioned, rendering them useless  for most research studies.  One scientist stated that this could set research back ten years.  However, one-half of 34 of the 50 brains had been preserved in formalin, so they could still be viable to use in some studies.  I'm not sure, but I remember hearing there are various advantages to freezing brains to preserve them rather than preserving them in formalin, such as certain enzymes and cell parts being intact.  Any neuroscientist who may happen to read this can correct me or shed further light on the subject.

As regular readers of the gadfly blog know, I long for a cure for autism and the end of the suffering it causes so many.  I feel that post-mortem autopsies may be our "ace in the hole" as there are probably no good animal models for autism and fMRI scanners probably can only yield limited information in living brains.  Because autistic people, often live out their lives and most persons are diagnosed young, there are only limited amounts of brain tissue available and the recent events may make this problem worse.  

One line of the article quoting lab director Francine Benes was particularly compelling:

Benes said the situation is so unusual - the perfect storm of alarm and thermostat failure and the concentration of samples - that she cannot rule out foul play. She said she has not spoken to law enforcement officials, pending the completion of the internal investigation. 

One wonders who would have motive for tampering with autistic postmortem brains.  Though, I'm not accusing anyone without proof or stating there are any certainties, I can't help thinking of that deranged cult of hatemongers, the neurodiversity movement.  These people are opposed to finding a cure for autism and are opposed to science funding this endeavor.

Normally these brains are distributed between twenty-four freezers.  A month before the malfunction, the brains were all moved into one freezer to make distribution easier.  There is an alarm system that is supposed to go off if the temperature falls below around minus 81 degrees Celsius.  The alarm system failed to go off.  Also, there's an external thermostat that gives the temperature and it read minus 79 degrees Celsius.  The freezers cannot be opened regularly as that might tamper with the expensive equipment used to house the brains.  One day a technician opened the freezer to obtain a sample and the normally cold air didn't whoosh out.  They found that in spite of the external thermometer reading, the temperature was actually about 7 degrees Celsius or about the same as a refrigerator.

I wonder what the probability is that right at the time the brains were moved, the alarm system would not happen to work and the thermometer would malfunction.  There was  a security camera and checkpoints to protect the brain samples.  However, this does not rule out an inside job.

Interestingly enough, this collection of brain tissue was owned by Autism Speaks, the organization that is consistently reviled and scorned by angry members of the ND movement.  Some years ago, I donated my brain to the autism speaks tissue program.  I've written about this elsewhere. This was before AS engaged in a variety of activities that I don't approve of, but more about that below.

Though, as mentioned above, in spite of the fact the neurodiversity movement has expressed contempt for autism speaks, they seem to be odd bedfellows.  At times, their executive staff has attended meetings of GRASP, the organization founded by Michael John Carley.  Without consulting me, Carley stated in his book that no autistics want to be cured of their autism.  They have funded Alex Plank's Autism Talk TV endeavor, though Plank stated that autism speaks' endgame was to develop a plan to find a way to abort autistic fetuses and engage in eugenics.  They also awarded a half million dollar grant to neurodiversity rogue scientist, Laurent Mottron.

Benes has stated that the lab is conducting an internal investigation before going to law enforcement authorities.  I look forward to reading any new developments if any.  

an article those who scorn pro-cure autistics should read

Neurodiversity activisit Alex Plank has stated that most autistics don't want to be cured.  This is in spite of the fact he's not above accepting charity from Autism Speaks, the organization who has stated that their ultimate goal is a cure for autism.

There are apparently at least some other members of the neurodiversity movement who feel this way also.
One immature teenage girl said that I'm like who Jew who helped the nazis during the holocaust.  Two of the most hard core hatemongers in the ND movement, whom I'll decline to name in this post, have stated that my desire for a cure for autism and even my disability comes from a domineering mother who was a witch and a shrew who taught me to hate myself.  These individuals have effectively tried to bring back the Bettelheim era which I lived through as a small child.  Retired neurodiversity blogger, the autistic bitch from hell has stated that all of the multiple persons with autism who receive disability benefits or applied for disability benefits are uncle toms who do so because we don't want to take responsibility for our lives and want to grovel before the feet of bureaucrats who'll pat us on our little incompetent heads.  She states we ought to be lined up against the wall and shot and/or strangled to death and turned into cat food.  ABFH is rumored to be Meg Evans, one of the executives in the autistic self-advocacy network who now have a seat on the IACC and the National Council on Disabilities, even though in the past they've stated they don't believe autism and Asperger's are disabilities.

Here's an article I believe the above-named individuals and others who feel as they do should read.

Aiden Bower drowns: ND movement proven wrong again

Here is yet another story of a defenseless autistic child drowning.  Although this appears to be commonplace, the neurodiversity movement insists that no one is ever killed from autism so there is no comparison to cancer and similar diseases.  They consistently play the murder card, claiming that those of us who don't like autism and wish a cure were available are responsible for the murder of autistic children whenever a deranged parent kills their autistic offspring.  However, it's only the rarest of occasions they mourn for the numerous autistic children who have died in accidental drownings or been run over by cars or trains.  Ari Ne'eman and ASAN have lobbied against restraints or wandering codes because it's a violation of autistic persons' human rights and civil rights.  Those of us who want a cure, and are fed up with the hatemongering and bullying of the NDs, according to them, are against human rights for autistics.  What about Aiden Bower's right to have been alive and grown up into adulthood?

Is neurodiversity's 92% figure accurate?

One of the main tenets of the neurodiversity movement is that the desire to cure autism and research in that direction will result in prenatal testing and wide scale abortion of autistic fetuses.  They allege the goal of Autism Speaks, The Simon's Foundation and others is to use this to deliberately eliminate autistic people from the human race.  Amanda Baggs and her friends on autistics.org have a tasteless cartoon showing an aborted fetus in a trashcan with the initials CAN embolded on it, indicating that Cure Autism Now, Autism's Speaks predecessor, had this goal in mind.  For this reason, ASAN's leader and Obama appointee Ari Ne'eman has called for a moratorium on all genetic research in autism. 

They cite a figure claiming that 92% of all fetuses with Down's syndrome are subsequently aborted.  Where does this figure come from and how truly accurate is it?  The main source for this statistic seems to be a study  from King's college in London done by Mansfield et. al using figures from the 1980s.  A few other studies have shown similar conclusions with percentages ranging from 80-92%.


According to one source I found,  there have been regional variations in some of the other studies done trying to answer this question.  The various studies have limitations in that they are done in just small areas in various parts of the world and may not be generalizable to all woman pregnant with Down's fetuses in the U.S.A. 

However, the 80-92% rate was not all Down's fetuses but just those who actually underwent prenatal screening.  The 80-92% rate is clearly a selective sample of woman who underwent testing because they would contemplated aborting the trisomy 21 child in the first place.

Bristol Palin, whose youngest brother has Down's, at one time also cited the same figure that activists in the neurodiversity movement use.  She recently corrected the record thanks to Amy Julia Becker, the mother of a Down's daughter who states:


I  just read Bristol’s post about babies who are born with DS being one of the 8%. I love the poem she includes, and I think her point is an important one. Still, I’ve learned recently that it’s an inaccurate number. It’s widely cited by many people, but it’s based on a single study from a single hospital in the 1980′s. Overall, it seems that about 70% of babies prenatally diagnosed with DS are aborted, and that the abortion rates vary greatly from region to region across the US. Moreover, lots of women don’t seek prenatal diagnosis, whether out of ignorance or because they don’t want to risk an amnio or because they don’t think the information is necessary. So out of all babies conceived with DS, 50% are actually born.

So, this figure that ND activists routinely trot out to bolster their crusade against a cure for autism is questionable.  I don't know the exact rate of all Down's syndromes babies that are actually aborted.  However, it's clear that it's not the 90 percent or more who just get the prenatal testing.  This is clearly a misrepresentation on Ne'eman's part and those who think as he does.

This is aside from the fact that autism is not Down's syndrome and they are two different conditions that prospective parents would likely take different attitudes toward.  I doubt there is any way that the ND movement can extrapolate  the true rate of abortion of autistics would be from whatever the number is for Down's is given the hypothetical that such a prenatal test for autism existed.

I realize that neurodiversity proponents will state that even a 50% abortion rate is high.  This is not to say that I believe that even coin-flip rate of abortion for Down's syndrome is acceptable, only that ND's should use accurate information if they want to engage in propaganda and fear mongering tactics.  

Bristol Palin corrected the record.  Perhaps it's time that Ari Ne'eman, ASAN and other ND proponents do so also.

New study shows high unemployment among young autists

According to a recent study by Paul Shattuck, one out of every three young adults with autism has no paid employment or college or technical education seven years after high school.  This contradicts what Joseph and"The autistic bitch from hell" have stated in the past where they claimed the Brugha study done in England showed there was no unemployment problem among autistics and they were employed in the same manner as non-handicapped people.  As well as Joseph's projected rate of 70% employment among autistics.  As well as other members of the neurodiversity movement who purport that autistics aren't a burden on the economy because autists Bill Gates and Stephen Spielberg are billionaires who contribute far more in taxes and revenue than most neurotypicals.   

The study used data from the 2007-2008 period, before the financial crisis hit.  Therefore, this study is likely a gross understatement of what the problem is today if current figures had been used.   

Autism speaks apparently helped partially fund this study.  Autism speaks executive Peter Bell weighed in as well.  This person, if I am not mistaken has a 19-year-old son on the moderate and severe end of the spectrum and the family is spending money and time preparing him to face the cruel world.  Peter Bell maintains a friendship with John and Jack Robison and Alex Plank and helped fund Autism talk TV.  Plank has stated that it's a good thing Mr. Bell's son is crippled and sick, so I wonder why Bell would maintain a friendship with these people and help fund this endeavor that does nothing to help persons with autism. 

Ari Ne'eman, an individual in his early 20's who has never had paid employment has stated the solution is to eliminate social pleasantry as a criteria for hiring people and evaluating their job performance.

This is a problem that unfortunately leads to no quick and easy fix.  I wish I had a solution myself, but unfortunately I don't.  I had to struggle in the workplace myself and after nearly twenty-eight years of hell I had to retire at a young age.

How the ND movement can say autistic people are fine the way they are and how this is not a problem I don't have an inkling of a clue.  I know.  My authorship of this post proves that I am against human and civil rights for persons with autism, as are all other persons who oppose the neurodiversity movement and long for a cure.  I realize I'm violating the civil and human rights of autistics by even writing this post.  So it goes.

Do I have too many Von Economo neurons

Today, I read an interesting post in the neurocritic's blog about a type of brain cell called a spindle cell or Von Economo cell. The blog entry stated that one of the areas these cells are located in is in the frontal area of the brain.  Recent research has indicated an excessive number of neurons in the dorsofrontal cortex of some postmortem autistic brains.  Also, apparently, there is destruction of these cells in frontotemporal dementia.  In a recent post, I wrote about parallels between FTD and autism.  

Naturally these made me wonder if these cells might somehow be involved in autism.  I asked the neurocritic and he replied:  jonathan - There have been speculations that VENs might be involved in autism, but conflicting studies have found greater, fewer, or the same number of VENs. Kind of hard to interpret that. Allman et al. said:

"There are many features of autism that suggest that the VENs may be involved in this disorder. An initial stereological study of the number of VENs in area FI in four autistic subjects plus controls did not confirm this conjecture. However, a second stereological study of VENs in dorsal ACC in nine autistic subjects plus controls found that the autistic subjects fell into two groups, one with significantly higher numbers of VENs than controls, and the other with significantly fewer VENs than controls. Thus the controls occupied a middle zone with little overlap with the high or low VEN autism groups."

When in doubt, postulate distinct subgroups.

Until recently, it was believed that these cells only existed only in humans along with a few other highly evolved primates.  Neurocritic's post dealt with a recent finding of these cells in a lower primate, macaque monkeys.  It has been subsequently discovered that these cells are also found in elephants and some whales, apparently only in larger mammals including at least some primates.  These neurons develop late.  They are small in number at the 35th week of gestation.  At birth, a person only has 15% of their final total number of VENs.  They continue to grow in the brain up until about age four, coincidentally during the time of the first onset of autism or the time during which at least a partial recovery from autism can be made (as was the case of myself around the age of four, when I regained my speech).

The fact that various findings from studies of these cells in autism is mixed, does not preclude the possibility that a problem with these cells, e.g. too few, too many or problems with formation and migration could be involved in at least some cases though not necessarily all.  in an article by the courchesne group , mention is made of two different studies in which 53% and 58% more voneconomo neurons were found in autistic brains versus controls respectively.

John Allman of Cal Tech speculated that VEN's found in the frontoinsular cortex and the anterior cingulate relayed outputs to portions of the frontal and temporal cortex where theory of mind and other social decisions are made and propose the possibility that impairments in this area may be responsible for social deficits found in autism.

He reports an MRI study in which the area containing VENs in the anterior cingulate gyrus is reduced in volume compared to matched controls.  tensor diffusion studies also showed white matter abnormalities in some autistic subjects.  This also might be consistent with recent work of Courchesne showing excessive growth in the dorsofrontal cortex as well as the recent genetic study using this data.  However, Courchesne stated in the above-linked paper that VEN's accounted for too low a percentage of all neurons in the frontal lobe to be totally responsible for all of the brain growth.

So, in my desire to finally uncover the etiology of my problems and the reason for my immense suffering, Von Economo neurons may be yet another leaf to be unturned.