Autism Spectrum Disorders And Religious Belief

I've been wondering about the religious demographics of people on the autism spectrum. I would expect that there are a far higher number of Atheists, Deists, Pantheists, Wiccans, Neo-Pagans, and Buddhists, basically belief systems that either reject the notion of a higher power, are apathetic about it, or convince of it in an impersonal force.

I've never been able to believe in a personal god. Even before I became an Atheist I thought of God in essentially Deist terms. I am baffled by the notion of a personal god for the same reason I am baffled by people, say, getting mad and yelling at a device that has quit working, as if it had ill-will towards the angry person, it's as if people are projecting our human folk psychology (something us autistics are notoriously bad at) on the physical world.

Asperger's/Autism Types

Wonderful AutTV video I found:



I fit Einstein, (Gary) Numan, and (Lewis) Caroll.

Positively Autistic

Wonderful series of videos I found at the Autism Acceptance Project website.

http://www.esteeklar.com/media/video-vault/positively-autistic-clip-1

The blogger who posted insulting things in a comment I deleted about "low-functioning" autistics and saying they will never be able to "go to college" or whatnot sort of disgusting nonsense should watch this.

The Autism Acceptance Project

Wonderful Website I ran into.

The Autism Acceptance Project is dedicated to promoting acceptance of and accommodations for autistic people in society.

The Autism Acceptance Project (TAAProject) will bring forth a different and positive view about autism to the public in order to foster understanding and acceptance, and to empower parents and autistic people.

We, as autistic people and friends and family of autistic individuals, do not see autism as a “tragic epidemic.” We view autism as a part of life – with both challenges and abilities that deserve to be accommodated. We believe that autistic individuals have the right to participate in all levels of autism advocacy, at all levels of government, and at all agencies and committees making policies about autism, alongside families and supporters.

TAAProject has presented critical lectures and exhibitions. We named our organization a “project” in order to address the salient issues in the best format possible each year. This will entail future exhibitions, online communities, and other creative endeavours. In so doing, TAAProject seeks to debate science, autism “belief” and public representations. We will also investigate and support educational needs backed by accurate science. TAAProject is interested in scientific, sociological, philosophical, creative and ethical answers to the question, “what kinds of help do autistics need in order to succeed and contribute to society as autistic people?”

In seeking to accomplish the above, TAAProject supports:

1. Continued forums for exhibitions, lectures and other creative endeavours by autistic people and their supporters;
2. Advocacy for understanding and acceptance of autistic individuals by society;
3. The greater understanding of autistic ability and challenges, and inclusive as well as special education that understands and educates autistic intelligence, and accomodates the challenges of autism;
4. Seeking ways to provide access for autistic individuals to participate both in our online and offline events, and address anti-ableism issues;
5. Support groups for families and autistic individuals;
6. A speaker’s bureau of autistic individuals and their supporters.

TAAProject wishes to model inclusion by having autistic and non autistic individuals working together on committees and our board of directors. We believe that we learn by working together.

Without this over-riding moral obligation to treat every human being with value, respect and dignity, we cannot establish acceptance, support, and inclusion of autistic people in society.

Autism, Baby Boomers, and Social Change

IMO it's not a coincidence that AS became an official diagnosis the same year (1994) that the Baby Boom Generation took the reins of political power in the Federal Government. The Boomers in general, on the New Age Left, Fundamentalist Right, and Technophobic Center, developed a hatred towards what they called the "Reductionistic Scientism" of their parents, the exact kind of logical, analytical thinking us Aspies are good at. Our way of thinking has thus become pathologized. The hysteria over a non-existent "autism epidemic" is, IMO, an expression of this anti-analytical mindset, exposed in bigoted nonsense about autistics being "souless" and "lacking empathy"

Autistics are a symbol of what many Baby Boomers in their heart fear, individuals that embody the rational, logical, analytical mindset of their parent's generation that they rebelled against in the 60s and 70s, and this we are considered "disordered" and need to be "fixed".

YouTube Video about an Autistic Alaskan Scientist

I thought this was great:

Survey: Bullies prey on autistic kids

Link

A shocking new online survey has found that nearly 90 percent of autistic children in the Bay State have been targeted by bullying so violent and ruthless that a state lawmaker says teachers and school systems must be held accountable.

The survey conducted by the Massachusetts Advocates for Children includes painful testimony from parents of autistic children who felt so tortured they stayed home from school for extended periods and even considered suicide.

“We were frankly shocked by the magnitude of the problem,” said attorney Julia Landau, director of the Autism Special Education Legal Support Center at MAC. “It took our breath away.”

About 400 Massachusetts parents responded to the online survey between Sept. 23 and Oct. 12. The survey was prepared as part of an effort to pass legislation requiring that autistic children be taught bullying coping tactics as part of their individual educational plans.

State Rep. Barbara A. L’Italien (D-Andover), who is sponsoring a bill to make teachers responsible for intervening when autistic children are bullied, said school systems have to be held accountable.

“The school systems are oftentimes not seeing it as part of their job,” L’Italien said. “But if it were a kid who was blind and stumbling, they’d immediately address it.”

A whopping 88 percent of parents who responded to the survey said their child was bullied. More than half of parents surveyed said their children were hit, kicked or chased. Nearly 40 percent of the children were bullied for more than a year, the survey results said.

The survey also found only 32 percent of parents said school officials provided an "adequate" response to their complaints about bullying.

Marie Nazzaro of Woburn said public school officials offered her son, Sean, 14, an out-of-district placement after the tormenting got so bad during his fourth-grade year that he confided an elaborate suicide plan to a school psychologist. The boy spent 10 days in outpatient treatment after that episode, his mother said.

“It was very heartbreaking,” said Nazzaro, whose son has Asperger’s syndrome.

On top of the bullying, Nazzaro said her son got caught in bad situations because his autism makes it hard for him to read social cues. In one incident, Sean hit his head on cement and vomited after charging a group of boys he thought were hurting some girls. It turned out the children were having a friendly shoving match, but Nazzaro said her son didn’t realize that.

Dr. Elizabeth Caronna, who directs an autism center at Boston Medical Center, said social skills should be addressed because so many autistic children don’t even know they’re being bullied.

“The first thing is teaching a lot of these kids to identify when it’s happening before it spins out of control,” Caronna said. “It’s such a big problem. It’s so prevalent.”

I am not surprised, unfortunately. It infuriates me that schools tolerate this. I have a bit of PTSD from being bullied.

About Myself

My name is Taylor Selseth. I'm a 23 year old guy with Asperger's Syndrome, a form of Autism. I grew up in the little rural town of Ulen, Minnesota and am currently living in Moorhead, Minnesota, across the Red River from Fargo, North Dakota. I was diagnosed with Asperger's when I was 15, I wish it had been much earlier.

I was always a shy and eccentric kid. Looking back on my childhood it is almost shocking how much of my odd behavior is explained by my diagnosis. My mom remarked that I always liked to walk on the tips of my toes, which I now know to be common autistic behavior. I also liked to arrange things, dixie cups were a favorite when I was at my dad's (my parents divorced when I was 4 years old), another common autistic behavior. I never made friends easily, I tended to bore my peers to death with my special interests (I could never figure out for the longest time why everyone didn't find astronomy to be as interesting and wonderful as I did).

When I was 6 I was diagnosed with ADHD. Asperger's Syndrome did not exist as a diagnosis until 2 years later in 1994, and the term "Autism" was associated with non-verbal individuals one one girl I went to school with named Bobbie. I was put on the stimulant medication Ritalin, which, it turned out, helped a lot. Looking back I can definitely say it reduced my autistic sensory sensitivities as well making me better able to multitask and focus on things I am not interested in, since I like many autistics have what is called Executive System Dysfunction, the Executive System being the areas of the brain used in planning and attention. Executive Dysfunction is why many Aspies (people with Asperger's Syndrome) that are in their 20s and 30s were originally diagnosed with ADHD.

School was hell. I was regarded as one of the smartest kids in class and my teachers were consistently frustrated by my difficulties doing my school work and my behavioral outbursts caused my other kids doing things like tapping pencils on desks that drove me bonkers but didn't bother anyone else. A particularly nasty 3rd grade teacher that gave us endless amounts of multiplication homework (200 problems!!!) drove me to meltdown constantly and left me with a horrible habit of lying about my school work, especially math, just to avoid meltdown because I had become so overwhelmed sensory-wise and socialization-wise at school.I had pretty much 2 friends at this time, Steve and RJ, mainly because both were, like me, into video games, because Steve was a bit of a science geek himself, and because RJ had ADHD himself.

My Asperger's diagnosis when I was 15 was like a revelation. It was the result of pure luck, my mother's insurance happened to switch my pediatrician to Dr. Ron Miller, a wonderful guy who is probably the pediatrician most knowledgeable about developmental disorders in the Fargo area. He suspected Asperger's Syndrome almost immediately and had various diagnostic things done which confirmed the diagnosis.

I graduated from high school in 2004 and have been living in Moorhead ever since. I started classes and Minnesota State University Moorhead that fall, but quit after 2 years because I lost eligabillity for Pell Grants and because I has simply burnt myself out. I plan on starting to take classes again next fall. I have staff for a few hours a day 4 days a week to help run errands, clean my place without having a meltdown, help being out in public without a meltdown, etc. I also have job coaches so I can work without having a meltdown or ending up getting fired because of being oblivious to how to behave around supervisors.



There is a lot of popular nonsense about Autism now days. Vaccines do not cause it, it's genetic. There is no "Autism Epidemic", just more people getting diagnosed and getting diagnosed correctly. There is no "cure" for Autism nor should there be. Autism is not a "tragedy", we are worthy human beings, not damaged goods. There are many famous individuals that are thought to be/have been Autistic. Albert Eistein, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Gates, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Lewis Caroll, and Paul Dirac among others. We wish to be treated with dignity and respect as human beings, not at "problems" that need "fixing". A world without autistic traits would be a world full of people that socialize and play petty political games to rise in the social hierarchy, but really don't get much truly objectively constructive done.