Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.
- President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Monday, August 11, 2008

Katherine McCarron

She was murdered by her own mother. Her mother murdered her because Katherine was autistic.

All right, take a read of this, would you? Page 14, specifically.

Apparently, the Department of Defense sees some kind of merit in researching autism. Of course, that merit probably runs along the lines of code-breaking or computer programming. In other words, the DOD wants to exploit the God-given talents of autistic people in order to defend the nation.

Autism Speaks, however, gets its bread and butter by pushing the party line that autism is always a tragedy, and has actively worked to marginalize autistic folks that are trying to put out a real aspect of autism: that we can hold down jobs, love our families, and contribute to society.

Look. Profoundly autistic people lead lives of quiet desperation, and deserve help from society. Other people on the spectrum just need a little patience and understanding. The second sentence of this paragraph, that simple truth? Autism Speaks seeks to silence it.

4 comments:

Krissyface said...

Page 14?

kimberkara said...

If you being who you are is a tradegy then sign me up for the drama. It would be nice if there were less people rocking in the corner for life, but the gap between AS people and LFA is far to wide to think something should be done to prevent people like you existing along with preventing LFA.

chris said...

i tried to sift through all the pages and didnt get to what you were talking cuz my eyes didnt make it. show me later, k? But look up "exploitation" in the dictionary and you will probably see "government".

cassdawn said...

i am going to need a little more time to do all the reading - but a quick response . . . if the government, specifically the DOD is seeking to exploit those on the autistic spectrum then they are treating them just like everyone else . . . just saying.

i did read page 14 and maybe i'm having an off moment - i'm not sure what the issue is. that page jsut speaks of funding for research. perhaps there is something sinister behind that that you are aware of . . . ?

As to the organization Autism speaks - i don't know a lot about them. i do know that generally speaking the only way to get money for anything is to convince people that it is a tragedy. that's just the way of things. so they play up the most extreme cases.

and let's face it - the extreme cases are just that. speaking as a mother - if i didn't know if my son was content or upset . . . if i had no road inward - i can't begin to even contemplate that kind of pain. is that selfish? sure. i'm okay with that.