![]() “Great strides have been made and the current state of progress is a far cry from the time when parents were given no hope for their children.” It’s not hard to see why the Autistic Self Advocacy Network, an organization dedicated to acceptance and inclusion, was forced to cut ties with Sesame Street. “Autism Speaks is dedicated to funding global biomedical research into the causes, prevention, treatments and a possible cure for autism,” the guide announces on its first page. The 100 Days Guide for Young Children, on the other hand, says the exact opposite more than a dozen times. Cure research has become increasingly unpopular as neurodiversity, the branch of the disability rights movement pioneered by autistic self-advocates, has become mainstream. Much fanfare was made last year when the word cure was removed from its mission statement. (In an email, Autism Speaks said, “The 100 Day Kit is not intended to provide medical advice, but rather to provide general information about autism services to the community to help them make informed personal decisions.”)Īutism Speaks, a longtime hotbed of controversy, currently asserts that it is not, in fact, searching for a cure for autism. This is listed alongside medically validated autism interventions like occupational therapy. For the record: Nobody has ever died of autism.Įlsewhere, the guide suggests a restrictive gluten-free, dairy-free diet for autistic children, which has no scientific support. Then there are smaller suggestions that children like me are a tragedy: In one parental anecdote, a mother complains about how a kid at her child’s preschool who was diagnosed with leukemia is getting all the attention she deserves, as if having a child with cancer and a child with a developmental disability are at all comparable. The kit even has an entire section outlining how parents may go through the Kübler-Ross stages of grief. The 100 Day Kit features a persistent narrative that having a child like me or Sesame Street’s Julia is like having a child who has died. Send me updates about Slate special offers. What happens if the test comes up positive, though? Then you get a link recommending the Autism Speaks 100 Day Kit for Young Children. This is relatively harmless-I and many other autistic adults feel that funding, and focus, on early diagnosis is disproportionate to the benefits and excessive, but it’s hardly offensive. It takes about two minutes and can be used to evaluate whether your child is keeping up with developmental milestones. The ads encourage viewers to have their children screened for autism and points to a resource on the Autism Speaks website that declares, “For Julia’s family, early screening made a lifetime of difference.” The first and biggest link on the page is a test called the M-CHAT-R (Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers, Revised). ![]() What could possibly be wrong? It’s only when you click through to the resource itself that things begin to get murky. What’s not to love about playing music with friends or promoting diversity in communication? Autism Speaks is one of the largest, most visible autism charities. When you watch the Autism Speaks ad spots in question, everything seems to be about acceptance. ![]() At first, it might not be so obvious what’s wrong with the partnership. ![]()
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