[dns_snek]

I see this sentiment often, but only when it comes to autism. How is this different from other disorders, disabilities, illnesses?

You could make the exact same arguments for blindness. Every day is challenging, difficulties are mostly a consequence of how we've structured society, it's other people who should accommodate those who have different needs, etc.

This narrative seems to originate from, and is perpetuated within online autism communities. I think it's great that people feel content with the way they are but I don't understand the animosity towards a mere suggestion that a cure should exist.

I'm familiar with the history behind it and I'm on high alert when someone ventures into eugenics, however I firmly believe that we should be looking for a cure, just like we do for every other illness and disorder.

[47282847]

> How is this different from other disorders, disabilities, illnesses?

Not diagnosed autistic myself, but I buy into the argument that a lot of “(mental) disorders” make one allergic to the amount of subtle and less subtle daily dose of interrelational violence. Plenty of drugs exist to numb organisms.

I don’t know if you’ve ever been on antidepressants or antipsychotics, but one who has might relate that that kind of “cure” means to turn you into a “functioning zombie”. One may prefer the suffering and ability to fight and point out violent behavior rather than a medically-induced zoning out.

Our societies are far from “healthy”. What is “disordered” is how we treat ourselves and others. It’s up to each one individually to decide how much they want to be part of this “normal” or whether they prefer to be “disordered” even if it comes with certain limitations.

”It Is No Measure of Health To Be Well-Adjusted to a Profoundly Sick Society” (Krishnamurti)

See e.g. Hughes, K., Bellis, M. A., Hardcastle, K. A., Sethi, D., Butchart, A., Mikton, C., Jones, L., & Dunne, M. P. (2017). The effect of multiple adverse childhood experiences on health: A systematic review and meta-analysis. The Lancet Public Health, 2(8), e356–e366. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(17)30118-4

[stonyrubbish]

> How is this different from other disorders, disabilities, illnesses?

Part of the confusion here is that autism isn't straightforwardly a disability. A plurality of people with autism are ASD-1, which is the kind requiring the least support needs while, purely empirically speaking, conferring lots of well-documented benefits. The sort of elephant in the room in these conversations is that there are lots of replicable studies which show that autistic people outperform non-autistic people in a variety of areas. The idea of attempting to engineer the removal of a class of people from society-- people with unique strengths which are necessary for the functioning of that society-- has consequences that are significantly less well-understood than proponents of this idea make it out to be.

[dns_snek]

I agree up until this point:

> The idea of attempting to engineer the removal of a class of people from society-- people with unique strengths which are necessary for the functioning of that society-- has consequences that are significantly less well-understood than proponents of this idea make it out to be.

I'll be the first to pick up my pitchforks at anyone who suggests non-consensual treatments. My point is that trying to find a cure for something is different from trying to eradicate people from a gene pool.

In fact, I would assume that having an effective treatment/cure for autism would make it more widespread, not less. People who were cured of their ASD-related deficits would be far more likely to find a partner and have kids, and those kids would inherit genes which are responsible for ASD.

[jimnotgym]

Because many autistic people have superpowers in some areas, like systems thinking, thinking outside the box and maybe suprisingly reading people.

If you had a superpower, but it came with a curse, that you couldn't always get to work on time, would you trade it in for a normal life?

On the other hand, i don't see why a company wouldn't accommodate someone's minor quirks to get access to a superpower.

[dns_snek]

I'm well aware and I don't have a problem with you or anyone else living life the way you want. This doesn't explain animosity towards treatment/cure research.

[inigyou]

It isn't unique. Deaf people fight against research to cure hearing loss and fight against people having it cured, as they say it's betraying the deaf community.

[dns_snek]

That's interesting, I didn't know about that!

[ssl-3]

> I see this sentiment often, but only when it comes to autism. How is this different from other disorders, disabilities, illnesses?

These are not equivalent, synonymous terms. I think that your premise might need some work.

There's plenty of people in the world who are healthy, autistic, and not disabled at all.

[dns_snek]

I know they're not synonymous, that's why I used all 3 and not just one.

[ssl-3]

That may be what was meant, but that's not how it was written.

[dns_snek]

It was written fine. ASD is a disorder which was the first item on that list. You could make the same type of argument about disabilities (e.g. deafness) and someone pointed out that people make the same arguments in the deaf community too.

[ssl-3]

Words mean things.

[dns_snek]

And my words in no way implied that those were equal, or that autism was necessarily an illness or a disability. People often make those arguments and I'm not one of them. You're attacking a straw man.

[catchnear4321]

treating the dsm like a checklist of cures to complete sounds a bit like what might go in the dsm

[dns_snek]

If you try to reformulate that snarky one-liner that into a good faith argument you'll see how ridiculous it sounds.

Yes, actually we should have treatments and cures available for anyone who wants them, for anything inside and outside the DSM.