On Tuesday, November 17, Autism Speaks had their fundraising concert at Carnegie Hall, with Jerry Seinfeld and Bruce Springsteen headlining. Celebrity attendees included actor Chris Meloni, radio show host Howard Stern, and infamous real estate mogul Donald Trump, who was noted as almost storming past protesters distributing flyers and holding signs outside the event. In less than two hours time, the Autistic Self Advocacy Network distributed over a thousand flyers to passersby, raising awareness of the issues Autism Speaks creates for autistic people, and ignoring the heckling from random Autism Speaks executives who would come out to yell at them. One even shouted "What was around before Autism Speaks?!" A brief internet search revealed that there are several autism advocacy organizations that are not only more reputable, but have been around well before Autism Speaks, including the AHA association on Long Island. ASAN, along with 59 other disability rights organizations, recently drafted and signed an open letter to Autism Speaks demanding, among other things, that they change their board of directors from having zero autistic adults to having at least 50% of their board consist of autistic adults, and that they stop spending their money on genetic research geared towards the design of a prenatal test that would allow parents to abort potentially autistic fetuses. One protester remarked "We know that people with tickets for this are going to go in anyway. We're hoping that after hearing what we have to say, they'll give their money to groups that actually deserve it from now on."
Comments
Great article, Marc! I hope the people who saw the graphic above gave it some thought... and that they read the literature y'all handed out!
That's great! I was wondering when we were going to hear about it.
One note: In the future, please make the apostrophe in "We're People" much larger! :-)
Sorry for the delay. I was waiting on the photos.
Sorry for the delay in sending the photos. I had a thermodynamics assignment to do that night.
What do the initials AHA stand for? What are some other reputable autism orgs?
For more information about AHA, please see their website, www.ahany.org
For more information about the autistic rights movement, please see www.iamautism.org
You might also want to check out any of the 60 disability rights organizations that signed the open letter denouncing Autism Speaks, which can be found at www.autisticadvocacy.org (since it's a word document, I'd rather not directly link to it).
I see that autism speaks raised 1.7 million dollars from this event that your wopping 15 persons protested. Of cousre it won't bother you one bit if some of this money goes to ND researcher Laurent Mottron.
There is an old philosophical question about whether a tree falling in a forest 1000 miles away from anyone makes a sound. Something for you and ASAN to think about.
Mr. Mitchell, do you have anything useful to contribute? If so, please do so. Otherwise, reserve your rants for your blog and your overbearing mother.
Mr. Marc Rosen,
Mitchell is contributing something useful. Perhaps this is further proof that your strategy isn't working and it needs to change. I am not against Neurodiversity but so far your strategies and arguments have been laughable.
"Neurodiversity" (whatever it is) should be able to take criticism and not automatically label everyone who contributes information that counters your ideas as a "troll" or "enemy" or even as not being "useful."
It is rather hypocritical that you say Mitchell and/or his statements are not "useful." Mitchell is a diagnosed autistic person and, according to "Neurodiversity" (whatever it is) all autistic people, all people with different neurological wiring, have inherent worth, regardless if you agree with them or not.
By "useful", I also mean "relevant". His comments were just a rant against ASAN and me. Quite honestly, if that's all he's here to do, then his future comments will be deleted. I really couldn't care less. I never said that he himself has no value, only that his comments are not a relevant contribution to this particular discussion. I will not delete comments that are critical, but I do expect them to be more than mere rants.
How is Mitchell's statement not relevant? Isn't it directly related to this article? What he said is true: Autism Speaks did raise 1.7 Million Dollars compared to ASAN's fifteen protesters and some of it could go to fund Dr. Mottron. I fail to see how none of this is relevant to a discussion about this article.
I fail to see any relevance Dr. Mottron has to this discussion. I would, however, like to know how much they SPENT to get that 1.5 mil. I have a feeling that's their gross intake, not their net.
Marc: My comment about Mottron is relevant because ASAN has urged people not to support autism speaks, yet they have never asked Dr. Mottron to refuse funding from this organization they (yourself included) detest so much, in fact they have extolled and lauded his research financed by the same organiation they protest. clearly a double standard.
The fact you have to stoop to insulting my mother shows you really have no facts to refute anything I say.
I am not that heavily involved with that aspect of Dr. Mottron's research, nor am I involved with that aspect of ASAN's work. Again, this is a news site, not a soapbox, despite my occasional use of editorial.
We condemn Autism Speaks because of its overall position and actions. We -- neurodiversity/autistic rights advocates, or whatever you want to call us -- do not condemn 100% of what Autism Speaks does. To do so would be very difficult to defend and indicative of prejudice. No organization, not even the worst of them, is 100% bad. Acknowledging such is not hypocrisy or a conflict of interests.
Any monies channeled through Autism Speaks never belonged to them in the first place. It's charity, grants, etc., raised on the backs of Autistic people, and as such, it is rightfully OURS to direct as we see fit. If Autism Speaks sometimes happens to direct some of that money to the right places, (which places are right is a separate issue), our position against Autism Speaks does not require that we condemn that.
If Autism Speaks did not exist, those who deserve funding would still get it. Autism Speaks does not create money; they merely GATHER it.
LOVE IT! This is GREAT!
Stephanie, your most recent comments have been deleted due to derogatory language and profanity. Neither will be tolerated here.
Stephanie, I have deleted your reposted comment for a reason. Post it again, and I will get the site's admins involved.
Why can't you refute it instead of merely deleting it? If it isn't true than prove to me it isn't.
What you wrote was an opinion. The way in which you expressed that opinion was derogatory, and in violation of Examiner.com's policies, so I deleted it. You're free to post your opinions in the comments section as you wish, but I will continue to moderate any discussion that takes place here.
Here's something Autism Speaks should think about: Autism not being a life-threatening plague or disease, considering that's what their trying to say about the 1 in 150 people diagnosed. No doctor should have to abort a pregnancy because of a possible autistic fetus, that's murder on a whole different scale!
I fail to see in what way it was derogatory, especially since the exact same comment has been reproduced at other news sites with no complaint or deletion.
(And am I not allowed to voice my opinion anymore?)
To put it simply, I found it to be derogatory towards a section of the autistic spectrum. No, it may not be enough to impact a news site's TOS, however, I still will not tolerate it.
I just can't believe that Autism Speaks would actually fund a proposal that would allow people to abort autistic pregnancies! Their brains may be wired differently, but aren't we all different in some way? Autistic, non-autistic......this isn't just about the very aspect of Autism any longer: its turning into a mental segregation. MLK once said that people shouldn't be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. This is no different than that. Nothing, including an unborn fetus, should be put to death because of autism. Weren't some of our nations idealists autistic, such as Thomas Jefferson? By condemning them to death, you could be condemning our future to death as well! So who's wrong: Autism Speaks, or the 1 in 150 that live an autistic life?
They won't directly show it, but that's the only real pragmatic outcome that could result from intensive genetic research on this. I personally say that bigotry and neuroelitism are far greater defects, and are in DIRE need of a cure. So where's my $52 million a year to fund research on curing bigotry and eradicating it from existence?
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