When my brother was six, he was diagnosed with autism. Granted, he’s high functioning, but it is still obvious that he functions differently than you and I. Autism is a broad spectrum of disorders with general social and mental development issues. Many autistic children have sensory sensitivities and anger issues early on. Many grow to adjust to these sensitivities and get accustomed to their own unique thought processes. Though, there are still many aspects that people generally do not understand about autism.
You are born with it. It doesn’t come out of the blue like a virus, and it is not curable, only controlled. Autism cannot be formed from vaccines or from any other outside stimuli, only the brain the autistic child was born with.
What I wanted to do was to call attention to a group called Autism Speaks. I remember my mom getting T-shirts, bracelets and even a magnet to support my brother and this company. I did my research on it and at first, the cause seemed to promote autistic research, but there was something that caught my attention: finding the “cure” for autism. This confused me because I knew something like autism could not be cured. They put a spotlight on how autistic people function, also mentioning how they wanted to get people to function more traditionally. Instead of attempting to further understand how brilliant the autistic mind is, they wanted to “fix” a brain that doesn’t need fixing.
Later on down the road, what I found out about the organization was heartbreaking. I am friends with and follow several people on the spectrum on social media, and many of them have said that they do not feel like Autism Speaks treats the autistic community as people but rather alienates them. The name of the organization ended up being extremely ironic to me, considering almost every single speaker for Autism Speaks is not even autistic. This program does not give people on the spectrum a voice at all, and to many, that does not seem to be a problem.
It hits very close to home. Growing up with a brother with autism was such an eye-opener. The disorder makes him so special, and he’s completely brilliant and amazes me every day. He didn’t even know what autism truly was until about a year or so ago when he asked my mom why he was treated differently. After explaining, I remember him saying, “So what if I’m different? I just want to play video games and run around like the other boys at my school.”
A few days after, speaking in curiosity of how he would respond to Autism Speaks, I asked him, “Do you wish you were different?” and he said, “Sometimes, but this is what makes me special.”
I said, “You know, it doesn’t go away. How do you feel about that?” He paused for a second and said, “I don’t want it to. I’m me because I have autism. And that’s okay.”
This is truly “Autism Speaks.” More autistic youth in the world need a voice, a real voice. They need the right to share their own stories, their own thoughts and their own daily processes, just like we all do. Let my brother speak. He and many others deserve to share the goods of autism rather than the evils. They should be allowed to speak for themselves.
