Tuesday, March 09, 2010

Autistic Persons You Don't See on Sitcoms, Reality Shows or Hollywood Movies .... or in the DSM 5

The CDFoakely videos present the realities of severe autism that you don't see on television or movies.

Persons who are severely autistic do not attend colleges for gifted youths, intervene as "autistics" before the Supreme Court of Canada to oppose families seeking government funded ABA interventions for their own children, pose for interviews with CBC, CNN or the New Yorker Magazine or hob nob with Washington politicians and bureaucrats.

Their existence, if they survive snow storms in Nova Scotia, being lost in the woods of Northwestern Wisconsin for a week, being physically abused by  some staff members in a Long Island residential home, living on a hospital ward in New Brunswick Canada, or jumping from an ambulance in South Carolina , is not always pretty and does not usually attract beautiful Hollywood actresses to portray "autism" for the world.

It is the families of the severely autistic who know their realities and speak for them, not the very  igh functioning IT professionals, researchers and  politically vocal university students who declare that autism is a different way of thinking and should not be cured.  It is the families who, day in and day out, care for, and love, their severely autistic family members who know and understand  the realities of severe autism. 

Severe autism may ultimately be whitewashed entirely from the public consciousness by Hollywood movies and the DSM 5.  If severe autism is not obliterated entirely from  public awareness it will be because even the mainstream media, at least at the local level, does report the tragic consequences that sometimes strike the severely autistic.   And because courageous family members will tell the world, and keep telling the world,  the truth about severe autism.

CDFoakley videos continue that effort to courageously portray some severe autism realities. You can find them on Youtube. And they are featured on the sidebar here at Facing Autism in New Brunswick. From CDFoakley "Persons You Don't See on Sitcoms, Reality Shows or Hollywood Movies":





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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

God bless you and your family. Stay strong and continue to stand up for your sons right. I am the mother of twin boys who are autistic. One of my boys is very self abusive to himself. I continue to help him the best I can. I am glad that you made this video. It can reach so many people who don't have a clue what severe autism is like.

Ian MacGregor said...

Autism, a benign and usually beneficial change in neurological development resulting in social impairments which can be rectified through changes in support structure, but also producing genius which has been responsible for every upward step the assent from troglodyte to modern man.

I expect the above to become the working definition of autism soon.

I wonder if it is time for children such as my daughter in which autism has caused significant impairments which cannot be addressed through societal changes to be given a different diagnosis?

Anonymous said...

Thank you Harold for continuing to show the truth surrounding severe autism. I am continually sickened by individuals who want to paint autism as "lovely" or just a "quirky variation." Parents who believe that are obviously living in complete denial and are, in my opinion, NOT good advocates for their kids. I give so much credit to the mom and dad in this video. They put forth 100% while also living in the real world and showing what autism can really be like for so many families. These are the parents to look up to, not the Estee Klars of the world.