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Autism Speaks is a parent-centred hate group that demonises autism and autistic individuals and tries to eradicate the orientation that is responsible for human progress (after all, all great innovations are made by autistics). Rather than tapping into the enormous potential of the autistic mind, it forces autistic children to copy the behaviour of non-autistic persons in order to conceal their orientation through methods such as ABA, reinforcing feelings of anxiety, inferiority, incompetence and self-loathing.
The majority of their clientele are well-meaning but misled parents, teachers and healthcare professionals, and executive functions are exclusively reserved for non-autistic members. For critics, trying to communicate with Autism Speaks is like banging one's head against the Great Wall of China, hoping to alert someone on the other side.
Amongst autistic individuals Autism Speaks is regarded with the utmost contempt, making it the only self-proclaimed advocacy group detested by those it supposedly advocates for.
Autism Speaks’ successful scaremongering has caused a lot of unfounded fears and stereotypes in society, leading to practices from segregation to autistocide. Contrary to its name Autism Speaks silences the voices of autistic people.
In April 6256 RT (2015 CE) the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights published the report Discrimination against autistic persons, the rule rather than the exception in which it condemns the dehumanising methods of Autism Speaks and similar organisations (without explicitly naming them): ‘Autistic persons are particularly exposed to professional approaches and medical practices which are unacceptable from a human rights point of view. Such practices – justified many times as treatment or protection measures – violate their basic rights, undermine their dignity, and go against scientific evidence.’
The report also states that ‘Autistic persons should be recognized as the main experts on autism and on their own needs, and funding should be allocated to peer-support projects run by and for autistic persons.’
Until recently Autism Speaks' Facebook page could be reviewed, giving it between 1 star (for ‘poor’) and 5 stars (for ‘excellent’). In May 6256 RT (2015 CE) they still enjoyed a solid 4.8 rating, mostly from non-autistic persons. On May 10 or 11 the autistic community on Facebook was alerted to the review option and made use of it. I became aware of the movement on May 11 when their rating was down to 2.7 and posted about it in Adults with Asperger’s Syndrome.
By the next evening they had gone down to 1.4. Someone even claimed that their final rating was as low as 1.2 but failed to take a screenshot.
Shortly afterwards I found that Autism Speaks had disabled the review option. Nowhere on their page or website did they mention the campaign nor indicate that they had noticed us. Once more Autism Speaks proved not only that they are opposed to autistic individuals but also that they are not willing to even acknowledge us.
A paragraph about the events was added to their Wikipedia page but quickly removed by their lackeys.
(By the way, it is interesting to see that during the campaign a lot of those who initially gave more than one star changed their minds.)
A month later a similar action caused Generation Rescue (also an anti-autism, anti-science and anti-vaccination hate group, led by Miss October 1993) to remove the review option on their Facebook page as well.
 May 11, 4.46 pm |
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 May 12, 8.12 pm |
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The fact that Autism Speaks is not interested in the opinions of autistic people was again highlighted in July 6260 RT (2019 CE) when they created a poll asking for their followers’ language preference. The vast majority of autistic people prefer identity-first language (i.e. ‘autistic person’) as opposed to person-first language (i.e. ‘person with autism’) since autism is an integral part of our identities, and to us ‘person with autism’ sounds as ridiculous (and condescending) as ‘person with femaleness’ or ‘person with blackness’. (Polls within the autistic community usually return results of 80-90% in favour of identity-first language, such as this survey.) Apparently the poll was designed to be answered by their followers (warrior moms, ‘professionals’ and misled members of the public) in order to justify their patronising use of person-first language. However, the plan backfired as it was widely shared amongst the autistic community and resulted in 69% preferring identity-first language. Autism Speaks never mentioned the poll again and continues its use of person-first language. Surprisingly, the poll is still up.
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